UHMLG Summer Residential
21st June, 2013
“With surgical focus…”:
Supporting the disembodied
at the RCS Library
Tom Bishop
Head of Library and Surgical Information Services
The Royal College of Surgeons of England
tbishop@rcseng.ac.uk
The Royal College of
Surgeons of England
“…an independent professional body
committed to promoting and advancing the
highest standards of surgical care for
patients.”
RCS Library – late
th
19
C view
Library Reading Room
Some number crunching
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Over 50,000 books (earliest 1471)
57 incunabula
c2000 periodical runs
c30,000 tracts and pamphlets
4.7 linear km of shelving
200 e-journal subscriptions
Archives – c2800 boxes
Museums – 54,000 specimens
c20,000 RCS members
The backdrop: Surgeons
• Time poor – many professional demands
• Reorganisation of the NHS and training
bodies
• Revalidation and recertification: new
requirements from 2012 onwards
• Too many sources of information… Too much
to read… Too complicated to navigate…
• Specialisation, sub-specialisation,
sub-sub-specialisation…
The backdrop: Us
• Library Review 2009/10 – proposed
expansion of electronic resources
• NHS Evidence experience – LSIS managed
the Specialist Collection for Surgery,
Anaesthesia, Perioperative and Critical Care
• Membership benefits – tangibility…
• Geographically dispersed membership
Current Awareness: What?
• Focus on tailored specialty-based information
supplemented by broader ‘general’ content
• Flexible approach to levels of evidence…
• Target = monthly bulletins
• Links to full text (RCS subscription or free)
wherever possible, leveraging (sorry…)
existing resources
Current Awareness: How?
• Key = collaborative with surgeons
• Initially 0.6 staff, plus input from managerial
group on project initiation and ongoing
strategy
• Two pilot specialties – Cardiothoracic
Surgery and Urology
Current Awareness: Again, how?
• Campaign Master – used by College for
email marketing campaigns. Allows for
detailed analysis of usage and usage
patterns, plus known ‘look and feel’,
reinforcing College branding
• SIMS - College membership database,
records surgeons’ specialist interests, used
throughout College for communications
activities
• CT bulletin
• CT bulletin
• CT bulletin
• CT bulletin
• CT bulletin
• CT bulletin
Developments…
• Increased dedicated staff resource – 1.6 (2 x
0.8) plus greater resilience
• Two more bulletins – Vascular Surgery and
Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
• Prototyping Patient Safety bulletin
• Website archive accessible to all Members
• Plastics bulletin
• Plastics bulletin
• Plastics bulletin
More number crunching
• 29 bulletins sent since 2012
• Open rates = 35-48%, average 41%; industry
standard = 7%
• Click through rates = 25-42%
• Of 163 email campaigns across all RCS
departments in 2012-2013, current awareness
bulletins held five of the top ten click through
rates.
• Three unsubscribes to date.
Oh, will the number crunching ever cease?
Number of unique journals checked per bulletin
Cross-specialty
41 plus 25 other sources
Cardiothoracic
57
Urology
47
Vascular
46
Plastic & Reconstructive
36
Total
227 journals plus 25 other sources
Number of articles assessed for relevance in a month (May 2013)
Cross-specialty
1,432
Cardiothoracic
1,824
Urology
894
Vascular
1,580
Plastic & Reconstructive
1,033
Total
6,763 articles assessed for relevance
Qualitative as well as quantitative
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I just want to thank you for the new Current Awareness Service for
Cardiothoracic Surgery. It is a fantastic idea and as a trainee, extremely useful
and educational for me. Although I browse table of contents for various journals
regularly, it is so much more convenient to have everything on the same page,
with access to the journals. (Cardiac Research Fellow)
I must congratulate you on this new venture. We are suffering from information
overload and a tool such as this is excellent in providing a digest of relevant upto-date literature. It took me a while to work things through but I am now
impressed by the ease of access. I think the editors have chosen a good range
of topics within urology and it is certainly a service I would like to use regularly.
(Consultant Urologist)
I think this is an invaluable educational resource for all surgeons practising the
specialty, from SpRs to new and established consultants. Even those examining
for the exit exam in the speciality will find something of interest. It is the best
thing the RCS has done to further post graduate education in the entire field of
cardiothoracic surgery. Well done. (Consultant Cardiothoracic Surgeon)
…and beyond?
• Orthopaedics – let’s try something different…
• Sponsorship opportunities
• Business case to expand further – more
resource, some economies of scale
• Spin-offs – Twitter journal club? Provision to
non-members?
• Usage can inform collection development
• Platform review?
War damage 1941