Library faculty have assembled a guide to resources for the novel Coronavirus. Major publishers, including the Lancet and BMJ, have made many of their resources on the virus freely available without a subscription. Key clinical resources like DynaMed and UpToDate have collected resources about the virus. The guide also features a link to genomic data about the virus.

Katrina Bell, Library Associate in Systems, was accepted to the Data Analytics Research Training (DART) Fellowship from The University of Texas at Arlington, funded in full by the National Network of Libraries of Medicine. The DART Fellowship is a 6-week cohort training and development program, providing a guided pathway for information professionals to acquire data literacy skills using common methodologies applied toward public health efforts. Throughout the program, the cohort will work collaboratively with guiding researchers – professionals currently engaged in the work the participants are learning – in order to complete a major component of a research project to be published in an official presentation, article, blog, or another professional dissemination method. The guiding researchers will provide a project from which the participants can choose a component on which to work.

Sarah Jackson, MLIS, education librarian, was funded through a competitive process to attend the National Network of Libraries of Medicine Library Carpentry workshop, to be held March 2020 at the University of Maryland Health and Human Services Library in Baltimore. Library Carpentry is an international effort focused on building software and data skills within library and information-related communities.

If you search PubMed, you have noticed major changes to its look and feel. People with a MyNCBI account will not have to recreate searches or accounts. They will eventually map to the new interface. Highlights include:

• The results page now shows abstracts with your highlighted search terms
• A “Cite” button on the right side of an individual record, to produce a correct citation in 4 popular styles
• Being able to page through your results from the abstract screen, instead of having to return to the results list to click the next citation
• More responsive design for mobile devices – more than 50% of PubMed searches are done on a mobile device 

Both the new PubMed and the old PubMed will be available throughout early 2020. Eventually, only the new interface will be available.

Questions? Contact the library at shlibref@lsuhsc.edu or 318-675-5445. The librarian for your department or program is happy to talk to you about enhancing your PubMed searches.

Erin Ware, MLIS, joined the Library as reference librarian on January 2, 2020. Ms. Ware is a graduate of LSU School of Library & Information Science, and a certified school media librarian. She has also worked at Baton Rouge General Hospital and the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality. Her responsibilities will include providing reference assistance, conducting database searches, and developing and teaching library classes.

Will Olmstadt, executive director of the health sciences library, was appointed to the Public Policy Advisory Council for the Special Libraries Association, for a 2-year term through 2022. This committee advises the association on policy issues that impact information professionals.

The Writing Consultant Service is unavailable during the holidays, starting on Friday, December 20. Documents will be reviewed in the order received starting on Monday, January 6, 2020.

For more information about the Library’s writing services and its policies, including turnaround time, please visit the Writing Consultants webpage.

The Library Writing Consulting e-mail will not be monitored Thursday, November 28 – Sunday, December 1, for the Thanksgiving holidays. Manuscripts submitted will be reviewed starting Monday, December 2, in the order they were received.

LSU Health Shreveport Medical Library will close at 5pm on Wednesday, November 27 and will also be closed Thursday, November 28 thru Saturday, November 30. Regular Library hours will resume at noon on Sunday, December 1.