Award Report: Having New, Consistently Working Computers Makes a Huge Difference in a Busy Teaching Hospital Medical Library!
What a difference new computers can make! The staff of the Health Sciences Library at Saint Barnabas Medical Center was pleased to receive a Technology Improvement Award at the end of 2009 to replace our old, slow and prone-to-break-down computers which are heavily used by attending physicians, hospital staff and students, and patients and families.
St. Barnabas Computer Lab Before Receiving Our New Computers
Over the past few years, we had spent a lot of staff time troubleshooting problems with our old computers. They were slow to download pdfs and to open websites with a lot of graphics. They often simply froze up and needed to be rebooted. Several of them made strange noises. At least once a week, but sometimes more often, we called for IT assistance. At the end of 2009 several of the computers had permanent “not working” signs on them.
When the new computers purchased with NNLM-MAR Technology Improvement Award funds were purchased and installed this spring, it was an immediate success. Our library users were delighted, and told us so. We were pleased to no longer have to spend time troubleshooting problems on failing computers. This freed us up to get to our other work done and saved everyone a lot of frustration.
After receiving our new computers!
We are very grateful to have received this reward and it is definitely helping us to fulfill our library’s mission. We have attached “before and after” photos.
Patricia Reusing
Margaret Eng
Health Sciences Library
Saint Barnabas Medical Center
Livingston, NJ
