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The NLM Technical Bulletin lists a few changes to PubMed that were implemented last Thursday (6/3/10).  Here is a brief run down of the changes, for more information including helpful graphics go to the May/June issue of the bulletin.

Email Abstract Format – Users can now include/exclude the MeSH and “Other Data” associated with the PubMed citation int he email.  The other data would be things like Publication Types.

PubMed Advance Search – The Advance Search page will be modified to provide users with a “more cohesive” method to build searches.   “The ‘Search’ and ‘Preview’ buttons will be improved to process search terms present in either the Search Builder box or main search box.”  Boolean operator buttons will now be in a pull down menu and terms in the Search Builder will default to AND unless users choose OR or NOT before clicking the Add to Search Box button.  Finally, search box in advance search will not include autocomplete and the RSS and the save search feature will not be offered from that page. (It appears that you can still save your advanced searches and RSS them once you have run them and you are on the PubMed Results page.)

PubMed Discovery Ads– At first when I read this title I thought PubMed was going to start allowing advertisements which surprised me.  It turns out that what they are discussing are the helpful bits of information in the “discovery area” (right side of PubMed results).  The bulletin refers to these helpful bits as “ads” and they are “designed to lead users to additional information or assist with searching.”  Whatever NLM wants to call it, this information has a new look to it with fewer lines, colors, and no more bulleted lists. 

Use Parnter Organizations to Sign in to MyNCBI– Unfortunately I don’t have any information I I can offer on this subject.  Apparently you can now sign in through a partner organization and also link your MyNCBI to your partner organization.  But really, can the NLM Technical Bulletin make this sound any more complicated or confusing?   Why somebody would want to do that is not explained in the bulletin, neither it is explained in (all three answers of) the Frequently Asked Questions on the Partner Account page.  The only place I could find some information about the partner organization is from the 2008 number 364 issue of the bulletin.  However that just says, “Use the ‘See more sign in options for My NCBI partner organizations’ link at the bottom of the Sign In page to learn more about this new feature which includes linking existing accounts with a partner organization account.” (It is a 2008 article so I don’t know if there was a link there, but there isn’t one now.)

There is a relatively small list of organizations listed as partner organizations.  From what I can gather logging in under the partner organization is sort of like logging into your (if your organization is “partner”) organization’s PubMed.  I assume (but could be completely wrong) this also enables full text linking and ILL. However I have no why somebody would want to do that instead of logging into MyNCBI.  Why would somebody choose to do one or the other?  More information and clarification from NLM would be nice.

CrunchGear posted a video and paragraph of Japanese doctors using an iPad (check out the “high tech” plastic baggy used as the iPad cover) during surgery.  Doctors in a hospital run by Kobe Univeristy used the iPad as a display during a surgical procedure.  A link to the video (in Japanese) is on CrunchGear.  As CrunchGear notes, this is not the most “elegant” usage of a new medical device in medicine but it is kind of interesting to see the different applications people find for the iPad, such as dolphin communication. Yes you read that right, dolphin communication.  Researchers at Dolphin Discovery’s swim facility in Puerto Aventura, Mexico are using the iPad (and the Panasonic Toughbook) to teach Merlin (2 yr. old bottlenose dolphin) to associate symbols with objects. 

For more “different” uses of the iPad check out the Huffington Post photos and videos. (My favorite Stephen Colbert uses it to chop veggies for salsa).

Lots of things happened at the meeting and even those of us who were there and blogging had a hard time keeping up, so I thought I would provide a week in review of sorts from the Annual Meeting blog posts. Since bloggers are still adding posts (after MLA) I will add their links to this list as soon as possible.

Please note the links aren’t always in order of how they were posted on the MLA Blog.  Due to the hectic nature of the conference many people posted about events that happened a day or two ago from the posting date.  True to my librarian organizing nature I have tried to put the posts in some sort of day/event order.  My apologies if it isn’t exactly perfect.  Also people sometimes wrote about multiple things in one post, in the interest of my mental health and the prevention of carpal tunnel syndrome, I am only listing their posts once, not under multiple days/topics.

General Information: Those of you attended the meeting (in person or online) have access to the online meeting content at: https://www.xpressreg.net/register/MEDL050/xpresstoolkit/login.asp

At that site you will be able to watch the Plenary Session Videos, view the posters and related abstracts, 5 minute lightning posters and abstracts, and section program videos.  I know some stuff is already up and available to watch and they are furiously editing the rest of it so that it is available as soon as possible.

Friday:

MLA News

• MLA Green Project – Kraft- Report on the MLA Green Project Award, applications due November 2010, awarded at MLA 2011.
• Seeing Stars– Leibfarth – Report on MLA leadership development pilot program MLA Rising Stars.
• NPR Library Tour– Mihlrad- Only 15 people were lucky enough to go on a tour of National Public Radio’s library, read about it and check out Leigh’s pictures.

Saturday:

General Information and Fun

• Amy Blevin’s First Post – Blevins- General information post about MLA.
• In the Neighborhood-Hoffecker- General post about the hotel neighborhood.
• Checkin’ In– Ettien- General information post about MLA and the hotel.
•  MLA First Tweet Up -Kraft- General post about the first unofficial MLA Tweet Up that happened at the Welcome Reception.

Business Meetings and Other MLA Meetings

• Section Planning from a Newbie’s Perspective -Kraft- What happens when you are are Section Planner for next year.
• Section Council: Putting the Pieces All Together-Esparza- Notes and information from the Section Council meeting.
• Starting Out-Leibfarth-Report primarily on the Leaders Tea and information sharing from Chapters.
• Colleague Connection at MLA ’10 -Schroeder- Report on the Colleague Connection

Symposiums, Section Programs, Forums and Other Sessions

• Opening Salvo-Ettien- Post about the Opening Reception and the Exhibit Hall.

CE’s

• E-Patient Symposium: View from the Trenches-Dettmar- Part one of blog post on the E-Patient Symposium with links to Nikki’s notes on Part 1 and 2 in Google Docs.
• E-Patient Symposium: Personal Health Records– Dettmar- Part two of the blog post of the E-Patient Symposium with a link to a Nikki’s Google Doc about Part 3 of the symposium.
• Oral History: How to do it-Hoffecker- Post on the MLA CE class, Preserving the History of Medicine and Science in a Modern Age: An Oral History Training Seminar.
• Rare Medical Books CE at NLM -Knapp- Notes on the MLA CE course Rare Medical Books: a hands on introduction.

Sunday:

General Information and Fun

• Tip for MLA 2010 Wireless Connectivity-Dettmar- Strategies for connecting to the wireless signal in the underground meeting rooms.
• Visitng NLM -Hurst- General information on experiences visiting NLM.
• I <3 The Bearded Pigs -Donahue- Commentary on the Bearded Pigs gig.
• Party Time-Ettien -Post about the various parties that packed Sunday night including, the Library School Reunion, Friends of the NLM Reception, Ovid Party, and Bearded Pigs.
• First Impressions (the next morning)– Donahue- Amy’s insights after the Welcome Reception and the MDConsult Night at the Museum party.
• Cruising the Potomac with Ebsco– Schroeder- Post about Ebsco’sOdyssey boat cruise with drinks, dinner and music.

Business Meetings and Other MLA Meetings

• Planning the National Meeting– Kraft – Experiences of what it is like as a co-chair planning MLA’s National Meeting.
• New Member Breakfast -Blevins- Post about the New Members Breakfast with Lucretia McClure speaking about the challenges to the profession.
• New Member Info-Ettien- Information on New Members Breakfast with specific notes about each speaker.
• Hospital Libraries Section Business Meeting  -Kraft- Notes from HLS Business meeting.

Plenaries and Other Lectures

• Plenary 1 and 2: Welcome to MLA ’10 and the John P. McGovern Lecture with Daniel Pink – Blevins- Post on the two Plenary Sessions
• Presidential Address -Leibfarth- Picture of President Connie Schardt’s address to the membership
• McGovern Lecture Daniel Pink– Ettien- Post on the McGovern Lecture
• McGovern Lecture: Daniel Pink– Dettmar -Nikki posts a link to her full Google Docs notes on the lecture and the connection she found between it and the E-Patient Symposium
• Quick Links: More on that Redesigned Pill Bottle -Walden- More information on the redesigned pill bottle mentioned in Pink’s lecture. 

Symposiums, Section Programs, Forums and Other Sessions

• Librarian Without Borders Open Forum -Donahue- Post about the Librarians Without Borders Open, including updates on the groups activities and speakers with international experience.
• Top Tech Trends IV-Dettmar- Nikki’s experiences as the Twitter Jockey at the Tech Trends session as well as a link to the transcript.
• Blogging is Dead, Long Live Blogging -Hurst- Information and commentary on the Blogging is Dead statement from the Tech Trends session.
• Open Forum: Informal Publication Methods-Ettien- Notes from the Informal Publications Methods forum including information about the speakers and their topics.
• E-Science: Exploring the Librarian Role-Walden- Post on the E-Science Exploring the Librarian’s Role section session featuring several speakers on data curation and sharing.
• E-Science-Halsted- Brief commentary on the E-Science session.
• Learning from Others: Informationist in Practice-Esparza- Post specifically about the Clinical Informationist Panel at the Informationist in Practice Symposium.

Regular Posters and Lightning Posters

• Whew! Five minutes goes fast! -Schroeder – Post on the experience of a lightning poster presenter.
• Kids, Fun, & Health Info -Francis- Thoughts and information from poster session, specifically poster #23, “Teaching Kids About Healthy Lifestyles Through Stores and Games: Partnering with Public Libraries to Reach Local Children.”
• Regular Posters: P-Index: A New Method in Bibliometrics– Kraft- Information and commentary specifically on the poster P-Index: A New Method in Bibliometrics
• Lightning Posters: Libraries Demonstrated Interal Revenue Service Mandated Community Benefit-Kraft- Thoughts on the lightning poster presentation, specifically the poster Libraries Demonstrate Internal Revenue Service Madated Community Benefit.
• Posters and Doody’s Reception– Blevins- Specific information on three posters, Pursuing Unity, Go Local Goes Faster, Multi-Type Library Collaboration and a paragraph on Doody’s reception.
• Working Outside the (Library) Box-Esparza- Information specifically on the Poster #2 Working Outside the (Library) Box
• Poster: Preparing Our Libraries for the Next Generation -Kraft- Information and thoughts on the poster about the next generation(s) in our libraries.

E-Conference Experience

• MLA Meeting in Idaho – Francis – Experiences attending the MLA meeting as an “e-Conference” attendee. 

Monday:

General Information and Fun

• Random Thoughts-Mihlrad- General information on poster sessions and vendor events.
• Blog Simulcast for NPC, “Putting it all together”– McCord- Post alerting people to the “Putting It All Together” workshop and discussion to be held May 26th.

Business Meetings and Other MLA Meetings

• More on Monday– Leibfarth- Pictures and information on the MLA Business Meeting and Awards Luncheon.
• Awards Ceremony: Especially for SCC/MLA Members-Halsted- Brief post on the Awards Luncheon.
• Cunningham Fellow Marie-Therese Alma Mitri– Halsted- Post about one of the Cunningham Fellows who spoke at the Award Luncheon.
• PRRC, Business, Awards, and Sections – Blevins- Post on the Professional Recruitment and Retention Committee meeting, with some brief information on the Awards Luncheon and the Section Shuffle.
• Notes from the Government Relations Committee -Walden- Notes from a newbie on the Government Relation Committee, specifically discusses things that should be on our radar.
• Membership Growth: Cancer Librarians Section Business Meeting-Esparza- Information on the Cancer Librarians Section planning and business meeting.

Plenaries and Other Lectures

• Janet Doe Lecture: Dr. Ana Cleveland-Dettmar- Post with Google Doc notes on the Janet Doe Lecture.
• Miles to Go Before We Sleep-Leibfarth- Pictures and commentary from the Janet Doe Lecture.
• I Read My Gratitude Letter to Carolyn Today -Brown- Helen-Ann’s thoughts on her moving letter to Carolyn at the end of Daniel Pink’s lecture.

Seminars, Symposiums, Section Programs, Forums and Other Sessions

• AIDS 2010: Evolution of Information– Walden- Information on the Section Program, AIDS 2010 Evolution fo Information.
• Peeking at a Journal -Ettien- Post on the Science Translational Medicine Event held at the Hay-Adams Hotel.
• Added Value: Linking E-Resourcs to Clinical Information Systems-Dettmar- Information including a link to her meeting notes on Google Docs about the Section Program Added Value: Linking E-Resources to Clinical Information Systems.
• EBSCO Focus Group -Schroeder- Information on the EBSCO focus group where they highlighted recent enhancements, described future enhancements, and sought librarian feedback.
• EBSCO Sunrise Seminar: Integration of Point-of-Care Content into the Electronic Health Record -Donahue- post on the Sunrise Seminar from EBSCO on why and how medical librarians should be involved with their institutions’ EHRS.

E-Conference Experience 

• E-Conferencing and MLA ’10 Presidential Address-Gann- Post on participating as an e-conference attendee and the Presidential Address.
• Online Content: Videos Now Available from Plenary Sessions I & II – Walden- Post alerting all with access to online meeting content that videos are now available

 

Tuesday

General Information and Fun

• Meeting Celebration– Ettien- Commentary on the Annual Meeting Celebration with the Capitol Steps performance.
• Time to Get Excited about Minneapolis – Blevins- Quick post and picture about the 2011 Annual Meeting
• Geocaching the House of the Temple– Dettmar – Post on sightseeing in DC related to The Lost Symbol, The House of the Temple and geocaching.
• The Backchannel-Hurst- Commentary on the back-channel method of learning, discussing and sharing at a conference.

Business Meetings and Other MLA Meetings

• Research Section Business Meeting -Donahue- A view of the Research Section’s business meeting from a person who was interested in joining the section and attended their meeting.
• Research for Librarians-Leibfarth- Pictures and summary of Research for Librarians Chapter Round Table lunch and discussion.
• NLM Update-Ettien- Detailed post on the NLM Update.
• MLA’s Membership Committee Meeting -Blevins- Detailed post about the Membership Committee Meeting.
• AHIP Question and Answers -Kraft- Information from the AHIP question and answer session, includes photo of an example AHIP portfolio submission.

Plenaries and Other Lectures

• Presidential Inaugural Address and Invitation to MLA ’11 -Schroeder- Commentary on the Presidential Inaugural Address and the MLA ’11 invitation.

Symposiums, Section Programs, Forums and Other Sessions

• Beyond Cool -Schroeder- Notes from the Beyond Cool Section Program.
• Cool Idea Presented in Beyone Cool Session -Kraft- Commentary on Dean Hendrix’s cool idea of recording his instruction sessions.
• MedlinePlus: Connect and Other News-Dettmar- Information on MedlinePlus Connect pilot project that connects information within the EMR to health subject pages on MedlinePlus.
• Step, Step, Shuffle, Shuffle-Esparza- Brief information post about the Section Shuffle.
• Pharmacy & Drug Info Section’s Mad Hatter Wins Section Shuffle Contest-McCord- Information on the Section Shuffle contest.
• Half Immune-Ettien- Post on the vaccine information programming, specifically the Q&A from the session.
• Section Program: Vaccine Information-Walden- Information and earlier material from the vaccine section program that Ettien missed. 
• Capitol Hill Day -Donahue- Amy’s experience’s participating in MLA’s Capitol Hill Day lobbying our government on topics important MLA and medical librarians.

Regular Posters and Lightning Posters

• Lightning Posters -Brown- Brief general post about the lightning posters.
• Poster: Library Support of iPhone/iPod Touch Integration in a Medical School Curriculum-Kraft- Thoughts on the poster about medical schools and medical school libraries supporting iPhone and iPod Touches.
• Poster: Customized USB Flash Drives Used to Promote Library Resources and Services to First Year Medical and Dental Students -Kraft- Thoughts on the poster and whether USB drives work as a method for distributing library information.

Exhibits and Vendors

• Vendor Profile: Quertel-Walden- Information on Quertle, a kind of PubMed alternative
• Vendor Profile: anatomyEXPERT-Walden- Information on anatomyEXPERT which provides detailed 3D web-based images.
• NLM Theater: MyBibliography for Managing NIH Public Access Compliance – Walden- Information on the use of MyBibliography (part of MyNCBI) to manage NIH Public Access Compliance.

E-Conference Experience 

• Photos & More @ Conference Community – Francis- Commentary about being an e-conference attendee and specific mention and link to conference photos on Flickr
• Online Poster Sessions-Gann- Commentary on viewing the posters online through cooliris, specific information on posters, Customized USB Flash Drives Used to Promote Library Resources and Services to First Year medical and Dental Students, and Preparing Our Medical Libraries for the Next Generation.

 

Wednesday

General Information and Fun

• I Shook Hands With Magic Johnson -Brown- Brief post about Helen-Ann’s opportunity to shake Magic’s hand.
• First Time Visit to NLM – Kraft- Experiences visiting the NLM and while they operate slightly differently than other libraries, they struggle with many of the same problems as all libraries.

Business Meetings and Other MLA Meetings

• Section Planning Part 2 -Kraft- Experiences from a newbie perspective on the actual Section Planning meeting where the section planners get together and discuss, partner, and work on section programs for next year’s annual meeting.
• E-Books and the Last Day -Blevins- Brief notes on the EMTS meeting and the Section Program on e-books.

Plenaries and Other Lectures

• Leiter Lecture: John Halamka– Ettien- Detailed information on Leiter Lecture, John Halamka.

Symposiums, Section Programs, Forums and Other Sessions

• Putting It All Together: Why Are You Here?-McCord- First in a three part blog post by Sarah on the activities from the clossingsession Putting It All Together: Reflecting on MLA ’10 and Connecting What You Have Learned With Your Daily Work.
• Putting It All Together: Think Fast!-McCord- Second post by Sarah on the final session, Putting It All Together: Reflecting on MLA ’10 and Connecting What You Have Learned with Your Daily work.
• Putting It All Together: But Out! (And, So!)-McCord- Third post by Sarah on the final session, Putting It All Together: Reflecting on MLA ’10 and Connecting What You Have Learned with Your Daily work.
• Seeing Eye to Eye and my last post -Blevins- Detailed post specifically on the session Librarians and Information Technology People: Seeing Eye to Eye.
• EHR-Mihlrad- Post on the session Electronic Health Record and Librarians.
• Addressing Some Health Disparities-Ettien- Detailed notes on the speakers from the section program Health Information for Those Left Behind: Outreach and Services for the Disenfranchised, Marginalized, and Unconnected

E-Conference Experience 

• MLA E-Conference Highlights-Gann- Highlights from an e-conference attendee.

I will be at the Medical Library Association Annual Meeting, my posts about the meeting (along with other posts from Official MLA Bloggers) can be seen on the Official MLA Blog.

You can also follow along with a lot of other librarians at the meeting (not just the Official Bloggers) by following the #mla2010 hashtag on Twitter.  You don’t even have to have a Twitter account to follow the 140 character conversation.  Just go to Visible Tweets and watch the conversation flow in.  If you are on Twitter make sure you make your account public if you want to interact with fellow #mla2010 people (you can always reset it to private after the meeting).

No this isn’t a Halloween post that was accidentally released early.  The New York Public Library contacted the folks at Improve Everywhere to stage a scene from Ghostbusters in the library to help bring awareness about the library as they face a funding cut of $37,000,000 which could cost 700 employees their jobs, the closure of 10 branches, and force the the library to be open four days a week instead of six. 

 Click the link to watch the YouTube video.
Improv Everywhere’s NY Public Library Ghostbusters

Every fourth Wednesday of the month from March through July 2010 the MidContinental Region presents information and instruction on resources from the National Library of Medicine. The call these sessions Spotlight! On National Library of Medicine Resources and they are free. 

The next two sessions are all about mobile resources, on June 23, 2010 the session will focus on Mobile PubMed and on July 28, 2010 it will be on Mobile MedlinePlus & MedlinePlus Twitter.   

If you are interested in the June 23, 2010 class Register online at http://tinyurl.com/mcrclasses (registration is not required but is appreciated).  Those who take the one-hour class and complete the exercises and class evaluation are eligible to receive 1 Medical Library Association Continuing Education credit.

If you aren’t available to take the class on the date that it is offered or if you are interested in previous classes the MCR has presented, check out their website and scroll to Previous Sessions where they have links to the archived recordings.

There is lots of information at MLA and sometimes it is hard to keep up with all of it.  Clare Leibfarth will be wearing two blogging hats at MLA this year, she will be one of the Official MLA Bloggers reporting on events at MLA on the Official Blog and she will posting “newsy items of particular interest to chapter members” on the ConnectMidwest Blog.  Already she has posted a great run down of what Midwest members are doing at MLA, including Ruth Holst who will be giving her Presidential Inagural Address on Tuesday. 

So check out the ConnectMidwest Blog to get information from the Annual Meeting that is of particular interest to the Midwest Chapter members.  Thank you Clare for providing a unique perspective to meeting for us in the Midwest, I just hope you find time to eat in between posts.

Before I even had a chance to check my Bloglines feed, gabinator alerted me to a really great post by T. Scott about privacy and Facebook.  He discusses the outrage some feel about the way Facebook handles users’ privacy.  Apparently there are 170 privacy options within Facebook and while I think 170 options are too many and I favor something a little simpler, in general I have to agree with Scott when he says,  “If you want all of that information to be that private, what in the world are you doing on Facebook in the first place?”

I am dumbfounded by the stories I hear from librarians about patrons who refuse, due to privacy concerns, to give the library their address or phone number (despite assurances that we do not release that information to anyone unless they have a court order) but they have no problem talking loudly on their cell phone about their illness and doctor’s opinion on it. 

Privacy in an increasingly online and networked world is difficult because we have grown accustomed to convenience.  Back when I was in high school people were just beginning to dip their toes into AOL.  None of my friends had email. Digital cameras were in the relm of 007. Video cameras were still ginormous contraptions that caused your shoulder to start to ache and then go dead within the span of 5 minutes.  People bought airline tickets from travel agents or they called the airlines.  People paid their bills by mail with stamps.  If you wanted to keep in touch with friends or family you called them (and paid for long distance) or wrote a letter. 

Twenty years later (ugh am I really that old), things have changed.  I can order Chipotle from an iPhone app and the share with the world via FourSquare that I am at the Chipotle store picking up my burrito bowl.  Not only does everybody have email, many people have 3-4 accounts.  Phones include still and video cameras, are the size of a pack of cigarettes, people are canceling their landlines.  People are posting the cell phone videos and pictures online.  Banking and bill paying is done online.  People submit online vast amounts of personal information including dates their home will be left empty all in an effort to get a good deal on an airline ticket.  While people still talk on the phone, the art of letter writing is quickly becoming extinct.  And the ultimate in convenience, we can communicate online and read about what our “friends” and family are doing without even seeing or speaking to them (sometimes for years). 

Today we give up a little bit of our privacy for the modern online convenience of life.  How much we are willing to give up is really up to ourselves.  However, I would venture to say that there is more about a person online than they realize.  That is because they were willing to trade a little bit of their privacy to do something.  Whether it buying a new house (guess what many counties property records are online), banking online, or buying an airline ticket, the price for this online convenience is privacy.  If you truly want to be private then you have to ween yourself off of our modern day online life. 

For those of you who don’t want to go completely off the grid, you have to realize the price for communicating with  friends and family via Facebook is a certain amount of your privacy.  Knowing what you want to remain private and what you are willing to allow open is the key.  If you don’t want people to know about it, or if you feel uncomfortable that a total stranger might know something about you, don’t ever put it online.

Ok I know a Tweet Up is technically done through Twitter, but I figure the more people know about it the more who will show up.  So if you use Twitter and will be at MLA, consider hitting the MLA Librarian Tweet Up at 6:00pm during the Welcome Reception at the NLM booth.

Question: What do zombies have to do with accessing the medical library resources remotely?

Answer: In case the world goes all Shaun of the Dead, the University of Florida Libraries recommends accessing the library resources remotely from a safe and secure area where authorized users can use UF’s remote resources to research survival skills. 

The University of Florida Libraries created a diaster preparedness LibGuide in case there should ever be an outbreak of ZBSD (Zombie Behavior Spectrum Disorder).  The complete UF Zombie Attack Disaster Preparedness Simulation Exercise is archived in the UF Institutional Repository and available to view. 

The UF Zombie Attack Disaster Prepardeness Simulation Exercise offers great insights on dealing with a national disaster such as ZBSD.

Thank you dial_m and jannabeth for directing my attention to this.  I would consider myself fairly knowledgable of ZBSD and from my vast research (including much of what is cited in this exercise) a diverse aresnal works best for protection, however I would not recommend LPs (as mentioned in the exercise) they have been proven ineffective as demonstrated in this short video clip (Wright 2004).