Medical Library Association | News Room : Press Releases, June 2008

News Room

Press Releases

June 2008

MLA Thanks MLA '08 Sponsors
MLA Awards Grants and Scholarships at MLA '08
MLA Promotional Bridges Made at MLA '08 Swap 'n Shop Booth:Winners of Marketing Contest Announced

MLA Thanks MLA '08 Sponsors

The Medical Library Association (MLA) and the 2008 National Program Committee (NPC) thank the MLA '08 sponsors whose generous financial support enriched the MLA annual meeting experience for attendees.

MLA '08, held May 16-21, 2008, in Chicago, IL, provided almost 2,500 colleagues with the opportunity to learn, share, and network through plenary sessions, continuing education courses, paper and poster sessions, and exhibits.

Many longtime supporters of MLA annual meetings contributed again this year and helped to make MLA '08 a great success: Elsevier once again sponsored MLA's annual meeting Internet Café; EBSCO Information Services sponsored plenary session one and supported MLA's "greening" of the meeting by providing each attendee with a free water bottle; Thomson Reuters sponsored the colorful, red and black meeting tote bags; McGraw-Hill got attendees going in the morning with free coffee tickets and helped them relax by sponsoring the Relaxation Station in the Exhibit Hall; Ovid and Wolters Kluwer Health sponsored wallet badge holders; and CyberTools for Libraries sponsored the MLA '08 Hospitality Center.

MLA would also like to thank the University of Chicago Press, American Academy of Pediatrics, Doody Enterprises, and Radiological Society of North America for sponsoring the MLA '08 President's Reception held at the McCormick Tribune Freedom Museum.

The association, 2008 NPC, and all MLA '08 attendees gratefully acknowledge the following supporters:

Michigan Avenue Bridge Sponsors:
EBSCO Information Services
Elseveir
Thomson Reuters

Wabash Avenue Bridge Sponsors:
McGraw-Hill
Ovid

State Street Bridge Sponsors:
American Academy of Pediatrics
American Medical Association/JAMA & Archives Journals
CyberTools for Libraries
J.A. Majors Company and YBP Library Services (Baker and Taylor companies)
Radiological Society of North America
Rittenhouse Book Distributors
The University of Chicago Press

MLA, a nonprofit, educational organization, comprises health sciences information professionals with more than 4,000 members worldwide. Through its programs and services, MLA provides lifelong educational opportunities, supports a knowledgebase of health information research, and works with a global network of partners to promote the importance of quality information for improved health to the health care community and the public.

For more information, please contact Ray Naegele , naegele@mlahq.org, 312.419.9094 x17.

MLA Awards Grants and Scholarships at MLA '08

Each year, the Medical Library Association (MLA) awards grants and scholarships to deserving students and practicing health sciences information professionals. The association is pleased to announce that the following recipients were recognized at the Awards Ceremony and Luncheon on May 19, 2008, during MLA '08 in Chicago, IL:

Karen Albert, AHIP (Medical Informatics Section/MLA Career Development Grant)
Elana Churchill (MLA Scholarship for Minority Students, Annual Meeting)
Amy Frey, AHIP (Hospital Libraries Section/MLA Professional Development Grants)
Mary Lou Glazer, AHIP (EBSCO/MLA Annual Meeting Grants)
Michelle Goodwin (Hospital Libraries Section/MLA Professional Development Grants)
Laura Haines (EBSCO/MLA Annual Meeting Grants)
Patricia Hammond, AHIP (Continuing Education Award)
Kathryn Kerdolff, AHIP (David A. Kronick Traveling Fellowship)
Lorie Kloda (Thomson Reuters/MLA Doctoral Fellowship)
Maureen Knapp (Medical Informatics Section/MLA Career Development Grant)
Lisa Kruesi (Cunningham Memorial International Fellowship for 2008)
Lisa O'Keefe (MLA Scholarship)
Meredith Orlowski (EBSCO/MLA Annual Meeting Grants)
Vijay Padwal (Cunningham Memorial International Fellowship for 2008)
Mark Puterbaugh (Donald A. B. Lindberg Research Fellowship)
Susan Schleper (Continuing Education Award)
Manju Tanwar (MLA Scholarship for Minority Students)
Jason Young (EBSCO/MLA Annual Meeting Grants)

Karen Albert, AHIP, and Maureen Knapp are this year's winners of the Medical Informatics Section/MLA Career Development Grant. The grant provides up to 2 individuals $1,500 to support a career development activity that will contribute to advancement in the field of medical informatics. The award was established in 1996 by MLA's Medical Informatics Section. Albert, Talbot Research Library, Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia, PA, used the award to support her medical informatics coursework, specifically in the areas of research methods and clinical decisions. Knapp, John P. Ische Library, Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center-New Orleans, will use the award to attend the 2008 "Internet Librarian" conference in Monterey, CA. Knapp looks forward to expanding her knowledge of emerging digital tools and trends and studying how these trends are applicable to the field of medical informatics.

The MLA Scholarship for Minority Students, Annual Meeting is a one-time award. This year's winner is Elana Churchill, School of Library and Information Science, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA, who used the award to attend MLA '08 and use the experience to further her goal of working in the health sciences information profession.

Amy Frey, AHIP, and Michelle Goodwin are the 2008 recipients of the Hospital Libraries Section/MLA Professional Development Grants. Frey, received the grant to attend the Health Care Education Association conference, held September 26-28, 2007 in Hartford, CT. During the conference, Frey attended three sessions including one on literacy and cultures, which discussed ways in which health care organizations can meet the challenges of multicultural education and low literacy. This session was especially relevant to Frey's work as manager of patient/family consumer health at the Hospital for Special Care in New Britain, CT.
Goodwin, Northeast Hospital and Medical center received the grant and will attend the Pacific Northwest Chapter/Medical Library Association annual meeting in Fall 2008. During the meeting, Goodwin hopes to take various continuing education courses and network with colleagues in her region as she is relatively new to the health sciences information profession.

Mary Lou Glazer, AHIP, Laura Haines, Meredith Orlowski, and Jason Young received the 2008 EBSCO/MLA Annual Meeting Grants. The grants are sponsored by EBSCO Information Services and enable MLA members to attend the association's annual meeting. Each year, grants of up to $1,000 for travel and meeting-related expenses are given to 4 librarians who would otherwise be unable to attend the meeting. Applicants must be currently employed as health sciences librarians and have between 2 and 5 years' experience in a health sciences library. With the grant, Glazer, Veterans' Affairs (VA) Medical Center, Northport, NY, was able to meet other librarians employed by the VA and in academic medical libraries, and she presented a poster at the meeting. Haines, Dana Medical Library, University of Vermont-Burlington, also used the grant to network with other academic medical librarians in addition to attending continuing education courses held during the meeting. Orlowski, University of Cincinnati Academic Health Center, Cincinnati, OH, felt encouraged to attend MLA '08 after her positive experience attending the Midwest Chapter Meeting in October 2007. She used the opportunity to connect with fellow medical librarians and take information and ideas back to her library to help institute new ideas and services. Young, Genesis Medical Center, Davenport, IA, attended MLA '08 to learn new ideas for library service in the digital age, meet other health sciences information professionals, take continuing education courses, and discovers ways of getting more involved in the profession.

MLA Continuing Education Awards of $100 to $500 are granted to MLA members to develop their knowledge of the theoretical, administrative, or technical aspects of librarianship. Patricia Hammond, AHIP, and Susan Schleper received the 2008 awards. Hammond, Immerman Memorial Library, Potomac Hospital, Woodbridge, VA, is a solo librarian at her institution and used the grant to update her knowledge of evidence-based medicine (EBM). Schleper, Health Sciences Library, St. Cloud Hospital, St. Cloud, MN, also used the grant to expand her knowledge of the subject. She used the grant to fund an online correspondence course, "Evidence-based Practice and the Health Science Librarian," which will help her gain a better, fundamental understanding of evidence-based practice and how health sciences librarians can play an active part in promoting EBP.

Kathryn Kerdolff, AHIP, Health Sciences Center, Louisiana State University-New Orleans, received the 2008 David A. Kronick Traveling Fellowship. Former chair of the MLA Medical Informatics Section (2006/07), Kerdolff will use the fellowship to study instruction programs at 3 South Central Regional libraries and then develop online instruction classes to teach health care professionals about accessing and using library resources to locate quality health information. The Kronick Fellowship, established in 2002, awards one $2,000 fellowship annually to cover the expenses involved in traveling to 3 or more medical libraries in the United States or Canada, for the purpose of studying a specific aspect of health information management.

The Thomson Reuters/MLA Doctoral Fellowship, sponsored by Thomson Reuters, awards $2,000 to foster and encourage superior students to conduct doctoral work in an area of health sciences librarianship or information sciences and to provide support to individuals who have been admitted to candidacy. The award supports research or travel applicable to the candidate's study within a twelve-month period. The award is given every other year and may not be used for tuition. Lorie Kloda, a doctoral candidate at McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada, received this year's award to conduct research aimed at understanding how healthcare practitioners working in rehabilitation sciences make sense of their information needs in order to provide the best possible patient care.

Lisa Kruesi, and Vijay Padwal, received the 2008 Cunningham Memorial International Fellowships. Kruesi, Herston Medical Library, Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital, University of Queensland-Brisbane, Australia, visited Vanderbilt University, Duke University, and University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and attended MLA '08 during her fellowship.During his fellowship training, Padwal, Institute of Immunohaematology of the Indian Council of Medical Research, Mumbai, India, visited the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, and Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, DC. Padwal also attended MLA '08 in Chicago, IL. The Cunningham Fellowship is a fellowship for health sciences librarians from countries outside the United States and Canada and provides for attendance at the MLA annual meeting and observation and supervised work in one or more medical libraries in the United States and Canada.

Lisa O'Keefe, received the 2008 MLA Scholarship, which grants up to $5,000 to a student who is entering an American Library Association (ALA)-accredited library school or who has yet to finish at least one-half of the program's requirements in the year following the granting of the scholarship. O'Keefe, a graduate student at the School of Library and Information Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, looks forward to a career as a health sciences information professional and will use the scholarship to further her studies and foster her natural research abilities and her love of medicine.

Mark Puterbaugh, Warner Memorial Library, Eastern University, St. Davids, PA, was awarded the honor of receiving this year's Donald A. B. Lindberg Research Fellowship. With the fellowship, Puterbaugh proposes to partner with the department of nursing at his institution to develop and evaluate a 3-dimensional chat environment, Virtual Learning Commons. In conducting his research, Puterbaugh will use current popular social networking tools to support the department's need for information, professional development, and library resources for nurses. The Lindberg Fellowship, established in 2003, provides a grant annually to fund research aimed at expanding the research knowledgebase, linking the information services provided by librarians to improved health care and advances in biomedical research.

The MLA Scholarship for Minority Students awards up to $5,000 to a minority student who is entering an ALA-accredited library school or has yet to finish at least one half of the program's requirements in the year following the granting of the scholarship. African American, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, or Pacific Islander American individuals who wish to study health sciences librarianship are eligible. Manju Tanwar, a master of library and information science and master of public health candidate, University of South Carolina-Columbia, was selected to receive this year's award. With her double major, Tanwar looks forward to focusing on instruction and outreach in the health information sciences profession. In particular, she wants to address the issues of health information literacy among vulnerable populations and help develop effective collaborations among libraries, health care providers, and community groups to address health information disparities.

For more information, please contact Lisa C. Fried, mlapd2@mlahq.org, 312.419.9094 x28.

MLA Promotional Bridges Made at MLA '08 Swap 'n Shop Booth:Winners of Marketing Contest Announced

The Medical Library Association (MLA) is pleased to announce the winners of the 2008 MLA Public Relations Swap 'n Shop. Open throughout MLA's annual meeting, the Swap 'n Shop booth gave attendees the opportunity to share library marketing ideas and samples with colleagues and to discuss marketing strategy with representatives from MLA's public relations consultant, Public Communications, Inc. (PCI). For the third year in a row, PCI representatives also conducted free marketing seminars, but this time, two different seminars were offered. On Sunday, during the meeting, a beginners' seminar, "Marketing 100: Starting at the Bottom" was presented, and on Tuesday, an advanced marketing seminar, "Marketing 200: Getting to the Top," was offered. Both seminars drew huge audiences.
At the end of the meeting, PCI representatives categorized and judged entries for creativity, accomplishment of stated goals, and best use of available budget and resources. They also devised a new award, the Next Generation Award, which went to the University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center and the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center.

MLA congratulates this year's Swap 'n Shop winners and thanks all those who participated. The winning entries will be posted on the 2008 National Medical Librarians Month (NMLM) site. The winners are:

NEXT GENERATION AWARD
The University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center and the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center won the new Next Generation Award for their creative take on last year's Best in Show entry. Library staff designed boldly colored, multifunctional standing table tents which they modeled on the Department of Library Services, Munson Healthcare, Traverse City, MI, "2007 Best in Show" three-dimensional mobile and building blocks that highlighted the library's collection. Staff at University of Michican also sought advice and guidance from Munson staff in making the tents.

BEST CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL MARKETING INITIATIVE
First Place: Shriner's Hospitals for Children, Tampa, FL, for its vivid, brightly colored brochures giving patients and their families an overview of services, and answering frequently asked questions
Second Place: Library & Information Commons, Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center, Seattle, WA, for its temporary tattoos featuring the hospital's logo

BEST COMMUNITY OUTREACH
First Place: Atlantic Health Overlook Hospital, Summit, NJ, and Morristown Memorial Hospital, Morristown, NJ; to make sure as many people as possible in the hospital area are aware of their services, staff took visually appealing, heavy-stock brochures to senior citizen centers, pharmacies, and other similar facilities as a way of grassroots marketing.
Second Place: Bernard Becker Medical Library, Washington University School of Medicine, Barnes-Jewish Hospital and St. Louis Children's Hospital for highly organized, visually appealing brochures that clearly define services.

ACADEMIC MEDICAL CENTER: BEST ONGOING MARKETING CAMPAIGN
First Place: William E. Laupus Library, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, for its multipart, multifunctional marketing campaign that included an innovative at-a-glance calendar to showcase pictures of the library's new facilities, glossy posters to advertise specific lectures, small car decals embossed with "Country Doctor Museum," and heavy-stock, gold-scripted invitations for an afternoon social to entice potential new board members.

Second Place: Library, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center-Dallas, for its folded mini-brochure bookmarks and innovative flyers advertising new technological services.

For more information, please contact Tomi Gunn, mlams@mlahq.org, 312.419.9094 x11.