HINARI Access to Research in Health Programme
Module 7.5: E-book Resources for HINARI Users
Table of Contents:
 Resources available from the HINARI Reference Sources drop down menu
 Resources accessible from the Internet gateways and specific resources
Background:
The initial part of this module discusses the E-book resources available via HINARI. This
material is from participating publishers. The 2nd part reviews access to E-books that are
available for free via the Internet
Many of these HINARI resources are underutilized plus users are not aware of free Ebooks available on the Internet. These E-books range from clinical to basic sciences
topics. After viewing the PPT presentation and completing the exercises, you will have
the knowledge about and skills to use these resources. You will note that most E-books
are organized in a similar way. Each has a table of contents with links to the specific
chapters. Some of the chapters are PDF files while others can be web (HTML) pages.
To complete these exercises, you will initially login to HINARI, access the Full-text,
journals, databases and other resources page and go to the Find books by title A-Z list.
To access the Internet based-resources, you will open the various resources using the
specific site’s Internet address or URL.
1. Finding and Using the Oxford Textbook of Medicine, 5th edition – from the Books
collection A-Z list
Exercise 1
 Open the HINARI website at http://www.who.int/hinari/ and login.
 From the Contents page, click on the O listing of the Books Collection A-Z list.
 Find the link to the Oxford Textbook of Medicine, 5th edition and open this Ebook. You will need to scroll down the alphabetical list to locate this title.
Note: For some countries and institutions, the publisher has chosen to exclude
access to this title. If you cannot open the contents of the book after completing this
step, go to next to last tab of this exercise.
 Scroll down the initial page and locate the Contents listing. Open the Nutrition
chapter link. (You do not need an access token or sign up for an individual
subscription as access is provided through HINARI). Look at the 6 sub-chapters
and click on the link to a chapter that is of interest to you. Note: if you are interested
in another topic, you may open that chapter’s link.
 The Essentials will be displayed. Click on the Full-text option and display all the text
in this sub-chapter. Note that each chapter has a Further Reading option at the
bottom of the page. What are the topics listed in this sub-chapter? Is the full-text
information a webpage (html) or PDF files?
 Return to the Table of Contents and open another chapter. Which chapter have
you opened and what are the topics of interest to you?
 How could this electronic textbook be used in your institution? Would the sister
publication Oxford Handbook of Tropical Medicine be useful?
 Return to HINARI’s Contents page.
2. Finding and using American Psychiatric Publishing textbooks from the Find
books by title A-Z list
Exercise 2
 From the HINARI’s Contents page, click on the A listing of the Books collection AZ list.
 Find the link to the American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Psychiatry, 5th
edition and open this E-book. Note – you will have to scroll down the alphabetical
list to locate this title.
 From Part II Basic Science and Development, open the chapter titled Genetics. (#
6). Look at the numerous sub-chapters listed in the left column. Note: if you are
interested in another topic, you may open that chapter.
 How is this chapter organized? List the links to chapters in other American
Psychiatric Publishing textbooks.
 List the options for saving the information in this chapter (above the chapter’s text).
 Return to the Table of Contents and open another chapter that is of interest to you.
Which chapter have you opened and what are the topics of interest to you?
 How could this book be used in your institution?
 From the list of American Psychiatric Publishing books (Textbook of Geriatric
Psychiatry, Textbook of Psychopharmacology, Textbook of Substance Abuse
Treatment, Dulcan’s Textbook of Childhood and Adolescent Psychiatry, Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, DSM-IV Casebook Gabbard’s
Treatment of Psychiatric Disorders, Helping Parents, Youth and Teachers
Understand Medications for Behavioral and Emotional Problems, Manual of Clinical
Psychopharmacology, Textbook of Psychotherapeutic Treatment, What Your Patient
Needs to Know About Psychiatric Medications), which e-books would be of use in
your institution? Note all these are accessible from the Reference Sources menu.
 Return to HINARI’s Contents page.
.
3. Using the Find books by title list to view E- book titles.
Exercise 3
 Return to HINARI’s Contents page. Using the alphabetical listing of the Books
collection A-Z list, browse some of the alphabetical listings and open the link to a
specific e-book that is of interest to you. Were you able to open the book without
significant problems?
 Return to HINARI’s Contents page. From the Books collection A-Z list, open the
link to the 2nd e-book. Were you able to open the book without significant problems?
 Note why these books are of interest to you.
4. Using the FreeBooks4Doctors gateway to locate electronic textbooks.
Exercise 4
 From the HINARI Contents page click on the Other Free Collections drop down
menu.
 Find the link to FreeBooks4Doctors.com. and open this gateway. You also can go
directly using this url: http://www.freebooks4doctors.com/
 How many full-text E-books are available from this gateway?
 What broad subject Topics would be of interest to you?
 Click on one of the Topics of interest to you and open the listing of E-books.
 How many E-books are in this category and which are of use to you?
 Return to the initial page of the FreeBooks4Doctors website.
 Open the FB4D Impact Top 20 listing.
 How many of these E-books be of interest to you?
 Would most of these books be of use to your Institution? If so, why?
5. Finding and Using the Hesperian Online Library.
Exercise 5
 Open the Hesperian Books and Resources page at http://hesperian.org/booksand-resources/
 Scroll down the list of E-books. Note that these are geared toward health
practitioners in the field. . For this book and all others, there is a DOWNLOAD PDF
option.
 Click on the DOWNLOAD PDF for Where There Is No Doctor.
 What is the format of the book? Note that you can download the individual chapters
of this book. To download the complete book, you would have to purchase the Full
Book PDF Download.
 Would this book be of use to health practitioners in your country?
 Click on BACK TO BOOKS AND RESOURCES link. From the list of titles, open
another book of interest to you.
 Which title did you select and why?
 If you found some of these books useful, how could you notify other health
professionals – about these resources?
6. Using the FreeBookCentre.net gateway to locate electronic textbooks.
Exercise 6
 Open the Free Book Centre.net ‘Medical Books’ page at
http://www.freebookcentre.net/ In the left column, click on the link to the Medical
books
 From the Free Online Medical books subject list, click on Infectious Diseases.
 How many E-books are listed? Would some be of use at your institution?
 Return to the list of Free Online Medical books and choose a topic of interest to
you.
 Click on the link to a book that you would like to view.
 What title have you chosen?
 Is it a PDF or html file (webpage)?
7.
Finding full-text books from the National Academies Press
Exercise 7
 Open the National Academies Press website at http://www.nap.edu/ In the left
column, click on either the Food & Nutrition or Health and Medicine topics.
 Once the topic page opens, click on a subtopic of interest to you.
 Which subtopic did you choose and why?
 How many E-books are listed at the bottom of the page? Would some be of use at
your institution?
 Click on the link to a book that you would like to view. Complete the instructions to
download the full-text (this will include entering your name and email address or
completing the free registration).
 What title have you chosen?
 Were you able to download a either a chapter or the full PDF file?
8. Locating full-text publications from the WHO Health Topics List
Exercise 8
 Open the WHO (A-Z) Health Topics webpage at http://www.who.int/topics/en/
 From the A-Z subject list, click on the Reproductive Health topic.
 How many ‘publications’ are listed? Besides these publications, what other types of
full-text information are available?
 Choose and open a Health Topic of interest to you.
 How many ‘publications’ are listed? Are any of the other documents useful to you?
If so, note 2 or 3 titles.
 Would the material (publications and others) be of use at your institution?
9. Using the National Center for Biotechnology (NCBI) Bookshelf to locate (U.S.)
National Institute of Medicine E-books.
Exercise 9
 Open the NCBI Bookshelf at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/
 You will see a Book List that notes all the titles in alphabetical order.
 Scroll down the A-Z Book List until you find a book of interest to you. Click on the
link to that book.
 How are the links to the information organized? Is the full-text material html
language (a webpage) or PDF files.
 Return to the A-Z Book List again and find another book of interest to you.
 What is the title of this E-book?
.
10. Using the Merck Manuals: Online Medical Library website.
Exercise 10
 Open the Merck Manuals: Online Medical Library at
http://www.merck.com/mmpe/index.html
 From Sections category, open the Pediatrics page. How is the material organized?
Do the sub-topics have links to other sections of the Merck Manuals?
 Return to a Merck Manuals page that lists the broad category Sections and
Symptoms.
 Open the Symptoms list and choose a symptom of interest to you. Is the
information useful?
 From the perspective of a primary care health professional, is the information in the
Merck Manuals Library of use? If yes, why?
Assignment
You have completed ten exercises for the E-book Resources for HINARI Users module. You
looked at resources accessible via the HINARI Find books by title A-Z list (Oxford Textbook of
Medicine, American Psychiatric Publishing). You also have viewed gateways and specific
resources available via the Internet (FreeBooks4Doctors, Hesperian Online Library,
FreeBookCentre.net, National Academies Press, WHO Publications, MY NCBI Bookshelf and
Merck Manuals). You now have knowledge to access basic science and clinical texts
electronically.
Updated 2013 12