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Date:         Thu, 13 Aug 1992 09:48:38 -0400
From:         Stephanie Publicker <spu%med.pitt.edu@CARNEGIE.BITNET>
Subject:      RE: secretaries using Grateful Med
X-To:         MEDLIB-L@UBVM.BITNET, spu%med.pitt.edu%CMU.EDU@CARNEGIE.BITNET

In response to Hannah King's message about research on end-user searching.
I'd like to list several articles detailing research that has already
been done.

1. Mitchell, JA, Johnson DE, Proud, VK. New thoughts about medical students
as effective searchers of MEDLINE. Academic Medicine 1990;65(7):434-437.

2.Walker CJ, McKibbon KA, Haynes RB, Ramsden MF. Problems encountered by
clinical end users of MEDLINE and GRATEFUL MED. Bull Med Libr Assoc
1991;79(1):67-69.

3. Haynes RB, McKibbon KA, Walker CJ, Ryan N, Fitzgerald D, Ramsden MF.
Online access to MEDLINE in clinical settings: a study of use and
usefulness. Annals of Internal Medicine 1990;112:78-84.

4. Burroughs CM. Clinicians' satisfaction with GRATEFUL MED: an exploratory
study. Bull Med Libr Assoc 1989;77(1):56-60.

5.  Bradigan PS. End-user searching in a medical school curriculum: an
evaluated modular approach.  Bull Med Libr Assoc 1989:77(4):348-356.

6. Ludwig L, Mixter JK, Emanuele MA. User attitudes toward end-user
literature searching.  Bull Med Libr Assoc 1988;76(1):7-13.

7. McKibbon KA, Haynes RB, Walker CJ, Ramsden MF, Ryan NC, Baker L,
Flemming T, Fitzgerald D.  How good are clinical MEDLINE searches?
A comparative study of lcinical end-user and librarian searches.
Computers and Biomedical Research 1990;23:583-593.

8. Marshall JG. Characteristics of early adopters of end-user online
searching in the health professions. Bull Med Libr Assoc 1989;77(1):
48-55.

9.  I've lost the name of the journal in which I found this reference and
its not printed on the page.  The only identifying thing is 1992 AMIA, Inc.
McKibbon ka, Haynes RB, Johnston ME, Walker CJ.  A study to enhance clinical
end-user MEDLINE search skills: design and baseline findings. 1992 pages
73-77.

As the Outreach Services librarian at Falk Library, I've been training
library contact people in rural western PA hospitals for 9 months.  Most
of the people who take care of the libraries in these hospitals are
either the medical staff secretary, a medical records administrator or
the nurse who handles continuing education.  They've beenvery quick at
picking up GRATEFUL MED and a few of them had taught themselves NLM's
command language.  Several of the hospitals have a consultant who the
contact person can call for search assistance.   Also, most of the
time the doctor does not want everything ever written, only a few
articles.
Another issue is that outside of an academic medical center many doctors
do not do literature searches (either they don't know it exists, they
don't feel the need, economic and time pressures are a factor, or else
they rely on their colleagues for information).  So, I'd rather have a
doctor realize they need information and have their secretary search
than not.  At least they'll get some information.

Stephanie Publicker, RN, MLS
Outreach Services LIbrarian
Falk Library of the Health Sciences
University of Pittsburgh
spu@med.pitt.edu