Finland is undergoing a health and social services reform. This reform will reshape the structure, services and funding of health and social services and establish new counties and transfer new duties to the counties. The aim is to provide people more equal services and even out population level differences in health and well-being, and to curb cost increases. This means a new type of operational environment for the university libraries acting in the hospitals. A survey was conducted at the Kuopio University Hospital to find out the needs of the users. It shows that both library collection resources and information services are needed by academic and hospital staff

Halkoaho, Arja

Luoto, Kirsi

Ovaska, Tuulevi

Saarti, Jarmo

English

Journal of EAHIL

9Journal of EAHIL 2018; Vol. 14 (1): 9-14Feature ArticleIntroductionThe medical practice in hospitals is built on researchresults, evidence-based methods and knowledge ofcenturies. This has been the basis for modern healthpractices in hospitals. The university hospitals arealso a major actor in both academic teaching andresearch. This means that there is a need foracademic level information services and librarycollections of current research publications to satisfythe specific needs of the academic and hospital staff.The modern information environment is digitisingrapidly. This means that many services at theuniversity libraries acting in hospitals are beingoutsourced to third-party actors; the most importantbeing the digital collections and databases. Theseare managed via contracts that enable the academicuse of the collection at the university hospitals. Thepublishers have an understanding for this type of useand this is evident in the pricing of, e.g. the e-journals. This is a win-win situation: the academicstaff at the hospitals produce a majority of thepublications that are used in developing hospitalservices and the new knowledge for the benefit ofpatients and healthcare globally. As working places,university hospitals are knowledge-dependentlearning organisations in a very classical sense. Theyneed efficient and up-to-date resources and services.The vast amount of academic documented resourcesavailable and the time-critical operational workconducted at the hospitals mean that there is a needfor library and information services that enable thestaff to focus on their main tasks and save time intheir information seeking and use. In addition, theself-service based digital databases require a goodskill base to be able to conduct valid and usefulsearches. This has meant that the role of the teacherhas become an integral part of the library andinformation services (1, 2). The university hospitals and universities have beenworking together in Finland to facilitate theuniversity hospitals with academic level informationand library services. In many cases, the hospitallibraries have in fact been the basis for the universitylibrary’s medical collections (3). Kuopio University Hospital (KUH) caters for thespecialist medical care of the 248,000 citizens in itsarea. It also serves for the one million inhabitants inEastern and Central Finland in cases that requirehighly specialised medical care. As one of the fiveuniversity hospitals in Finland, KUH provides high-AbstractFinland is undergoing a health and social services reform. This reform will reshape the structure, services andfunding of health and social services and establish new counties and transfer new duties to the counties. The aimis to provide people more equal services and even out population level differences in health and well-being, andto curb cost increases. This means a new type of operational environment for the university libraries acting in thehospitals. A survey was conducted at the Kuopio University Hospital to find out the needs of the users. It showsthat both library collection resources and information services are needed by academic and hospital staff.Key words: access to information; health care reform; information services; libraries; surveys andquestionnaires.Supporting the medical research and daily work atthe hospital – analysing the library and informationservices at the Kuopio University HospitalArja Halkoaho (a), Kirsi Luoto (a), Tuulevi Ovaska (b), Jarmo Saarti (b) and Tuomas Selander (a)(a) Kuopio University Hospital, Kuopio, Finland(b) University of Eastern Finland Library, Kuopio, FinlandAddress for correspondence: Tuulevi Ovaska, University of Eastern Finland Library, PO Box 1627, FI-70211 Kuopio, Finland.E-mail: tuulevi.ovaska@uef.fi.10 Journal of EAHIL 2018; Vol. 14 (1): 9-14Arja Halkoaho, Kirsi Luoto, Tuulevi Ovaska, Jarmo Saarti and Tuomas Selander quality care in all medical specialties, conductsinternationally renowned research, and trains thetop experts of the future (4).University of Eastern Finland (UEF) is a multidis-ciplinary university that offers teaching in more than100 major subjects in four faculties: the Philosoph-ical Faculty, the Faculty of Science and Forestry, theFaculty of Health Sciences, and the Faculty of So-cial Sciences and Business Studies. The UEF Li-brary is a public academic library offering library andinformation services especially for the university’s3,000 staff members and 13,000 students. However,the library is also open to everyone else who is seek-ing information. The UEF Library is one single ad-ministrative entity comprising the campus librariesin Joensuu, Kuopio and Savonlinna, and the KUHMedical Library – a joint library of KUH and UEF(5, 6).There has been a university reform in Finland fromthe 2010 onwards. At present, the healthcare legis-lation is being renewed. Both of these policy devel-opments have started to bring in new publicmanagement types of managerial and ownership is-sues into the academic environment (7). This mayhave severe consequences especially for the aca-demic use of digital resources, if there is an effort toeconomise by outsourcing the academic work orworking environment to a business-like environ-ment.We decided to conduct a survey-based research thattries to answer to the following questions: 1) What type of information is needed and whatservices are used at the Kuopio UniversityHospital?2) Is there a difference between the use and needsof the academic and hospital staff? The authors are from both the hospital researchadministration and the university library, since bothneeded information to develop our services andinform the policy makers. In the following, wedescribe our research and its results and make someconclusions based on them.MethodsData collection The data for the study was gathered by surveycarried out with the E-lomake software. Thequestionnaire (in Finnish) was published in theinternal website of KUH, and anyone who had theaccess to the intranet was able to answer.  The main theme in the questionnaire was the usageof the library services. The services were categorisedinto collections, research and publishing supportservices, personal services, teaching services andguidelines. In addition, the use of library space andequipment as well as acquisition services were askedabout. The respondents answered the questions bychoosing the appropriate option. The options of thestructured part of the questionnaire were “Yes, now”,“Yes, now and in the future”, “Yes, in the future”,“Not now nor in the future”, “Cannot say”. Therewas also an unstructured part with open-endedquestions about the use of services now and needsin the future. As background information theaffiliations and position or title of the respondentwere asked. Table 1 presents the structuredquestions of the survey.Table 1. Survey questions.11Journal of EAHIL 2018; Vol. 14 (1): 9-14Supporting research and daily work Data analysisWithin the open-ended questions, the data wereanalysed both qualitatively and quantitativelyaccording to themes: database, informationspecialist services, teaching and guidelines, remoteaccess, space and equipment and acquisitionservices. The data were analysed using thematiccontent analysis and the answers were grouped. Theconcepts with similar content were combined toform upper concepts. Data were presented both asquotes to show the meaning that participants gaveto the theme in question and in some cases alsoquantitatively to show how many shared the sameview. The statements were read by AH andmeaningful concepts and information were groupedunder the selected themes.  If a theme wasaddressed even in one sentence, this was includedas a statement within the theme. The research groupalso worked together in reviewing theconceptualisation process and the selected conceptsby confirming the validity of the study (8-10).Statistical analysesNumerical variables from the survey were re-classified by TS into four groups “Cannot say”, “Notnow nor in the future”,” Yes, now” and “Yes, now andin the future” where the choices “Yes, now and inthe future”, “Yes, in the future” were combined.These variables were expressed as median orfrequencies with percentages from all data and bothstudy groups. Median was calculated from choices“Not now nor in the future” to “Yes in the future”,excluding the choice “Cannot say”. Groupdifferences were tested by Fisher’s exact test. P-values <0.05 were set to indicate statisticallysignificant results. All analyses were executed by Rstatistical software version 3.1.1.ResultsThere were 184 responses. 138 of the respondentswere only KUH staff members, and 29 persons wereboth KUH and UEF staff members or students,while only four had solely UEF affiliation. In all, 45respondents identified themselves as clinicians, 43as researchers, 19 as students and seven as other.Structured questionsThe results inside each of the question groups do notusually differ. If the respondents use one of theservices in a group, they seem to use the others, too.For example, among the personal services, half ofthe respondents use guidance (information specialistservices by appointment), information services(commissioned services, reference lists) and librarymaterial delivery to office now and in the future. There are not any significant differences betweenthe respondent types in the use of most of theservices. The ones that show a clear difference –remote access to electronic collections, bibliometricservices and customer services/reference services –are shown in Figures 1, 2 and 3. They also show thatthe remote access and customer/reference servicesare used almost by all the respondents while morethan half of them do not use or know bibliometricservices. As the respondents represent all hospitalstaff, not only researchers, this is understandable. Figures 4 and 5 show almost identical numbers forthe library’s teaching services and guidelines and thelibrary space and equipment. While more than athird of the respondents are current and futureusers, a quarter or almost a quarter is not interestedFig. 1. Remote access to electronic collections.Fig. 2. Bibliometric services.12 Journal of EAHIL 2018; Vol. 14 (1): 9-14Arja Halkoaho, Kirsi Luoto, Tuulevi Ovaska, Jarmo Saarti and Tuomas Selander in these services, a significant number (close to halfof them on teaching and guidelines) cannot say –either because they are not aware of these servicesor not interested in them. We cannot explain thisgap by the respondents being only hospital staffmembers but must take a closer look at marketingthese services to all potential users.The acquisition services are the most unknowngroup of these services. Most of the respondents didnot seem to have any knowledge about this kind ofservices to their units.Unstructured questionsThe replies to the open-ended questions aboutwhich services the respondents use now, focus oncollections. Books (printed and e-books) got 62mentions. They have a big role in continuousprofessional development. In addition, journals(electronic and printed) are important with 53mentions. The use of different databases wasmentioned 35 times. Remote access to electronicresources was mentioned 30 times withoutspecifying if databases, journals, e-books or all ofthem were accessed remotely. Information specialistservices were also popular and mentioned 43 times,while lending and reference desk services got 26mentions. Acquisition services got mentions, too.Twelve respondents mentioned training services.According to these unstructured responses, many ofthe respondents use the library space for studyingand group-work (17 mentions) and they use thelibrary work stations and printers, as well (15mentions). Some respondents did not specify theservices but responded all services (3) andcollections (5). Seventeen said they do not use thelibrary.The replies to the open-ended questions aboutwhich services would be used in the future indicatethat the respondents are satisfied with the currentservices and would use them also in the future (15).Personal services related to information retrieval(13) and information skills training (12) were mostcommonly mentioned. The respondents stressed theimportance of expertise in customer services (6).They listed avoiding predatory publishers andreference management as training topics. Twelve ofthem mentioned the importance of remote accessalso in the future. Databases (6), articles (4), books(9), and library space (4) also got some mentions.The third unstructured question was the most open-ended one, asking if the respondents would like tosay anything else about the library services. Theyappreciated the competence of the staff and thefriendliness of the customer services. They werethankful for the smooth processes, especially thelogistics and delivery services between the libraryunits (11). Though they considered remote accessnecessary, they also hoped that the local service inthe hospital would remain. They regarded libraryFig. 3. Customer services/reference services.Fig. 4. Teaching services and guidelines.Fig. 5. Library space and equipment.13Journal of EAHIL 2018; Vol. 14 (1): 9-14Supporting research and daily work services important for professional development.The quotes are translated from Finnish.“Library definitely has to remain at KUH! Importantfor professional development.”In addition, the respondents brought forward that auniversity hospital must have a research library thatsupports the clinical research conducted in the hospital.“The library services at the KUH Medical Library areexcellent. The service is good and prompt. A universityhospital has to have its own research library.”Among the services, the respondents valued especiallyteaching, and wanted targeted information skillstraining to support research. They would also like todevelop the space and equipment, for example, byadding computers.“I consider it extremely important that [the services]remain and evolve. Also, the physical library isneeded (not only virtual).”The survey also suggests that the library mustcommunicate more actively. Some of the respondentswere not aware of all library services; some found ithard to find them on the library website and thehospital intranet. For example, Quesenberry et al.(12) have raised the question on how to increaseawareness of the library services in order to makethem an integral part of the scholarly process.Additionally, they emphasise the need to implementstrategies to streamline access to online resources andproviding instruction in preferred formats (12).Lack of time and busy work shifts are the mainobstacles of using the library. One respondentdescribed their situation at the time of the survey:“I have not had a chance to get to know the servicesand the collections. During working hours there is notime to acquaint myself with the library tips presentedin the hospital intranet.”The fact that this person has apparently at leastnoticed the regular "library tip of the week" bulletinscan be considered as an encouraging feature in theirsituation.Conclusions"It is crucial that the library can communicateactively about its collections and services. This is notsolely an information dissemination or marketingissue, but involves aligning with hospital priorities,seeking out supporters and forging partnerships toenhance integration" (13). Some of the questions inthe survey turned out to be more useful as marketingtools, providing information of the services that areless used or unheard of, than as data about the usageof those services. The data collected here providesmaterial also for the lobbying of the need foracademic level library and information services atthe (university) hospitals. This is crucial whenplanning the services for the renewed health carepolicies in Finland.Our hypothesis that both the academic and hospitalstaff need library and information resources andservices was proven correct. A good and up-to-datedigital collection is what the users are looking for.We thought that there would have been moredifferences in the information services usage, but itwas found that also the information services, e.g.bibliometrics, reference and teaching – even thelibrary space, were widely used.As a conclusion, we can say that hospitals that alsoconduct research have created an informationculture that is quite similar to all the people workingat the hospitals, regardless of the type of work aperson does. The different practices are based onresearch and documented evidence. This means thata hospital has a need for professional level academiclibrary and information services and cannot rely onlyon digital resources on a self-service basis. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSThe authors would like to thank Urho Heinonen andSuvi Tolvanen for proofreading the article.Received on 5 February 2018.Accepted on 16 February 2018.14 Journal of EAHIL 2018; Vol. 14 (1): 9-14Arja Halkoaho, Kirsi Luoto, Tuulevi Ovaska, Jarmo Saarti and Tuomas Selander REFERENCES1. Bhatti R, Bin Naeem S. Measures of self-efficacyamong healthcare professionals to perform thedifferent tasks involved in conducting internetsearch. The Fifth European Conference onInformation Literacy (ECIL); 18-21 September2017; Saint-Malo, France. Information LiteracyAssociation; 2017.2. Lahtinen J, Talja S. Information specialistspromote workplace information literacy – a casestudy of the health care libraries’ expertise androles in a working life project. The FifthEuropean Conference on Information Literacy(ECIL); 18-21 September 2017; Saint-Malo,France. Information Literacy Association; 2017.3. Huuhtanen R. [Searching information for theScience Park of Kuopio: Growth and the firstdecades of the Kuopio University Library,Finland] Finnish. Kuopio: University of Kuopio;2006.4. Kuopio University Hospital [Internet]. Kuopio:Kuopio University Hospital; 2018 [cited 12January 2018]. Available from:https://www.psshp.fi/web/en.5. University of Eastern Finland [Internet].Joensuu, Kuopio, Savonlinna: University ofEastern Finland; 2017 [cited 12 January 2018].Available from: http://www.uef.fi/en/etusivu.6. Ovaska T, Saarti J. Jointly Effective - making endsmeet in the KUH and UEF library. JEAHIL.2011;7(2):5-8.7. Juntunen A, Muhonen A, Nygrén U, Saarti J.Reinventing the academic library and its mission:Service design in three merged finnish libraries.In: Woodsworth A, Penniman WD, editors.Advances in Librarianship. Bingley: Emerald;2013. p. 225-46.8. Malterud K. Qualitative research: standards,challenges, and guidelines. Lancet. 2001 Aug11;358(9280):483-8.9. Sandelowski M. Real qualitative researchers donot count: the use of numbers in qualitativeresearch. Res Nurs Health. 2001 Jun;24(3):230-40.10.Hsieh HF, Shannon SE. Three approaches toqualitative content analysis. Qual Health Res.2005 Nov;15(9):1277-88.11.Haapanen M, Kultamaa P, Ovaska T, Salmi K.Reducing library space can promote the shiftfrom storage of print-collections towards alearning-centre without limiting the access toinformation. Library Management. 2015 11/09;2018/01;36(8):685-9.12.Quesenberry AC, Oelschlegel S, Earl M,Leonard K, Vaughn CJ. The impact of libraryresources and services on the scholarly activity ofmedical faculty and residents. Med Ref Serv Q.2016 07/02;35(3):259-65.13.Macdonald K. Collaborative partnerships forlibrary services: Examples from a hospital library.Journal of Hospital Librarianship. 201510/02;15(4):365-72.This paper is published under a CC BY license

Supporting the medical research and daily work at the hospital – analysing the library and information services at the Kuopio University Hospital

http://ojs.eahil.eu/ojs/index.php/JEAHIL/article/download/254/248/

Supporting the medical research and daily work at the hospital – analysing the library and information services at the Kuopio University Hospital

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Journal of EAHIL