by Yamila El-Khayat, MALS
Outreach Services Librarian,
Arizona Health Sciences Library
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ

NN/LM Pacific Southwest Region exhibited National Library of Medicine resources at the 69th Annual Convention & Marketplace of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) in Sacramento, CA, October 23-25, 2012. Staffing was provided by Kay Deeney, NN/LM PSR Educational Services Coordinator, and Yamila El-Khayat, Outreach Services Librarian at the Arizona Health Sciences Library. They were ably assisted by several local Network volunteers; including Suzanne Beattie, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, Roseville; Alison Clement, Marshall Medical Center Community Health Library, Placerville; Ana Macias, Kaiser Permanente Sacramento Valley Area; and Margaret (Peggy) Makie, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, Sacramento. All volunteers did a wonderful job to disseminate the information about NLM’s health resources! The NCAI meeting was an important event, bringing together a large group of people, representing many different American Indian tribes from across the nation, along with Alaska Native tribes. (more…)

by Yamila El-Khayat, MALS
Outreach Services Librarian, Arizona Health Sciences Library
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ

Tucson hosted its seventh annual “Vida” Conference on October 6, 2012, at Apollo Middle School, located in the southern part of Tucson, with a population consisting of roughly 83% Mexican-American and 10% Native American residents. This conference was held in this area because its primary goal is to provide bilingual breast cancer education to the minority community of southern Arizona. (more…)

By Sophia Prisco
Department of Information Studies student
UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies

Hello, I am Sophia Prisco, the Pacific Southwest Regional Medical Library’s fall 2012 intern. I am a second-year student at UCLA, working towards a Masters degree in Library and Information Science (MLIS). (more…)

With September being National Preparedness Month, we’ve been hearing a lot about how to prepare for emergencies. Indeed, hurricanes, fires, and other events over this past summer and early fall are reminders of the importance of being prepared, with or without advance warning. In an ideal world, the time to prepare for a disaster or emergency is of course prior to the event, with continued awareness of how to maintain readiness and to know what to do during and after an actual event. (more…)

NLM released DOCLINE 4.9 today, September 25, 2012. Although this new version is largely a maintenance release, there are several new borrowing features. The Release Notes are available and the key points are summarized below. (more…)

The National Library of Medicine (NLM) is pleased to announce the release of a new educational resource, GeneEd. Developed in collaboration with the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), and with teachers and experts in genetics and genetic counseling, GeneEd is a useful resource of trusted information, designed to help students and teachers in grades 9 – 12 learn about genetics. (more…)

Here are some highlights from the NLM Technical Bulletin issue from July-August 2012: (more…)

During my spring 2012 internship, I took on a variety of projects at NN/LM PSR. One of these projects included making modifications to the existing Helping Older Adults Search for Health Information Online: A Toolkit for Trainers to create a toolkit targeting adults, especially those with low literacy skills. (more…)

Occasionally the settings in PubMed don’t operate the way they did the day before. This may be due to a change to PubMed by NCBI. Sometimes this change affects only a small number of users. One way to avoid problems is to make sure that your browser settings are up-to-date. (more…)

I just returned from a great trip to the 3rd Biannual National Latino Cancer Summit, held July 23-25, 2012, at the Mission Bay Campus of the University of California, San Francisco, where I presented an overview of NLM’s TOXNET system to researchers and community activists working to eliminate cancer in the Latino community. The summit is organized by Latinas Contra Cancer, a nonprofit organization established in 2003, which is dedicated to assisting Latino cancer patients and advocating on their behalf. In addition to organizing the Biannual summit, Latinas Contra Cancer mobilizes promotoras community health workers to provide linguistically appropriate patient navigator services in cancer centers, support groups, and educational workshops for cancer patients and their families. The organization also advocates for increased cancer research funding and community engagement, and provides access to bras, wigs, and prostheses for cancer patients and survivors. The summit is held biannually in San Francisco, with an estimated attendance of 200. (more…)