A unique resource for cancer patients, their families and the clinicians who treat them has opened in Santa Rosa, California. Janie Grosman, MLIS, formerly Manager of the Sutter Resource Library in Sacramento, California is the new director of this com munity health library. The library is sponsored by Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital (part of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange health system) and is located at the Redwood Regional Oncology Center in Northern Santa Rosa approximately 60 miles (1 hour when t here's no traffic!) north of San Francisco.
Prior to Janie's arrival, almost $100,000 was raised to develop this resource for cancer patients and their families. Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital coordinated initial fundraising efforts with the regional oncology group and local community agencies. Th e interior library environment is very restful as is the exterior since the entire cancer center sits upon a hillside overlooking Santa Rosa to the West and vineyards to the East. Beautiful ash bookcases line the library walls and a special "quiet room" w ith leather chairs, soft lighting and a waterfall provide patrons with a place to read, meditate, listen to music or watch a videotape. Also part of the library is a large conference room that is used nightly for cancer support groups. Hospital and commun ity retreats are often held in the library conference room because of the serene environment.
The primary focus of the collection, of course, is cancer information, but the library also has a great deal of general health information that would be found in most consumer health collections. There are over 500 books, 100 video and audiotapes, over 60 journals, and 400 clipping files. Most of the cancer materials are organized in modular form. For example, all the books, video/audiotapes, clippings, etc. on breast cancer are located in one place. Similarly all the materials on colon cancer are in a nother location. This modular form is also used for general health topics-(i.e. children's health, women's health, men's health, etc.) The NLM classification scheme was used to catalog each book, but the shelf organization is modular because of the smal l size of the collection. There is also a large section of materials on complementary/alternative medicine.
There are several CD-ROM programs for patrons to use, including the Infotrac Health Reference Center. There's also an Internet workstation with cancer site specific bookmarks for patrons to get to information quickly and easily with some assurance of q uality and credibility. A special feature of the workstation is the email feature where cancer patients and families can go immediately to support group archives and read what others with the same diagnosis are saying and post personal questions of their own. This feature is becoming very popular since many patients have no Internet hookup at home. Classes on using the internet to locate cancer information are becoming very popular with patients as well as their extended families.
The library is on DOCLINE and hopes to increase the journal holdings in the coming year to include additional clinical resources for hospital personnel and cancer clinicians.
At this point in time, there is no special name for the library so you can refer to it as:
The library is open to the public Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.