# Health Libraries Association of British Columbia

The Health Libraries Association of British Columbia (HLABC) has had a very busy and rewarding year. Our members have enjoyed a wide variety of events and are already busy planning for 2009–2010.

The Executive members were Ana Rosa Blue, President; Devon Greyson, Vice-President/President-Elect; Diana Hall, Past President; Elisheba Muturi, Secretary; and Anne Allgaeir, Treasurer/Membership Secretary. Other important team members were Krista Clement, Forum Layout Editor, and the Website Committee: Robyn-Joy Ingvallsen, Megan Wiebe, and Doug Salzwedel. The incoming Vice-President/President-Elect is Brooke Ballantyne Scott. Congratulations, Brooke!

Immediately after the AGM 2008, the new Executive lost no time in getting things off the ground with lots of ideas and energy. For example, a University of British Columbia School of Library and Archival Information Studies student award for promising health information professionals is going to be established, although the details have yet to be worked out. As well, a Google mail account was set up as a central archive for correspondence among the Executive.

## Programming

HLABC had our usual busy year of professional development programs. The following topics and speakers were featured in 2008–2009:

(1) *Health literacy* – presented in November 2008 by Dr. Irving Rootman. Rootman is the Executive Director of the Canadian Council on Learning's Health and Learning Knowledge Centre and an Adjunct Professor in Human and Social Development and Education at the University of Victoria.

(2) *Advanced directives* – presented by Laura Watts in January 2009. Watts is the National Director for the Canadian Centre for Elder Law (http://www.bcli.org/ccel).

(3) Three sessions at the British Columbia Library Conference in April 2009, were convened and presented by HLABC members and friends: (i) *Consumer health information* – speakers: Brooke Ballantyne Scott, Vicki Lee, Beth Morrison and Megan Wiebe; (ii) *Expect the unexpected: be prepared when disaster strikes your library* – pre-conference session presented by Guy Robertson, Patricia Daum, and Glen Magel; *Open access in Canada – overview and update* – speakers: Heather G. Morrison, Andrew Waller, Donald Taylor, and Devon Greyson.

(4) *Evidence based librarianship* – presented by Lindsay Glynn in June 2009. Glynn, from the Health Sciences Library, Memorial University of Newfoundland,

co-founded the open-access journal *Evidence Based Library and Information Practice* and served as Editor-in-Chief for 3 years.

(5) *Tips & tricks of the electronic health library of BC databases* – held after the June 2009 AGM and presented by Niki Baumann (Evidence-Based Medical Reviews), Krista Clement (Managing Subject Alerts in Ovid vs. EBSCO), and Shannon Long (Subject Alerts using RSS feeds).

## Communications

The Website Committee has been hard at work updating the HLABC Web site (http://hlabc.bc.ca) to make it more attractive and user-friendly. We have begun handling online registrations and membership payments via PayPal.

HLABC is on Twitter! Check us out at http://twitter.com/HLABC.

HLABC published two issues of our newsletter, *The Forum*:

(i) Volume 31, Issue 2, Spring/Summer 2008 – theme: Collaboration (http://hlabc.bc.ca/fileadmin/fe-files/fe-downloads/2008_312.pdf)

(ii) Volume 32, Issue 1, Fall/Winter 2008–2009 – theme: Intellectual Freedom and Health Libraries (http://hlabc.bc.ca/fileadmin/fe-files/fe-downloads/FORUM-Fall-Winter-2008-2009.pdf)

## Membership

Two HLABC members retired this year: Hoong Lim retired from the Burnaby Hospital after working there for 32 years, and Linda Clendenning retired from the College of Physicians & Surgeons of British Columbia after nearly 40 years of work. An article on Linda appeared in *BC Medical Journal* (Vol. 51, No. 3, April 2009, p. 129). It can be accessed at http://www.bcmj.org/retiring-librarian. HLABC congratulates them both and wishes them all the best in their retirement.

## Looking forward

Looking to the future, the Health Libraries Association of British Columbia will be implementing a Records Management Plan. The Plan will ensure statutory compliance, safeguard all personal information, and allow for easier location of documents. The HLABC Executive is also researching the best method for delivering speaker presentations, so members in other parts of the province can also participate.

The past year has been hectic but very rewarding. All members of the Executive team worked hard throughout the
year. It has been a sheer delight and a privilege to have
worked with such a great group of colleagues. I look for-
ward to working with them in the coming year!

Ana Rosa Blue

Past President, Health Libraries Association of BC
c/o WorkSafeBC Corporate Library
6951 Westminster Highway
Richmond, BC V7C 1C6, Canada
E-mail: anarosa/blue@worksafebc.com