July 2013 Archives
Health care practitioners in many areas of Virginia have little or no access to the caliber of medical information they need to best treat their patients. Health care providers associated with universities have vast online repositories of the most up-to-date information at their fingertips. Other providers do not.
A new website, A Common Wealth of Public Health and Primary Care Information, helps address this disparity.
Designed to serve public health care and community health center physicians, nurses, dentists, dental hygienists, nutritionists, health educators, health administrators, epidemiologists and others, the site is a partnership between Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences at Virginia Commonwealth University and two of Virginia's eight Area Health Education Center (AHEC) Programs, the Capital and the Rappahannock AHEC programs. The National AHEC Organization (NAO) works to assist health practitioners in medically underserved areas. They are nonprofit organizations strategically located where health care and health care education needs are not adequately met.
AHEC programs work "to bridge the gap between academic health centers and the community. VCU Libraries' technical expertise in collaboration with AHEC has created a project that can benefit communities in the commonwealth," said Jane Wills, RAHEC executive director.
The project partners developed the new website with insight provided by an advisory committee consisting of public health and primary care professionals, and VCU public health faculty members.
VCU librarians organized the materials for public health and primary care professionals. The partners are now working to promote the website so Virginia public health, rural health, and primary health care organizations, associations and providers can use the resource to better care for their patients.
VCU librarians:
- Identified relevant public health and primary care subject areas and develop research guides highlighting these resources on topics including chronic diseases, maternal and child health and evidence-based health care practice.
- Searched free websites to find databases, journals, books and other information which may be relevant to Virginia public health and community health center workers such as PubMed®, TOXNET, AGRICOLA, and MedlinePlus®.
"This project provides much needed access to free evidence-based information not only in our region but throughout the state," said Tracy Causey, CAHEC board chair and president of the Virginia
Community Care Association.
"Now, a health care provider in downtown Petersburg or rural Pulaski or on the water in Reedville on the Northern Neck, have equal and easy access to important medical information. It's all free and reliable," said Barbara Wright, Research & Education Librarian and project manager.
The project was funded in whole or in part with federal funds from the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under Contract No. HHS-N-276-2011-00004-C with the University of Maryland, Baltimore.
The VCU Department of English has recently announced the winners of both of its celebrated annual literary book awards: the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award and the Levis Reading Prize, which is presented for the best first or second book of poems.
This year, the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award goes to Ramona Ausubel for "No One Is Here Except All of Us," published by Riverhead Books. The novel follows the residents of a remote Romanian village and the difficult choices that they must make about how best to go about their lives when faced with the horror of WWII. The novel was a New York Times "Editor's Choice" and was named a "Best Book" by both the San Francisco Chronicle and The Huffington Post, and it was a finalist for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award. Christine Schutt, author of "Prosperous Friends" and "All Souls," describes the novel as "a wise, compassionate book that even in its darkest turns uplifts." Ramona Ausubel is also the author of a collection 
of short stories, titled "A Guide to Being Born." This fall, she will come to VCU to give a public reading, co-sponsored by VCU Libraries. Stay tuned for details. To learn more about the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, see the official website.
The 2013 Levis Reading Prize goes to Michael McGriff for his second collection of poems, "Home Burial," published by Copper Canyon Press. His first collection, "Dismantling the Hills," was released by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2008. He has also edited a volume of the selected writings of David Wevill, titled "To Build My Shadow a Fire" (Truman State University Press, 2010), and he co-translated Tomas Tranströmer's "The Sorrow Gondola" (Green Integer, 2010). He will read from "Home Burial" on September 25 at 8 p.m. at the VCU Grace Street Theater at 934 West Grace Street. A book sale and signing will follow the reading. To learn more about the Levis Reading Prize and Michael McGriff, see the VCU Department of English webpage. The Levis Reading Prize is named for poet Larry Levis, who taught at VCU and whose papers are now housed in Special Collections and Archives in James Branch Cabell Library.
Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences is hosting the traveling National Library of Medicine exhibit, "Every Necessary Care and Attention: George Washington and Medicine." George Washington, first president, Revolutionary War general, plantation owner and businessman, and head of household, had many different concerns and responsibilities from running his estate to ensuring the stability of a new nation. Alongside the traditional demands of political life and military leadership, Washington focused considerable attention on the health and safety of his family, staff, slaves and troops.
Washington's status and wealth gave him--and his community--special privileges. During his lifetime, with the practice of medicine slowly becoming a licensed profession, he could call on a growing class of experts and new knowledge about the spread and prevention of disease. Even so, Washington encountered the limits of medicine when faced with serious illness.
Visit the exhibit's official website
The exhibition is on display in the reading room, Special Collections and Archives, Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences, 509 N. 12th St.
Central Virginia author Dale Brumfield is set to launch his latest book this month. And on September 4, he'll be giving a VCU Libraries Presents talk sponsored by Special Collections and Archives at 1 p.m. at James Branch Cabell Library.
The library is a familiar place for Brumfield, who relied heavily on VCU Libraries collection of independent and alternative newspapers, weeklies, zines and magazines to research "Richmond Independent Press: A History of the Underground Zine Scene."
According to publisher notes on Barnes & Nobel website: "During the political and cultural upheaval of the 1960s, even the sleepy southern town of Richmond was not immune to the emergence of radical counterculturalism. A change in the traditional ideas of objective journalism spurred an underground movement in the press. The Sunflower, Richmond's first underground newspaper, appeared in 1967 and set the stage for a host of alternative Richmond media lasting into the 1990s and beyond. Publications such as the Richmond Chronicle, the Richmond Mercury and the Commonwealth Times, as well as those covering the African American community, such as Afro, have served the citizens of Richmond searching for a change in the status quo. ... Brumfield explores a forgotten history of a cultural revolution."
Brumfield draws clear distinctions between the monopolistic mainstream press (The Richmond Times-Dispatch and the Richmond News Leader) and the jaunty, nimble underground papers.
Some observers of the journalistic scene, he says, "may recall the underground press of the '60s and '70s only as a temporary deviation, choosing to emphasize the papers' divisions and their failures while de-emphasizing their successes. Richmond's 1960s underground press may have been short-lived but it did not fail. It achieved its purpose of giving a voice to radical criticism and social change.
"The legacy passed on by those gritty, early papers was the alternative press that rose in the mid-70s and the '80s, leading the way for longer lasting publications such as STYLE Weekly, now in its 32nd year."
Brumfield contributes to STYLE Weekly and the Austin Chronicle. He is the co-founder of ThroTTle Magazine, a Richmond indie publication. A VCU alumnus and MFA graduate student, he also worked on the Commonwealth Times. The book, "Richmond Independent Press: a History of the Underground Zine Scene," is published by History Press of Charleston, South Carolina.
VCU Libraries and VCU Alumni are working to keep alumni connected to library resources in new ways.
A little-known and expanding benefit is that dues-paying VCU Alumni members can access to online journals Academic Search and Business Source Alumni Edition from their home or office. In 2014, additional databases will be available for remote access.
Already, alumni who join the Friends of the VCU Libraries gain opportunities to stay up-to-date on discoveries, innovation and scholarship tied to Virginia's largest research university. Friends receive borrowing privileges for personal use, invitations to Friends-sponsored events and preview admission to the annual book sale. And, Friends receive borrowing privileges and access to a print collection of 2 million volumes and 50,000 serial titles, along with an extensive collection of digital indexes, full-text digital periodicals, and other digital materials. Friends can access online journals in library buildings, either at James Branch Cabell Library or Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences.
The alumni benefit allows for access to hundreds of useful resources from home or office. Additional information about online access to Academic Search and Business Source Alumni Edition, including a listing of journal titles, is available on the VCU Alumni website.
Discounted Friends of the Library membership
Members of the VCU Alumni Association are eligible for discounted Friends of the VCU Libraries rates.
- Annual members of VCUAA and MCVAA -$75 annual donation (save $25)
- Life members of VCUAA and MCVAA - $50 annual donation (save $50)
- GOLD annual members - $35 annual donation (save $65)
- Discounted rates are available only via the alumni website.
New at Cabell Library, all checkouts of media are managed by the single service desk. Previously, checkouts were on the third floor. Now, patrons have two easy paths.
- To borrow DVDs, VHS tapes, 16mm films and other materials, request them at the front desk. Library staff will pull the materials for immediate checkout. During busy times, there might be a slight wait.
- Members of the university community can also place holds or requests for retrieval for media materials through the search box. The materials will be pulled and held for pick up at the service desk.
Most media are not on open, self-serve shelves. Albums, scores and other musical materials remain available on open shelves on the third floor. Browse and bring selections to the first floor. If Innovative Media (third floor) is closed, bring requests to the first floor desk.
