HINARI Access to Research in Health Programme
E-book Resources for HINARI Users
(Advanced Course Module 7)
Table of Contents:
 Resources available from the HINARI Reference Sources 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 Books collection 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 not to offer
their contents to this title. If you cannot open the contents of the book after
completing this step, go to the next 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?
 Return to HINARI’s Contents page.
.
3. Using the Books collection list to view E- book titles.
Exercise 3
 Return to HINARI’s Contents page. Using the alphabetical listing of Publishers
click on Taylor & Francis. Once the list of e-journals and e-books is opened,
browse down the alphabetical listings and open the link to a specific e-book that is of
interest to you. Note that an e-book will have one year for publication and an ejournal will have several years of volumes listed (e.g. vol. 35 (2000) – current issue).
 Were you able to open the book without significant problems? What is the title of the
book?
 Return to Taylor & Francis e-journal and e-book list. Open the link to the 2nd ebook. Were you able to open the book without significant problems? What is the
title of the book?
 Note why these books are of interest to you.
 If your institution has access to other publishers with e-books, open these publishers’
e-journal and e-book lists to view other book titles that are of interest to you. Hint –
the e-books will be located in the Accessible Content list.
4. Using the Google e-Books option
Exercise 4
 Open the Google books page at http://books.google.com/ - that contains Internet
access to material from the Google Library Project and Partner Programs
 In the search box, enter clinical cardiology and click on the Search Box.
 From the Search results page, click on several different title links. Note that some
are full-text e-books books, others are chapters and some are not available
electronically. Also note the Google Adds in the right column.
 Return to the Search results page (click back on the web browser). On the top
horizontal bar, click on Search Tools. Open the Any books drop down menu and
click on Free Google eBooks.
 Click on the link to a book or chapter of a book that you would like to view.
 What title have you chosen? Can you view the full-text of the book or chapter?
 Now return to the Search results page (click back on the web browser) with the
Search tools displayed. From the top horizontal bar, open the Sort by relevance
drop down menu and click on Sorted by date. Is this sort more useful than the
relevance one? Remember to click on Clear – to complete a different search (unless
you want these specific limits).
 In the Search Box, enter a search that is of interest to you. What search did you
complete? Were the results useful? Remember to use the Search Tools to limit
this search.
5.
Using Booksee.org to locate full-text e-books on specific topics
Exercise 5
 Open the Booksee.org page at http://en.booksee.org - a site with access to over
2,400,000 books with the option to download most as PDF files
 Enter Infectious Diseases in the search box and click on the magnifying glass
icon.
 Scroll down to the bottom of the displayed page. How many E-books are listed? Are
these all the books for this topic? Note the size (MB) and language of each title
listed.
 Repeat the Infectious Diseases search and check the Exact matches box and the
magnifying glass symbol.
 Are the results the maximum number allowed for each search?
 If so, limit this search by adding AND pediatrics in the search box and clicking on
the magnifying glass icon.
 What is the number of results from this more precise search? What is the size of the
smallest and largest e-books (MB)? Download the smallest PDF and note the time
necessary for this download.
 Return to the list of Booksee.org search page and choose a topic of interest to
you.
 How many titles are listed in your search? If you have reached the maximum
number of titles, limit your search (use AND plus another term).
 What is the size of the smallest and largest e-books (MB)? If there is sufficient time,
download the smallest PDF and note the time necessary for this download.
6. Using the FreeBookCentre.net gateway to locate electronic textbooks.
Exercise 6
 From the HINARI Contents page click on the Other Free Collections drop down
menu, open the link Free Book Centre.net ‘Medical Books’ website. You also can
go directly using this url: 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.
 How many e-books are listed? 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
 From the HINARI Contents page, click on the Other Free Collections drop down
menu, open the link to National Academies Press website. You also can go
directly using this url: http://nap.edu
 Once the topic page opens, click on a Browse by subtopic and open 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 completing the free registration).
 What title have you chosen?
 Were you able to download a either a chapter or the full PDF file?
8. Using the National Center for Biotechnology (NCBI) Bookshelf to locate (U.S.)
National Institute of Medicine E-books.
Exercise 8
 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. What is the title of the 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?
9. Locating full-text publications from the WHO Health Topics List
Exercise 9
 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?
.
Assignment
You have completed Advanced Course Module 7 and the nine exercises for the E-book
Resources for HINARI Users module. You looked at resources accessible via the HINARI
Books collection list (Oxford Textbook of Medicine, American Psychiatric Publishing, Taylor &
Francis). You also have viewed gateways and specific resources available via the Internet
(Google e-Books, enbooksee.org, FreeBookCentre.net. FreeBooks4Doctors, National
Academies Press, MY NCBI Bookshelf and WHO Publications,). You now have knowledge to
access basic science and clinical texts electronically.
Updated 2015 06