Medical Resources for News Libraries
SLA News Division, June 11, 1996
Your Reference Collection: The Next Generation
Barbara Hijek, St. Petersburg Times News Library
Why purchase medical textbooks?
- More authoritative than consumer-oriented books.
Healthcare specialists recognize these titles and this
gives more credibility to your reporting. Would you rather
see some Family Medical Guide or Harrison's Principles of
Medicine cited in your infobox?
- Builds staffer relationships. Everyone has a need for solid
medical info. When staffers recognize you have these resources
they will approach you for personal information needs. This
can be a good bonding process.
- Because of AIDS the public has acquired a richer understanding
of disease and medical terminology. Readers/staffers seek
info that is not "dummied-down."
BOOKS:
In Medicine just about every condition, disease or injury seems to have
about 3 names. So, the first step is to check a good medical dictionary.
MEDICAL DICTIONARIES
- Stedman, Thomas Lathrop. Stedman's Medical Dictionary. 26th edition.
Baltimore, Williams & Wilkins, 1995. $44.95
- Taber's Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary. 17th edition. Philadelphia, Davis,
1993.
$29.95
- Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary. 28th edition. Philadelphia,
Saunders. 1994.
$43.25
ANATOMY
- Gray, Henry. Anatomy of the Human Body. 30th American edition. Edited by
Carmine
D. Clemente. Baltimore, Williams & Wilkins, 1995. $89.50
MEDICAL ILLUSTRATIONS
- The CIBA Collection of Medical Illustrations, 13-volumes, CIBA-Geigy Corp.
The Human Body Series.
GENERAL INTERNAL MEDICINE
- Berkow, Robert, ed. The Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy. 16th ed.
Rahway, NJ,
Merck & Co., $26.00
- Isselbacher, Kurt J., eds. Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine. 13th
edition. New York, McGraw-Hill, 1994. 2 v. $125.00
- Rubenstein, Edward, and Federman, Daniel D., eds. Scientific American
Medicine. New York, Scientific American, 1995. 3 v. #359.00. Loose-leaf
updated.
After initial purchase subscription is $281.00/year.
- Washington University School of Medicine. Department of Medicine. Manual of
Medical Therapeutics. 28th ed. Boston, Little, brown, 1995. $29.95
PHARMACOLOGY
Great for checking info about drugs - side effects, dangers
- American Medical Association. Division of Drugs and Toxicology. Drug
evaluations
annual. Chicago, AMAM, 1996. $98.95
- PDR: Physicians' Desk Reference. 50th edition. Montvale, NJ, Medical
Economics Data,
1996. $64.95. Published annually.
- Physicians' Desk Reference for Nonprescription Drugs. 17th edition. Montvale,
NJ,
Medical Economics Data, 1996. $41.95. Published annually.
SURGERY
Good for illustrative purposes. Internal Med books do not cover
surgery.
- Schwartz, Seymour I., ed. Principles of Surgery. 7th edition. New York,
McGraw-Hill,
1993. 2 v. $125.00
SPORTS MEDICINE
Great for illustrating injuries to athletes. If you have a health/fitmess
section these
books offer great tips on injury prevention.
- Birrer, Richard B. , ed. Sports Medicine for the Primary Care Physician. 2nd
ed. Boca
Raton, Fla., CRC Press, 1994, $59.95.
- Strauss, Richard H., ed. Sports Medicine. 2nd ed. Philadelphia, Saunders,
1991.
$75.75
CANCER/ONCOLOGY
They are textbooks that offer indepth detail - but for our purposes the
general internal
medicine books cover this subject.
Note: most sources are available on CD-ROM.
If you're looking for a solid textbook in a specific medical speciality refer
to
the Brandon-Hill List of Selected Books for the Small Medical Library.
Majors Scientific Books will forward one to you. Majors: 800-241-6551
For example, if your paper circulates in an area that has a world class
Heart
Institute/ Cancer Center / Neonatology Research - get books in those subject
area. Your news/newsart departments will be very grateful. Chances are
that some new procedure or breakthrough will be announced and you'll need
explanatory info with illustrations.
ELECTRONIC RESOURCES:
- Also - on MEDLARS (commonly called MEDLINE) is a specialized databank called
PDQ
(Physician Data Query). PDQ was designed by NCI (National Cancer Institute)
for use by both doctors and the general public. Very comprehensive. Subscribe
to PDQ through MEDLARS. PDQ is relatively CHEAP to use and its very user friendly
(all menu driven).
- MEDLARS - Over 100 companies liscense Medline from the NLM.
Commonly called MEDLINE but is a databank containing 40 databases. Launched
by the NLM (National Library of Medicine) in 1971 , it now has 7.5-million citations
(not full-text articles) from 4,000 sources.
- This year MEDLINE became available on the web - as well as a version of
Grateful Med (communications and search engine). Users will pay for online time and info
retrieval but no longer have to pay $30 for the software. You can search AIDSLINE free.
- FREE MEDLINE!!!
HealthGate Data Corp.
http://www.healthgate.com
On April 29, 1996 HealthGate Data Corp. announced global Web access to its
MEDLINE
database FREE of charge. It also offers access to other MEDLARS databases
such as
CANCERLIT and AIDSLINE for a charge.
The fee-searchable areas are:
- Unlimited Searching Access: nine of its most popular databases for
$14.95/month
- Transaction Access: search any database starting at 25-cents per citation
- Consumer Health Information: varies
- If you are a physician with a DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency) number you can
search
MEDLINE, receive email and other services for free via a service called
Physicians Online.
- AOL - late in 1995 AOL made MEDLINE free to its subscribers.
It's in AOL's Better Health & Medical Network.
WWW and Medical Information:
SE/A (Southeastern/Atlantic Region of the National Network of Libraries of
Medicine) stated in their March/April 1996 edition of SEA Currents that as
far as medical journals are concerned the full-text concept on the web is
something often-sought and little delivered. Publishers provide a taste of
their journals: cover shots, tables of contents and some abstracts.
Worthwhile Websites
-
The Medical Sciences Library at Texas A&M University
http://msl-www.tamu.edu/msl/fulltext.htm
Provides an index of full-text journals on the web and a listing with links
to publications from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control), NIT (National Institutes of Health) and some other publications. Nicely annotated notes that help you decide whether or not the link is worthwhile - e.g. "requires the Adobe (TM) Acrobat (TM) Reader." Links to a medical dictionary.
- Medical Breakthroughs
http://www.ivanhoe.com
features breaking news reports from the world's top medical centers and
research labs.
Sign up by clicking "subscribe" at bottom of homepage. Every Monday a free
issue
is delivered to your via email.
- American Medical Association
http://www.ama-assn.org/journals/standing/jama/jamahome.htm
- Centers for Disease Control
http://www.cdc.gov
State Health Departments online.
MMWR (Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report) - viewable only with Adobe (TM)
Acrobat (TM) reader. Timely data on infectious disease (flu, AIDS, etc.).
Contains Bulletins from Around the World - flashes of health info especially
valuable if you're a global traveller.
- Index to Medical Network Resources
http://blair.library.rhodes.edu/Biolhtmls/med.html
Health advice, info about medical schools, links to general medical
collections (e.g. ethics
& genetics conversations at U of Penn and U of Chicago), purloined tobacco
papers, info
about specific diseases, 1996 Internation AIDS Conference, and more.
- GO ASk ALICE
http://www.columbia.edu/cu
Alice is interactive health service sponsored by Columbia University. Type
in symptoms
and get some free advice. Good trendy topics in mailbox- esp. in human
sexuality.
Lots of excellent links.
- OncoLink - University of Pennsylvania Cancer Center Resource
http://cancer.med.upenn.edu
This site has won numnerous awards. Very useful mix of cancer info .
- Checkout your local medical school on the web.
Barbara Hijek
hijekbarb@aol.com
1996 News Division Program for the SLA Annual Conference
SLA News Division Home
Reformatted on 03/23/03
Jessica Baumgart
newsdivisionweb@yahoo.com