By Ann Pederson
Altru Medical Library
Altru Health System
Grand Forks, ND
Use of social media in the face of disasters has added another facet to disaster assistance and information. The staff at the national Red Cross is reviewing their recent survey and finds that Facebook is the fourth most frequent site uses as a means of obtaining emergency information after traditional broadcast sites. Three out of four individuals expect assistance to arrive within the hour after they have posted a message for help in a disaster.
Surprised? The recent symposium conducted by the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (more…)
By Amy Donahue, MLIS, AHIP
University of Minnesota Bio-Medical Library
Back in December 2010, I had the opportunity to attend the free Wisconsin Voluntary Organizations Active in Disasters (VOAD) Conference. (Link to brochure: http://emergencymanagement.wi.gov/news/2010/2010_VOAD_Conference_Brochure.pdf). Lodging, lunch, and breakfast were provided for those who traveled more than 50 miles, which included me, and was sponsored through state funding.
I decided to go to the 3-day event after e-mailing the conference organizers to see if it would be appropriate for me to be there as a medical librarian with an interest in disaster information–given that I have no direct relationships with any VOAD member organizations. They encouraged me to come, and it was a great opportunity. The conference was held in Fort McCoy at the Wisconsin Military Academy. (more…)
The severe winter storm that affected the Midwest gave libraries in the region a great opportunity to activate their service continuity plans. If you don’t have a plan, this is a good time to prepare for the next major service disruption. Resources to help you can be found on the Writing Your Disaster Plan page on the NN/LM Emergency Preparedness & Response Toolkit at: http://nnlm.gov/ep/disaster-plan-templates/
If you did have a plan, how did it go? Would you change anything? If so, this is a good time to make those changes.
For more information about resources for emergency preparedness, see our Web page on this topic: http://nnlm.gov/gmr/member/emprep/
For those of you working with non-English speakers or preparing to do so, take a look at the Disaster Preparedness translations located on Health Information Translations (http://www.healthinfotranslations.org) in multiple languages. Included are hospital signage documents “to meet the needs of hospitals, clinics, emergency response teams and others who assist the public during emergencies and at other times.” From the website: http://www.healthinfotranslations.org/disaster-preparedness.php, the information is:
Easy to read
Translated into different languages with English (dual language)
Radiation Emergency Medical Management (REMM) is produced by the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, Office of Planning and Emergency Operations, in cooperation with the National Library of Medicine, Division of Specialized Information Services, with subject matter experts from the National Cancer Institute, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and many US and international consultants.
REMM provides:
Guidance for health care providers, primarily physicians, about clinical diagnosis and treatment during mass casualty radiological/nuclear (rad/nuc) events
Just-in-time, evidence-based, usable information with sufficient background and context to make complex issues understandable to those without formal radiation medicine expertise
Web-based information that is also downloadable in advance, so that it would be available during an event if the Internet is not accessible.
Judith Weinstein, MA, MPH
Associate Director
Heartland Alliance Refugee Health Programs
(part of Heartland Health Outreach)
Chicago, IL
The health messages are simple: dress warmly when it’s cold; don’t forget to floss; look left, then right—then left again!–before crossing a street. But the challenge of reaching newly arrived refugees with this basic information is great. Our work in refugee health education is complicated by refugees’ limited English skills, often low literacy levels, the number of different languages spoken, as well as their cultural and ethnic diversity.
Expanding Multi-lingual Health Information for Immigrants and Refugees, made possible with an Outreach Express award from the National Network of Libraries of Medicine, Greater Midwest Region, allowed us to translate the scripts of five slide presentations on basic health topics in to four key refugee languages, to be recorded by native speakers. Eventually, these multi-media, multi-lingual presentations will be available online for free access and downloading by health promoters and immigrants and refugees themselves. (more…)
Greetings to all in our region focusing on information and health services to the Public Health community. The GMR has created an email discussion list to help connect those who are working in this specialized field of librarianship. Join us at: GMRPH@uic.edu
The NN/LM Midcontinental Region has scheduled a Symposium for July 15, 16, & 17 in Laramie, Wyoming, at the Coe Library on the University of Wyoming campus. In keeping with the slogan Plowing Through Pandemonium: Proactive Librarians the NN/LM staff and others will be presenting topics on emergency preparedness. Joe Moore, Director of Wyoming Department of Homeland Security, will be the special speaker at this event. Librarians and representatives of community-based organizations will also be brainstorming how to partner for emergencies.
Christopher Childs
Education & Outreach Librarian
Hardin Library for the Health Sciences
University of Iowa
New Influenza A (H1N1) also known as the Swine Flu Resource Guide Available from the Hardin Library
A new resource guide containing information on Influenza A (H1N1) has been created and is available from the Hardin Library. All of the information contained in this guide is free and available to the public. The guide includes: national & international resources, maps, blogs, an RSS and Twitter feed, Iowa resources, articles, and consumer health resources available in English, Spanish and multiple Languages.
The National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provide links to resources about the 2009 Swine Flu outbreak. The National Library of Medicine Division of Specialized Information Services has released an Enviro-Health Links page on Swine Flu. This page contains links to resources about the flu outbreak, including transmission, prevention, treatment, and the genetic makeup of the influenza virus. MedlinePlus released a new health topic page on Swine Flu: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/swineflu.html. The page is also provided in Spanish: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/spanish/swineflu.html.
MedlinePlus – Multiple Languages provides information in Arabic to Vietnamese on the MedlinePlus: Flu – Multiple Languages site: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/languages/flu.html. Related Multiple Language links from MedlinePlus include the Germs and Hygiene resources: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/germsandhygiene.html translated in ASL (American Sign Language), Arabic, Chinese, French, Hindi, Hmong, Japanese, Khmer, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Somali, Spanish, Tagalog, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.
The World Health Organization site: http://www.who.int/ provides information in English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian and English.
An easy way to post updated information is to use the widget seen below:
Clicking on Get widget now! will bring you to the Health and Human Services (HHS) Image and Icon Library and the code for this installing the widget on your web page.
Additional resources are included on PandemicFlu.gov providing one-stop access to U.S. Government swine, avian and pandemic flu information.
Christopher Childs