M aintaining a personal, updated library of medical information pertaining to your particular form of dwarfism serves two purposes. First, copies of your information could be given to your health care provider. While a layman probably won't understand the entire contents of an article published in a medical journal, it can be used as a springboard to generate questions to be discussed with your physician. T he following is only a brief introduction on how to do a review of the medical literature. Additional information about how to conduct a medical review can be obtained from your local librarian or by taking a class at a local college.
Librarians can be an extremely helpful and often under-used resource.
Librarians LOVE questions about research. T he first step in the process is to find out if your local library or medical school subscribes to Medline. Call the library in advance because it is customary to reserve a time slot to work on the Medline computers. W hen you are ready to do your review of the literature, ask the librarian if he or she will demonstrate how the system works. You can also pull up the computer program and review the contents of the help function.