• Access to Primary Percutaneous Coronary Intervention for ST-Segment Elevation Myocardial Infarction in Canada: A Geographic Analysis. Alka Patel, Jack Tu, Nigel Waters, Dennis T. Ko, Mark Eisenberg, Thao Huynh, Stéphane Rinfret, Merril Knudtson and William Ghali http://www.openmedicine.ca/article/view/302/298

According to new research by Patel et al., published today in Open Medicine, approximately 64 percent of Canadian adults (age 40 and older) have access to primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), a treatment for severe heart attacks, within 60 minutes. (In the U.S., 80 percent of adults have access to PCI within a similar time frame.) PCI, in which a balloon catheter is used to restore blood flow to the heart, is currently the recommended treatment for ST-segment elevated myocardial infarction (STEMI). The authors used geographic information systems and census data to estimate transit time to PCI facilities in Canada using ground transportation. They found that transit times vary greatly from province to province. In New Brunswick, for example, only 15 percent of adults age 40 and older have access to PCI in that time frame, while in Ontario that number is 73 percent. The study also evaluated how the addition of four hypothetical facilities would affect access. This research on geographic access to PCI has important mplications for policy makers creating regionalized care models for cardiac care.

• Should geographic analyses guide the creation of regionalized care models for ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction? Adrian Levy, Mikiko Terashima, Andrew Travers. http://www.openmedicine.ca/article/view/382/304

This commentary discusses the policy implications of new research by Patel et al., using geographic information systems to estimate access to primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), a technique used to manage severe heart attacks.

• Pharmaceutical industry representation on CIHR’s Governing Council. William Ghali, Claire Kendall and Anita Palepu, editors, Open Medicine. http://www.openmedicine.ca/article/view/383/301

Late last year, the appointment of Bernard Prigent, vice-president of medical affairs at Pfizer Canada, to the governing council of the Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR), generated much controversy and two hearings by a Standing Committee on Health of the House of Commons. In this editorial, the editors of Open Medicine present an official response from CIHR to a commentary and analysis piece by Steven Lewis, also published today in the journal.

• Neoliberalism, conflict of interest, and the governance of health research in Canada. Steven Lewis, president, Access Consulting http://www.openmedicine.ca/article/view/379/302

Steven Lewis, a health policy consultant based in Saskatoon and a member of Open Medicine’s editorial board, criticizes the appoint of Bernard Prigent, vice-president of medical affairs at Pfizer Canada, to the governing council of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. “More discouraging than the Prigent appointment in itself is the refusal of either government or the CIHR to acknowledge that the appointment raises even the possibility of conflict of interest,” he writes in a new commentary published today in Open Medicine. “It is one thing to make and defend a decision; it is quite another to refuse to recognize and substantively engage with the very real ethical issues at its core.”

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Introduction

On January 12th, 2010, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck the country of Haiti with an epicentre near Port-au-Prince. In the coming weeks and months, health librarians will be asked to provide assistance in locating information to assist with recovery efforts and complex health issues arising from the quake. This guide will provide a starting place for information. Additionally, the National Library of Medicine (U.S.) announced on January 25th that it would begin an Emergency Access Initiative (EAI) to provide free access to full text articles (see ) from January 25, 2010 to February 19, 2010 from major journals for healthcare professionals, librarians, and the public affected by the disaster.

Canada

• Canada for Haiti (social media tracking....)
• Canada Haiti Action (CHA)
• Canada - Haiti relations
• Canadian Centre for Emergency Preparedness (CCEP)
• Canadian Disaster Database
• Disaster Recovery Information Exchange (DRIE)
• Emergency Preparedness Canada
• Emergency Preparedness - Vancouver
• Health Canada - Emergency Preparedness
• Operation HESTIA in Haiti
• World Vision Canada

French:

• Bibliothèque des resources familiales / Family Resource Library, IWK Health Centre and Library

United States

• NLM's Specialized Information Services - Haiti earthquake resources
• FEMA Disaster Information
• NLM’s Disaster Information Management Center

International

• Center for International Disaster Information
• Cochrane Evidence Aid: resources for Haiti earthquake
• International Committee of the Red Cross
• Wikipedia. 2010 Haiti Earthquake.

Spanish:

• Central American Network for Disaster Health Information (CANDHI) – Regional Disaster Information Center for Latin America and the Caribbean

Open Medicine’s ghost and guest authorship policy
January 19, 2010. Vol. 4(1), pp.11-12
Sally Murray, Jay Brophy, Anita Palepu
HTML PDF

"...Ghost authorship occurs when someone makes a significant contribution to a manuscript without due acknowledgement of their role. Guest authorship, in contrast, occurs when an individual is named as an author of a manuscript when they do not meet authorship criteria. Both are disturbingly common.1
The preliminary results of a recent survey of corresponding authors conducted by the editorial staff of JAMA found that over one-quarter of articles published in six major general medical journals in 2008 had guest authors (range by journal: 16%-39%) and nearly 10% had ghost authors (range by journal: 2%-11%).1 The prevalence of guest authors and ghost authors was highest in Nature Medicine (39%) and New England Journal of Medicine (11%) respectively." [rest of article here]

See also Digital Libraries Glossary, Open access in Canada and Research for librarians - portal

Data management is the process of ensuring the accuracy, currency, storage, security and accessibility of data sets and other digital files in perpetuity. Its archival element is often referred to as data curation. In fulfilling these preservation responsibilities, library organizations may take responsible for the overall management of data and will consider the needs of faculty and researchers while delegating some aspects of the process to outside suppliers. Research data is defined as the factual records (e.g. data sets, microarray, numerical data, clinical trial information, textual records, images, sound, etc.) used as primary sources in research. This data is also distinguished by the fact that it is commonly accepted in the research community as a necessary source of information to validate research findings. According to CARL/ABRC, the majority of research data is not being properly archived in Canada. One study of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) found that only 3 organizations out of 110 systematically archived data in repositories and of those all were archived in the United States. Put simply, research data generated in higher education is not managed in any coherent manner in Canada and much is under-utilized for knowledge-creation. While some disciplines and research areas have institutional, national and international supports in place for data management, this support is neither coordinated nor comprehensive.

References

• Beagrie, N. Digital Preservation: Setting the Course for a Decade of Change. 2007. http://www.abd-bvd.be/documents/60/BDA-1107_NB.ppt
• Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL). CARL Data Management Sub-Committee. Research Data: Unseen Opportunities An Awareness Toolkit commissioned by the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) http://www.carl-abrc.ca/about/working_groups/pdf/data_mgt_toolkit.pdf
• Cech T (2003) Sharing Publication-Related Data and Materials: Responsibilities of Authorship in the Life Sciences. Washington: National Academies Press.
• Community-based Data Interoperability Networks 2009. National Science Foundation. http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2007/nsf07565/nsf07565.htm
• Humphrey, C. Preserving research data: A time for action. In Preservation of electronic records: new knowledge and decisionmaking. 2003. Canadian Conservation Institute: Ottawa. pg. 83-89.
• Harnessing the Power of Digital Data for Science and Society. Report of the Interagency Working Group on Digital Data to the Committee on Science of the National Science and Technology Council. January 2009. http://www.nitrd.gov/about/Harnessing_Power_Web.pdf
• Lord P, MacDonald A. 2003. Data curation for e-science in the UK: an audit to establish requirements for future curation and provision. JISC Comm. Support Res. (JCSR).
• Banks M. Marcus' World blog. Open Access, Grey Literature, Grey Data. July 21st, 2009. http://mbanks.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/07/open-access-grey-literature-grey-data.html
• Piwowar, HA, Day, RS, Fridsma, DB. Sharing Detailed Research Data Is Associated with Increased Citation Rate. 2007. PLoS ONE 2(3): http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0000308
• Research Data Canada - http://data-donnees.gc.ca/eng/index.html
• Search Principle blog. Let's Liberate ‘Grey Data’ & Grey Literature. Sept 14th, 2009. http://blogs.ubc.ca/dean/2009/09/lets-liberate-grey-data-grey-literature/

Men's & Women's Health Channels

• Men's Health
• Women's Health

Introduction to this portal

The idea for the HLWIKI - Canadian consumer health information (CHI) portal originated at the 2009 CHLA/ABSC Conference in Winnipeg. Upon returning from the 2009 CHLA/ABSC Conference in Winnipeg, the wiki team engaged in discussion about what we could do to create a set of files to support consumer health information. This is because Canadian health librarians currently do not have any coherent mechanism to locate local, provincial and national materials in CHI. This wiki entry is a starting point or portal to information for health consumers and patients and for librarians working in Canada. Please let me know if you would like to get involved in creating new files.

Why a CHI Portal?

See also Complementary & alternative medicine (CAM) & Patient education

Consumer health information (CHI) is a term used to describe the provision of health and medical information for consumers. Due to its clear, non-technical presentation, CHI explains medical procedures, prescription drugs and healthcare systems to consumers. CHI includes information about diseases and may also deal with health prevention. CHI is found in pharmacies, grocery stores, health food stores, bookstores, physicians' offices, health and public libraries or via the Web. CHI is also a kind of biblio- or information therapy. CHI in Canada has seen tremendous growth in the last decade thanks to the Canadian Health Network (now defunct) and the Consumer Health Information Service (CHIS) (also defunct). From its early beginnings in hospitals and public libraries, CHI has grown into an important area for health librarians. Studies show that accurate health information is important in reducing anxiety in patients. Adequate provision of CHI is increasingly recognized as a factor in patient empowerment for informed decision-making and health maintenance.

References

• Consumer health information
• Patient education

1. ACM Digital Library
2. Agricola - agriculture and allied disciplines
3. arXiv - Physics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Quantitative Biology and Statistics
4. Canadian Association of Research Libraries / Association des bibliothèques de recherche Open Archives Metadata Harvester
5. CiteSeerX - computer and information science
6. Combined Health Information Database (CHID)
7. ClinicalTrials.gov
8. DiscoverEd @ Creative Commons
9. Drug Industry Document Archive (DIDA)
10. Entrez - Life sciences search engine - meta-search tool
11. ERIC Education Search - education research
12. FUSE — a business research engine - 728 open-access business ejournals, and open research texts
13. Google scholar - largest open tool searching across academic disciplines
14. GoPubMed - knowledge-based search engine for biomedical texts
15. HighWire Press - Largest Repository of Free Full-Text Life Science Articles in the World
16. IngentaConnect - a range of items across academic disciplines
17. JURN: A curated academic search-engine, indexing 3,205 free ejournals in the arts & humanities
18. Lalisio literature - arXiv, PubMedCentral & IngentaConnect
19. NLM Gateway - search all NLM files, biomedicine, bioinformatics
20. OAIster - OCLC via WorldCat.org - open access and institutional repository meta-search tool
21. POPLINE - reproductive health literature 1970-present (selected citations back to 1886)
22. PubMed - biomedicine and allied fields
23. PubMedCentral - open access repository in biomedicine
24. PubMedCentral Canada
25. Science Commons
26. ScienceDirect - 10 million+ articles across science and humanities
27. Scirus - science, Elsevier content, PubMed
28. Scitopia - science-technology, plus patents and government data
29. Scopus - 435 million scientific web pages; 23 million patents
30. SumSearch - evidence-based meta-search tool, U.S.
31. Transportation Research Information Services (TRIS) Database
32. TRIP Database - evidence-based meta-search tool, U.K. content
33. WolframAlpha - Computational Knowledge Engine - trillions of pieces of curated data and millions of lines of algorithms
34. WorldCat see OAIster

This week in Open Medicine - December 16, 2009

NEW RESEARCH:
Prevalence and incidence of hepatitis C virus infection among Aboriginal young people who use drugs: results from the Cedar Project

Little is known about the extent of the hepatitis C (HCV) epidemic among Aboriginal people in North America. However, some research suggests that prevalence of HCV infection among Aboriginal people, as well as the number of new cases, is significantly higher than among non-Aboriginal people.

This study sought to estimate the prevalence and incidence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection among Aboriginal youth who use drugs and to identify risk factors associated with HCV infection in this specific population.

Five hundred and twelve Aboriginal youth (ages 14 to 30) from Vancouver and Prince George, British Columbia, participated in the study. The results of this study inidcate the prevalence of HCV infection in this population is 34.8 per cent (59.4 percent among injection drug users). The authors conclude that culturally based prevention, treatment and harm-reduction programs are urgently needed to address this serious public health problem.

To view the full-text article, visit
http://www.openmedicine.ca/article/view/249/287.

Authors:
Kevin Craib, Patricia Spittal, Sheetal Patel, Wayne Christian, Akm Moniruzzaman, Margo Pearce, Lou Demerais, Christopher Sherlock, Martin Schechter; Cedar Project Partnership

For regular updates from the editors of Open Medicine, join the journal’s
Facebook group at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6117690964

Follow Open Medicine on Twitter and Identi.ca. Just search “Open
Medicine.”

Setting Information Free

freeforall

FreeForAll is an international collaboration of libraries whose mission is to  provide underserved nations with health science journal articles for free.
Librarians interested in participating please visit:

FreeForAll Group for Librarians

Need an article?
FreeForAll Group for Patrons
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Recipient of Library Journal's "Movers and Shakers" Award
Questions? Email

1. Intention to treat analysis from a clinician's viewpoint.

Bhaskar E. Open Med. 2009 Jul 14;3(3):e120. No abstract available. PMID: 19946399 [PubMed - in process]

2. The chain of communication in health science: from researcher to health worker through open access.

Chan L, Arunachalam S, Kirsop B. Open Med. 2009 Jul 7;3(3):e111-9. No abstract available. PMID: 19946398 [PubMed - in process]

3. Failure of psychological interventions to lower blood pressure: a randomized controlled trial.

Perez MI, Linden W, Perry T Jr, Puil LJ, Wright JM. Open Med. 2009 Jun 9;3(2):e92-e100.PMID: 19946397 [PubMed - in process]

4. Asynchronous telehealth: a scoping review of analytic studies. Deshpande A, Khoja S, Lorca J, McKibbon A, Rizo C, Husereau D, Jadad AR. Open Med. 2009 Jun 2;3(2):e69-91.PMID: 19946396 [PubMed - in process]
5. The use of older studies in meta-analyses of medical interventions: a survey. Patsopoulos NA, Ioannidis JP.  Open Med. 2009 May 26; 3(2):e62-8.PMID: 19946395 [PubMed - in process]

6.Analgesic effect of acupuncture needle penetration: a double-blind crossover study. Takakura N, Yajima H. Open Med. 2009 May 19;3(2):e54-61.PMID: 19946394 [PubMed - in process]

7. Missing outcomes in randomized trials: addressing the dilemma. Altman DG. Open Med. 2009 May 12;3(2):e51-3. No abstract available. PMID: 19946393 [PubMed - in process]

8. Have last-observation-carried-forward analyses caused us to favour more toxic dementia therapies over less toxic alternatives? A systematic review. Molnar FJ, Man-Son-Hing M, Hutton B, Fergusson DA. Open Med. 2009 Mar 24;3(2):e31-50.PMID: 19946392 [PubMed - in process]

9. Discussing prognosis with patients and their families near the end of life: impact on satisfaction with end-of-life care. Heyland DK, Allan DE, Rocker G, Dodek P, Pichora D, Gafni A; Canadian Researchers at the End-of-Life Network (CARENET). Open Med. 2009 Jun 16;3(2):e101-10.PMID: 19946391 [PubMed - in process]

10. Recent trends in HIV incidence in coastal South India: Implications for prioritizing HIV control strategies. Kumar Hn H, Jayaram S, Rao MR, Kumar S SG, Kotian M. Open Med. 2009 Mar 17;3(1):e26-30. No abstract available. PMID: 19946390 [PubMed - in process]

11.Better access to outpatient magnetic resonance imaging in Ontario - But for whom? You JJ, Venkatesh V, Laupacis A. Open Med. 2009 Mar 3;3(1):e22-5. No abstract available. PMID: 19946389 [PubMed - in process]

12. Evaluation of a pharmacist-managed anticoagulation clinic: Improving patient care. Bungard TJ, Gardner L, Archer SL, Hamilton P, Ritchie B, Tymchak W, Tsuyuki RT. Open Med. 2009 Feb 2;3(1):e16-21.PMID: 19946388 [PubMed - in process]

13. Severe atovaquone-resistant Plasmodium falciparum malaria in a Canadian traveller returned from the Indian subcontinent. Perry TL, Pandey P, Grant JM, Kain KC. Open Med. 2009 Jan 20;3(1):e10-6.PMID: 19946387 [PubMed - in process]