Library Tutorials

Library Orientation for Health Science and Nursing Faculty

Hello, and welcome to the Library Resource Orientation for Health Science and Nursing Faculty. I am the Director of the Health Sciences and Nursing Library in the Center for Healthcare Education, Geoffrey Staysniak, and in this video, I will introduce you to some of the core resources available to you here through the Sacred Heart Library website. 

The very first thing you may notice when you come to the library website is the QuickSearch. This is our discovery tool that allows you to search most of the library’s resources at once. 

It can be either used in its basic single search field format that you see here, also you can click on the Advanced Search link below, and that will take you to the advanced QuickSearch with its multi search field format Also, if you were to click on this "What is QuickSearch?" link, that will take you to a page where you can view a full list of all the resources that are searchable through the QuickSearch, which is most of them, and also a full list of the several resources that are not included and searchable through the QuickSearch. 

If you want to search our books specifically, you can either do so through the QuickSearch, by using the books tab on the front page of the library website, or by going to search in the main menu bar and selecting the library catalog link. 

We have access to a variety of physical books and eBooks. Our eBooks can be easily accessed from off campus using your Sacred Heart username and password. Now keep in mind that our eBooks come under a variety of different licenses that range from unlimited simultaneous users to a limited amount of users such as only one user at a time or up to three simultaneous users at a time as we see here with this particular medical dictionary. So should you want to use any book for any of your classes, or rather should you want to use any eBook specifically for any of your classes then it is recommended that you contact your librarians first. 

You can access our specific subject databases by either going to search in the main menu bar and selecting Databases A-Z to get a full alphabetical listing of all of Sacred Heart Library's databases. Or you can go to Research Support in the main menu bar and select databases by subject. That will take you to a page where we have organized all of our databases by major subject area including the health sciences. 

Included amongst our health science databases are our variety of article databases such as CINAHL, MEDLINE, Nursing & Allied Health Premium and Trip. As you can see, we put all of these core article databases together at the very top of the page. Also included amongst our various article databases are various specialty databases, such as Access Medicine which is our major medical reference database which has over one hundred up-to-date medical reference eBooks, a drug database and also 3D human anatomy modules. 

We also have the Bates Visual Guide to Physical Examination, and similarly, we have the Jove Clinical Skills selection of videos 

We also have Policy Map a geographic information system that can be used to create custom maps across the United States for a wide variety of information including all kinds of different health information, as can be seen here. 

We also have access to a point of care resource - Five Minute Consult which can be used here on the library website or downloaded as an app to your smartphone. 

Here on the library website, you will also find several specialized search tools including our very own very frequently used Publication Finder tool and Citation Linker tool. Publication Finder can be used to look up and see whether Sacred Heart has access to specific academic journals like for example, the New England Journal of Medicine. 

You can also use this to check to see what databases or what electronic subscriptions we access specific journals through, and what publication date ranges we have access to. Also, of course, you can use the Publication Finder to search within or just browse specific academic journals. 

Citation Linker, meanwhile, can be used to look at specific articles by their citation information like article title, author name, or unique identification number such as DOI number or PubMed ID number. 

Now although we do have access to a wide array of databases, we have only so many databases we can subscribe to at once, so chances are you may come across an article that you want that we don't have access to.  When this happens, however, you can always request your desired article or articles through our Interlibrary Loan service. 

Article requests can be submitted through your individual Interlibrary Loan account, which you can access by going to Research Support in the main menu bar, selecting Interlibrary Loan, go into Interlibrary Loan account log in, and after logging in with your Sacred Heart username and password go to the "Create Request" button. 

However, chances are that the grand majority of your Interlibrary Loan requests will come about as a result of finding an article through one of our databases that we don't have access to in full text format. Whenever you come across an article that you can only access as an abstract then you will be provided with the option to request that particular item. 

Then you do so you will be routed directly into Interlibrary Loan and upon signing into your Interlibrary Loan account. If you're not signed in already, you will be taken directly to an article request form where most of the article's information will be autofilled. 

For interlibrary loan requests there is no limit on how many requests you can make. Also, there is no charge for interlibrary loan articles as well. However, you do have to deal with the time limit. On average you'll have to wait about two to three business days after submitting your interlibrary loan request. Sometimes it takes quicker than that, and sometimes it takes longer before you receive an electronic copy of the specific article or articles that you requested. 

On the Sacred Heart Library website, you can also find our library of specially made video tutorials, which you can access by either going to the large "Get Help" button on the front page of the library website below the Quicksearch, or by going to "Research Support" once again in the main menu bar and clicking on the tutorials link there. 

And these video tutorials cover an array of different search tools, resource strategies and subjects including for example the Quicksearch, Publication Finder and Citation Linker as I mentioned earlier. 

Some other noteworthy tutorials that you'll find here are the tutorials for Zotero which is our preferred reference management software for saving research and for providing citation assistance. 

Also available is a short tutorial on the free browser extension known as Libkey Nomad which, when installed can check to see whether articles found through outside websites like Pubmed are readily available through the Sacred Heart library. And this browser extension can also provide direct links for when those articles are available. 

Also on this tutorials page is a link to the Health Sciences Library Research Module. This is a one-hour self-guided module made to provide students in the college of health professions, college of nursing, and St. Vincent's College an introduction to core library resources and research skills. 

You can easily embed this module into any one of your Blackboard courses using the embedding library resources tutorial which you can find under "Faculty Resources" right here. 

And along with all of these core resources through the Sacred Heart library, you can also freely access the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Chronicle of Higher Education. If you're interested in any of these titles, then you can look them up in our alphabetical databases listing. And once you find a specific title you will be supplied with instructions for how to set up your free personal account. 

And lastly, through the library website you have several options for getting in touch with your librarians for class instruction, professional research assistance, questions about various resources and other relevant information needs. Simply go to the large "Get Help" button on the front page below the Quicksearch where besides a link to the video tutorials you will also find a contact us link, which will take you to all the ways you can get in touch with our reference desk and also the contact information for specific individual librarians. 

Through here, you can also select these "Schedule an Appointment" links to set up an in person or virtual appointment. Although I believe as of right now we're still only offering virtual appointments. And if you need to speak with a specific librarian through an appointment, you can also go to get help and just click on the "Make an Appointment" link where you can select a librarian and a date and a time that they have posted for their availability. 

And that concludes this video orientation. Thank you very much for your time and attention, and don't hesitate to reach out to my colleagues and I whenever you would like our assistance. Thanks again, and we look forward to working with you this semester.