Well I have finally done it - I have filled in my registration form for CILIP Chartership! I haven't actually sent it off yet but am planning to do so this week. It may not seem like such a big deal to most people but I have been ummming and ahhhing about Chartership now for well over a year, trying to decide whether or not it's worth going for. On one hand I can see the value in being reflective about your practice, getting support from a mentor and developing a portfolio of your professional development. But practically will it really change my practice? And will it price me out of the job market at this point in my career? And do I really have the time?
The Chartership question all came to a head this week when I read over the job description for the post I currently hold and found Chartership had been put in the person specification as essential. I should say this job description is a re-vamped one for the consultation we are currently undergoing at the Trust whereby we all have to reapply for our jobs (or jobs very similar to ours). I want to give myself the best possible chance of getting the job as I don't know who I may be up against (possibly my manager - how is that for awkward?) and at least if I don't have chartership yet I can show I am in the process of obtaining it. Anyway it has been on my PDP for this year as well so now will do as well as ever.
One of the main reasons I have been holding off is because I wanted to make sure I have a bit of experience behind me first. I just don't see the point in launching straight into Chartership after qualifying - what can you realistically bring to the exercise? Now I have 2 years of experience I have quite a few examples I can draw on. It might even encourage me to blog more regularly! Watch this space....
Tuesday, 2 August 2011
Wednesday, 18 May 2011
Living your life with one arm: a beginner's guide
I am not the first person to fall off my bike and fracture my shoulder and I certainly won't be the last. To help all of those folk out there who live life one-handed I have developed a very non-scientific rating scale for the activities one might encounter in daily life as a guide to aid decision-making:
1: Very easy (makes you question why we even have two arms)
2: Fairly easy (can be accomplished without much trouble)
3: Moderately difficult (can be undertaken but better to get some help)
4: Very difficult (do not attempt unaided)
5: Impossible (don't even bother)
So for example I would give a rating of 1 to something like putting something in the bin or pressing a light switch, 2 to making a glass of squash or typing on a keyboard, 3 to making a cup of tea or food shopping, 4 to baking a batch of brownies or cleaning the floor and 5 to rock-climbing or playing the saxaphone.
This is meant to be a guide not gospel and it will very much depend on how you're feeling that day. For instance I would probably rate "making spanikopita" as a 4 (fiddly filo pastry, messy feta cheese, all that washing up...) but I really fancied it this evening for my dinner and made some without falling down dead. Also the examples may be slightly skewed toward female activities, as that is what I am!
Reading a book: 1 (although more difficult if you try to combine reading with another activity, like eating)
Packing a suitcase: 2 (but give yourself plenty of time)
Taking a shower: 2 (make sure to go slowly and carefully so you don't slip)
Washing your face: 3 (the flannel is your friend)
Putting on a bra: 3 (was originally a 4 but then I discovered that if you turn the bra round backwards and attach it round your waist you can slide it round to your front, hook the straps round your arms (bad one first) and shimmy it up til it's in place! Note: for all clothing matters there is generally a fair amount of shimmying involved)
Washing dishes: 3-4 (uncomfortable and pretty ineffective)
Putting on a t-shirt: 5 (go for buttons or vest tops)
Contact lenses: 5 (glasses are the way forward)
1: Very easy (makes you question why we even have two arms)
2: Fairly easy (can be accomplished without much trouble)
3: Moderately difficult (can be undertaken but better to get some help)
4: Very difficult (do not attempt unaided)
5: Impossible (don't even bother)
So for example I would give a rating of 1 to something like putting something in the bin or pressing a light switch, 2 to making a glass of squash or typing on a keyboard, 3 to making a cup of tea or food shopping, 4 to baking a batch of brownies or cleaning the floor and 5 to rock-climbing or playing the saxaphone.
This is meant to be a guide not gospel and it will very much depend on how you're feeling that day. For instance I would probably rate "making spanikopita" as a 4 (fiddly filo pastry, messy feta cheese, all that washing up...) but I really fancied it this evening for my dinner and made some without falling down dead. Also the examples may be slightly skewed toward female activities, as that is what I am!
Reading a book: 1 (although more difficult if you try to combine reading with another activity, like eating)
Packing a suitcase: 2 (but give yourself plenty of time)
Taking a shower: 2 (make sure to go slowly and carefully so you don't slip)
Washing your face: 3 (the flannel is your friend)
Putting on a bra: 3 (was originally a 4 but then I discovered that if you turn the bra round backwards and attach it round your waist you can slide it round to your front, hook the straps round your arms (bad one first) and shimmy it up til it's in place! Note: for all clothing matters there is generally a fair amount of shimmying involved)
Washing dishes: 3-4 (uncomfortable and pretty ineffective)
Putting on a t-shirt: 5 (go for buttons or vest tops)
Contact lenses: 5 (glasses are the way forward)
Tuesday, 17 May 2011
My one-armed life
The following blog post doesn't really have much to do with libraries or information of anything of that ilk but last Thursday on my way to work I fell off my bike after a rather stupid-looking black Alsatian ran into me. Fortunately it happened in the park right behind Lewisham Hospital so I made my way over to A&E and was seen and tended to by the lovely staff there very efficiently. The upshot of the whole affair is that I have fractured my humerus, of which the only humorous - ha, ha! - thing is that I can say I now literally have a chip on my shoulder, and am reduced to living my life with one arm.
The timing isn't great - I am maid of honour at my sister's wedding in two weeks time and while the colours of the occasion are yellow and purple, I'm not sure the horrendous bruising on my inside upper arm are really what people want to see! But it could have been a lot worse - it's my left, not my right arm that is out of action, I fell just outside a hospital and I have incredible family, friends and work colleagues who have rallied around and given me so much love and support I am overwhelmed with gratitude! It has also been interesting seeing the NHS from the other side and I am so impressed by the care I was given at Lewisham Hospital. All the staff I encountered were friendly, efficient, professional, and up on the latest evidence. The nurse practitioner who wrote out my pain meds prescription came back a few minutes after giving me the scrip and changed it based on new research she had heard about from consulting with a colleague.
I am back there tomorrow morning for an apppointment at the fracture clinic so am hoping all shall be well. At some point I am going to write a post on living life with one arm and rate various activities one takes for granted on a sliding scale from relatively easy to impossible. Which shall hopefully be quite amusing but also remind me how lucky I am. After all, some people live their whole lives missing a vital limb and this will be my tribute to them!
The timing isn't great - I am maid of honour at my sister's wedding in two weeks time and while the colours of the occasion are yellow and purple, I'm not sure the horrendous bruising on my inside upper arm are really what people want to see! But it could have been a lot worse - it's my left, not my right arm that is out of action, I fell just outside a hospital and I have incredible family, friends and work colleagues who have rallied around and given me so much love and support I am overwhelmed with gratitude! It has also been interesting seeing the NHS from the other side and I am so impressed by the care I was given at Lewisham Hospital. All the staff I encountered were friendly, efficient, professional, and up on the latest evidence. The nurse practitioner who wrote out my pain meds prescription came back a few minutes after giving me the scrip and changed it based on new research she had heard about from consulting with a colleague.
I am back there tomorrow morning for an apppointment at the fracture clinic so am hoping all shall be well. At some point I am going to write a post on living life with one arm and rate various activities one takes for granted on a sliding scale from relatively easy to impossible. Which shall hopefully be quite amusing but also remind me how lucky I am. After all, some people live their whole lives missing a vital limb and this will be my tribute to them!
A new library website
Tomorrow (18 May 2011) sees the launch of a shiny new website for SLHT Library & Knowledge Services. The library manager at PRU and myself have been hard at work over the last few weeks and months getting all the pages ship-shape to launch for Knowledge Awareness Week 2011. We have been fortunate in that we only had to adapt an already-existing website but has still been quite a challenge deciding what to keep, what to get rid of, how the whole thing should be organised and how to make it visually appealing!
The website is run on the open source content management program Joomla! , which I had no experience of previously but I found it pretty easy to use. We decided quite early on that we didn't want just text and had the idea of using blue textboxes of varying hues for people navigate round the site. One of the trickiest parts was trying to get these boxes all the same width and height as they are all dependent on each other.
We also had to agree on the language used across the site and ensure everything was consistent across all the pages, like what pages should open in a new window and having hover-text over links. It's always the small things that take the longest!
However the last documents were uploaded today and linked in so it looks as though we have ourselves a website! I am pleased with it and really glad to have something decent to present to our users that they can use on and off-site. Now we just have to make sure everyone knows about it!
The website is run on the open source content management program Joomla! , which I had no experience of previously but I found it pretty easy to use. We decided quite early on that we didn't want just text and had the idea of using blue textboxes of varying hues for people navigate round the site. One of the trickiest parts was trying to get these boxes all the same width and height as they are all dependent on each other.
We also had to agree on the language used across the site and ensure everything was consistent across all the pages, like what pages should open in a new window and having hover-text over links. It's always the small things that take the longest!
However the last documents were uploaded today and linked in so it looks as though we have ourselves a website! I am pleased with it and really glad to have something decent to present to our users that they can use on and off-site. Now we just have to make sure everyone knows about it!
Healthy Lives, Healthy People need a Healthy Information Strategy
I stumbled across a news item in this week's CILIP Update/Gazette which I wanted to make a note of as I thought it was rather good. A blog post by Guy Daines, CILIP's Director of Policy and Advocacy on the official responses to yet another of the government's White Papers on health and the NHS. This time it was the turn of public health in "Healthy Lives Healthy People" and once more there is no mention of the role of information, evidence-based practice, information literacy, research or the part libraries have in bringing about change and influencing clinical practice. As Daines points out, "it remains important to assert the crucial role librarians, knowledge officers and other information specialists already play in promoting and facilitating an evidence-based approach and how a modest investment in such skills and services can help effect the transformation desired" but as always the question is how best to convey this message to those making decisions.
There are already clear signs the huge plans for the NHS are foundering - perhaps if Mr Lansley had consulted a library professional and had done a bit more background research we wouldn't be in this mess right now....
There are already clear signs the huge plans for the NHS are foundering - perhaps if Mr Lansley had consulted a library professional and had done a bit more background research we wouldn't be in this mess right now....
Thursday, 21 April 2011
Librarians...The New Cupcakes?
It's been ages since I've posted anything on this blog but I came across this article via the wonderful Pop Culture Happy Hour Facebook page (a podcast which I listen to religiously every week) and knew it had to go on here. Thank you Linda Holmes - you hit the nail on the head, as ever!
And for all of you out there who have not yet experienced PCHH (as it is affectionately know) - get thee to iTunes OR visit Linda's MonkeySee blog and give your ears a treat. I should warn however that if you listen to PCHH on public transport you may end up embarrassing yourself!
If you need any further convincing, a large section of the PCHH fans appear to be librarians...
And for all of you out there who have not yet experienced PCHH (as it is affectionately know) - get thee to iTunes OR visit Linda's MonkeySee blog and give your ears a treat. I should warn however that if you listen to PCHH on public transport you may end up embarrassing yourself!
If you need any further convincing, a large section of the PCHH fans appear to be librarians...
Sunday, 7 November 2010
Two very different training sessions and a Face-off!
This week I encountered two very different training scenarios which once again reinforced the variety of skills and experience needed to do this job. Both training sessions occurred on the same day, which probably made the juxtaposition more evident in my mind but I thought it would be a good topic to reflect on in this blog.
The first session was a refresher for the Orthopaedics registrar who had come in to see me last week about his dissertation. His topic was about treating Achilles tendon with various non-surgical immobilisation strategies such as bandaging or binding and in the last session we had done a combination title-MeSH search using surgical and non-surgical terms. Now he wanted to focus on the non-surgical and try searching all fields (.af) instead of just title. I had a suspicion this would definitely increase the number of articles obtained but they might not be as relevant. We built a good search though and in this session I really took a backseat and let him get on with it, making suggestions and giving encouragement when he needed it. He was rather disappointed by the large number of results, especially when we re-ran the search in Embase, CINAHL and AMED and he is going to try title and abstract next, rather than all fields. It was interesting that he never actually looked at his results, just at the number of results and I suspect he felt a bit overwhelmed by it all. I don’t think anyone would be able to fault his search strategy however and it really brought home to me just how individual every search is and the importance of trying different things. It was also reassuring that he had picked up what I had shown him last week and seemed relatively comfortable with using the databases and combining terms. To be honest I don’t think I really needed to be there but I think he wanted some reassurance that he was doing it ‘right’. The session last just under an hour and a half.
My second session took place in the afternoon with a staff nurse who confessed herself she was not comfortable with computers and instructed me to talk to her like she was ‘stupid’. She had the additional problem that she was suffering from vertigo and had difficulty concentrating. But she had an essay to write by the beginning of January and had not written anything academic for over eight years! Our search was on treatment of acne in adolescents, which was fairly straightforward but I found myself having to explain things a few times over and I could tell by the middle of the session she was starting to flag. The session lasted just under an hour.
I have been trying to get the trainees to do more themselves recently, rather than me showing them how to do things, and am finding it incredibly frustrating! I am so familiar with the HDAS interface and use it all the time so watching someone try to use it for the first time and clicking all the wrong things is very difficult for me. It’s very tricky trying to get the balance between keeping the search relevant to them (e.g. choosing a topic that they want to search) while making sure all the basics of searching effectively are covered (e.g. truncation, phrase searching, MeSH). If a user wants to find articles on nursing and mentoring, they naturally want to type “nursing and mentoring” in the search box (like Google!) not “nurs*.ti AND exp NURSING” AND “mentor* and exp MENTORING”. It’s not logical to them, even though it’s perfectly logical to me. This is something I must overcome as it is only by doing that trainees are truly going to learn. Perhaps I should start the session by getting them to put in the terms they would naturally use to search then go from there, demonstrating through trial and error that truncation, phrasing and MeSH terms equals more results and more relevant results (hopefully!).
Both sessions were very interesting in very different ways and I found myself utilising different skills in each one. The first was rigourous on an intellectual level while the second tested my skills in teaching and patience. In terms of what was learned I think the first session was probably more successful but am hoping the nurse took something away which she will be able to put to use later. We did at least find some relevant articles for her essay, so that was a bonus!
On Friday I hosted what I am hoping will become a regular event in the library for the next six weeks or so. It was a Point-of-Care Tools “Face-off” which gave participants the opportunity to test out three leading point-of-care tools currently on the market; Up-to-Date, Best Practice and Dynamed. We subscribe to Up-to-Date through the Trust already but Best Practice (from the BMJ) and Dynamed (an Ebsco product) we have on a trial basis through the London Deanery until 31 December 2010. Basically what they do is present a medical condition and walk the clinician through it from initial diagnosis through to treatment and follow-up, all backed up with the latest evidence. A clinician’s dream you might think (!) but the uptake of these tools has been fairly slow and I really wanted to find out if they have any practical use in the real world by getting those in the real world of medicine to try them out.
I advertised the Face-off to just the medical students and FY1s/FY2s this time around, liaising with the medical students coordinator and emailing all of them, following up with a reminder this week. There wasn’t much interest unfortunately and I’m not sure whether this is because they are too busy or just genuinely not interested. I tried to use hooks in the email to get their attention (e.g. “good medical exam resource”) and even offered food but in the end we only had two medical students come along, plus my manager, the library assistant and a student radiologist. However they were very enthusiastic and gave some very helpful feedback. I kept the session very simple and informal (more of a drop-in rather than an actual session) where they chose one condition and tried out the tools searching on that one topic and filling out an evaluation for each one. Unfortunately we lost access to Dynamed in the afternoon (it had been working fine in the morning) so the session just trialled Up-to-Date and Best Practice. I wrote up their vote and comments on the whiteboard and so far Up-to-Date has 3 votes and Best Practice has 2 votes. Interestingly the clinicians both voted for Best Practice.
I am hoping to run more of these Face-offs every Friday now until mid-December and advertise them to the wider Trust. I now have all the materials set up and it will just be a case of topping up the refreshments every other week or so. Will be sure to record what happens on this blog!
The first session was a refresher for the Orthopaedics registrar who had come in to see me last week about his dissertation. His topic was about treating Achilles tendon with various non-surgical immobilisation strategies such as bandaging or binding and in the last session we had done a combination title-MeSH search using surgical and non-surgical terms. Now he wanted to focus on the non-surgical and try searching all fields (.af) instead of just title. I had a suspicion this would definitely increase the number of articles obtained but they might not be as relevant. We built a good search though and in this session I really took a backseat and let him get on with it, making suggestions and giving encouragement when he needed it. He was rather disappointed by the large number of results, especially when we re-ran the search in Embase, CINAHL and AMED and he is going to try title and abstract next, rather than all fields. It was interesting that he never actually looked at his results, just at the number of results and I suspect he felt a bit overwhelmed by it all. I don’t think anyone would be able to fault his search strategy however and it really brought home to me just how individual every search is and the importance of trying different things. It was also reassuring that he had picked up what I had shown him last week and seemed relatively comfortable with using the databases and combining terms. To be honest I don’t think I really needed to be there but I think he wanted some reassurance that he was doing it ‘right’. The session last just under an hour and a half.
My second session took place in the afternoon with a staff nurse who confessed herself she was not comfortable with computers and instructed me to talk to her like she was ‘stupid’. She had the additional problem that she was suffering from vertigo and had difficulty concentrating. But she had an essay to write by the beginning of January and had not written anything academic for over eight years! Our search was on treatment of acne in adolescents, which was fairly straightforward but I found myself having to explain things a few times over and I could tell by the middle of the session she was starting to flag. The session lasted just under an hour.
I have been trying to get the trainees to do more themselves recently, rather than me showing them how to do things, and am finding it incredibly frustrating! I am so familiar with the HDAS interface and use it all the time so watching someone try to use it for the first time and clicking all the wrong things is very difficult for me. It’s very tricky trying to get the balance between keeping the search relevant to them (e.g. choosing a topic that they want to search) while making sure all the basics of searching effectively are covered (e.g. truncation, phrase searching, MeSH). If a user wants to find articles on nursing and mentoring, they naturally want to type “nursing and mentoring” in the search box (like Google!) not “nurs*.ti AND exp NURSING” AND “mentor* and exp MENTORING”. It’s not logical to them, even though it’s perfectly logical to me. This is something I must overcome as it is only by doing that trainees are truly going to learn. Perhaps I should start the session by getting them to put in the terms they would naturally use to search then go from there, demonstrating through trial and error that truncation, phrasing and MeSH terms equals more results and more relevant results (hopefully!).
Both sessions were very interesting in very different ways and I found myself utilising different skills in each one. The first was rigourous on an intellectual level while the second tested my skills in teaching and patience. In terms of what was learned I think the first session was probably more successful but am hoping the nurse took something away which she will be able to put to use later. We did at least find some relevant articles for her essay, so that was a bonus!
On Friday I hosted what I am hoping will become a regular event in the library for the next six weeks or so. It was a Point-of-Care Tools “Face-off” which gave participants the opportunity to test out three leading point-of-care tools currently on the market; Up-to-Date, Best Practice and Dynamed. We subscribe to Up-to-Date through the Trust already but Best Practice (from the BMJ) and Dynamed (an Ebsco product) we have on a trial basis through the London Deanery until 31 December 2010. Basically what they do is present a medical condition and walk the clinician through it from initial diagnosis through to treatment and follow-up, all backed up with the latest evidence. A clinician’s dream you might think (!) but the uptake of these tools has been fairly slow and I really wanted to find out if they have any practical use in the real world by getting those in the real world of medicine to try them out.
I advertised the Face-off to just the medical students and FY1s/FY2s this time around, liaising with the medical students coordinator and emailing all of them, following up with a reminder this week. There wasn’t much interest unfortunately and I’m not sure whether this is because they are too busy or just genuinely not interested. I tried to use hooks in the email to get their attention (e.g. “good medical exam resource”) and even offered food but in the end we only had two medical students come along, plus my manager, the library assistant and a student radiologist. However they were very enthusiastic and gave some very helpful feedback. I kept the session very simple and informal (more of a drop-in rather than an actual session) where they chose one condition and tried out the tools searching on that one topic and filling out an evaluation for each one. Unfortunately we lost access to Dynamed in the afternoon (it had been working fine in the morning) so the session just trialled Up-to-Date and Best Practice. I wrote up their vote and comments on the whiteboard and so far Up-to-Date has 3 votes and Best Practice has 2 votes. Interestingly the clinicians both voted for Best Practice.
I am hoping to run more of these Face-offs every Friday now until mid-December and advertise them to the wider Trust. I now have all the materials set up and it will just be a case of topping up the refreshments every other week or so. Will be sure to record what happens on this blog!
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