How visible is your institution's librarian? Does your librarian participate in your leadership meetings, your unit council meetings or your journal club meetings? Does your librarian make rounds on a routine basis with the nursing staff and does she teach you how to do searches, and what the difference is between literature reviews and systematic reviews?

That is exactly what Diane Rourke, MS, AHIP, Director of Library Services at the Baptist Health South Florida Hospital System and Donna Flake, MSLS, MSAS, AHIP, Library Director of the North Carolina SEAHAC Hospital System do. At the Medical Librarian Association Meeting in Washington, DC this past week, Donna Flake presented: Going Beyond the Library to Integrate Your Resources into the Nurses' Environment and Diane Rourke presented: Supporting Today's Magnet Journey in Nursing. Diane is the MLA delegate to the American Nurses Credentialling Center's Magnet Certification Program. 

The role of the library is changing. No longer is the library thought of as this room where you go to search through books and journals.  Now the library is a living entity that is accessible through workstations on wheels in every nursing unit. Librarians can assist nurses with the finding the evidence-based research that supports practice change. Hospital systems that are integrating evidence-based, best practice at point of care, have found that the librarian-nurse partnership has the potential to positively impact nursing practice and patient outcomes. 

For more information on this topic, please join us at a webinar on June 30th at 1pm. Just go to www.ovid.com to register.

By  Anne Dabrow Woods, MSN, RN, CRNP, ANP-BC