Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library Blog

Effective Wednesday, February 27, the Library’s public workstations have been updated. Patrons will be able to browse the contents of and save to their USB drives or floppy diskettes. UCLA students, staff and faculty will be able to use CLICC’s Software Shortcut to access many software applications. Available software includes the Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access), Graphical Applications (Photoshop, Rhino), Statistical Applications (SPSS, Stata), and a Social Sciences Application (MapInfo Pro). More applications may be added in the future.

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Beginning Monday, February 4th, you will need your BruinCard to access the Biomedical Library’s 3rd floor. BruinCards must be swiped to access the 3rd floor via stack level 8 or the main stairway. The Library Staff elevator provides handicapped access and has also been equipped with a card swipe device. As a reminder, access to the Graduate Reading Room and group study rooms on the 3rd floor continues to be restricted to graduate students in the health or life sciences only.

How the New NIH Public Access Law Affects UCLA Scientists

Scientists receiving grant money from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will now have to submit copies of their research papers to PubMed Central (PMC) when their papers are accepted for publication in a journal. PMC will then make these papers freely available to the public no later than 12 months after publication.

PubMed Central (PMC) is the NIH’s free digital archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature.

Important dates:

• As of April 7, 2008, all articles arising from NIH funds must be submitted to PubMed Central upon acceptance for publication.
• As of May 25, 2008, NIH applications, proposals, and progress reports must include the PubMed Central reference number when citing an article that falls under the policy and is authored or co-authored by the investigator, or arose from the investigator’s NIH award. This policy includes applications submitted to the NIH for the May 25, 2008 due date and subsequent due dates.

Further Information and Help

• The NIH maintains a Public Access website with an FAQ and detailed instructions.
• To help you become familiar with the step-by-step submission process, illustrated submission tutorials are available.
• For more information or questions about the NIH policy, during this transitional stage, please contact Janet Carter, jcarter@libraray.ucla.edu or 310-825-5802.

DynaMed is now available to all UCLA affiliates. This online tool summarizes evidence for health care professionals and can help guide clinical decisions. Nearly 2,000 topics are covered; each topic is organized into clinically relevant sections. 500 journals and reviewing sources are monitored, and new evidence is integrated into the summaries each day.

We recommend accessing DynaMed through the Biomed Library’s Key Resources page, where we willl always have an active link to DynaMed and our other frequently-used resources.

Locating statistics and information about economics, health indicators, and ecology in countries outside the U.S. can be difficult. SourceOECD is created by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) to provide access to this type of information. In addition to a searchable database of statistics, they provide statistical abstracts with basic information about OECD member countries.

The OECD also convenes groups of researchers to study aspects of economic development. These researchers gather the statistical data and use it to write working papers, books, and peer-reviewed journals, all of which are available on the SourceOECD website.

Some example titles of working papers:

• Trends in Severe Disability Among Elderly People
• Pharmaceutical Pricing and Reimbursement Policies in Mexico (part of a series; other titles in the series cover this topic in other OECD countries)
• Dynamics of Biotechnology Research and Industry in India
• Higher Education Management and Policy

Contact a reference librarian if you have questions about using SourceOECD.

The National Library of Medicine has created the free Drug Information Portal to provide patients, families, and health care professionals with quality information on medication.

Begin by typing a trade or generic name for a medication in the search box, and click “Go.” Your results are links to other resources provided by the National Library of Medicine and National Institutes of Health:

NLM’s Drug Information Portal links you directly to the relevant portions of these websites. Previously, you had to search each website individually, a time-consuming and often frustrating process. The NLM Drug Information Portal makes it easier to gather information about medications from multiple sources.