VOL. 28 NO. 2 March - April 2007

 

 

Nobel Prize Winner Earl W. Sutherland, Jr. Research Notebooks

The Library is pleased to announce that the research notebooks of Nobel Prize winner Earl W. Sutherland, Jr., M.D. (1915-1974) are now readily accessible at: calder.med.miami.edu/Sutherland/index.htm, together with a brief biography, his bibliography and Nobel lecture.

In 2006, Koichi Tasa, the Library's first archivist, organized and preserved the 110 notebooks, and staff from Biomedical Communications scanned the first 59. Faculty identified, acquired and trialed the ContentDM software; created a metadata record for each notebook; and loaded the notebooks and the metadata into ContentDM. Faculty and staff designed a Sutherland website and created the biographical and bibliographical components.

In 2007, the Richter Library purchased a University-wide subscription to ContentDM and created the University of Miami Libraries Digital Initiatives website, a component of which are the digitized collections of the Louis Calder Memorial Library. Following the debut of the Earl W. Sutherland, Jr. website above, staff in Biomedical Communications resumed scanning the research notebooks.

Other "Special Collections" on the Library's website and other "Digital Initiatives" at the Richter Library website are the D. Ralph Millard, MD, Emanuel M. Papper, MD, PhD and David S. Howell, MD sites and the Ralph H. and Ruth F. Gross Lecture Series.


A sample page from the notebooks

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Exhibit of Historical Collection of "Cups"

When Murray Kane's (Class of '61) father-in-law arrived in America from Europe in the 1910s, he brought with him a set of 44 "cups", or "bonkis" in Yiddish, that were used in the 1800s to treat congestive disorders of the lungs, kidney and other organs. The cups are made of thick glass, measure about 1 � inches in diameter, and hold about two ounces. They are on exhibit on the third floor of the Library near the elevators.

A description of cupping appears in The Modern Home Physician, edited by Victor Robinson, M.D., published by Wm. H. Wise & Co. in New York in 1934, and also donated by Dr. Kane:

The inside of the cup is usually moistened with methylated spirits and then "set alight". The hot cups are immediately applied to the skin, which extinguishes the flame and creates a partial vacuum. "The air within them is reduced, so that the skin swells up within the glass and becomes dark in color from the blood with which it becomes engorged," in a process called dry cupping.

Wet cupping involves removing the cup as soon as the skin has swelled and making a number of small incisions on the skin with an instrument known as a scarificator. The cups are then reapplied and soon fill with blood. "Wet cupping may be used instead of bleeding by venesection, and when the heart is finding difficulty in pumping the volume of blood along, its work may be lessened for it in this way."

Cupping was used in traditional Chinese medicine as long as 2,500 years ago to relieve "stagnation" in the treatment of respiratory diseases such as the common cold, pneumonia and bronchitis. A form of acupressure, cupping is still being used as a type of complementary alternative medicine to treat back, neck, shoulder, and other musculoskeletal pain in Western medicine. Although its efficacy has never been demonstrated in a clinical trial, patients report a long lasting feeling of relaxation and invigoration, similar to the results of massage.

Modern day cups are usually bell-shaped and hold about four fluid ounces. Eight to twelve are applied to the patient's back in two parallel 'vertical' columns, midway between the spine and edges of the body. Today, cups are heated by swabbing with and then lighting the rubbing alcohol, holding the cup over an inverted flame, or igniting a flame with a small alcohol-soaked cotton wad that rests directly on the patient's skin.

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FAQs on E-Resources and Services

Q1. What Electronic Resources Does the Library Have?

A1.1. The Library's Internet Catalog under "Quick Links" on the Library's website (calder.med.miami.edu) was just updated and expanded to include all accessible e-journals, books and specific databases, in addition to important, freely accessible websites. Patrons are encouraged to browse the Internet Catalog for ready access to relevant electronic journals, books, databases, and freely accessible important websites in the following disciplines and related areas:

AIDS
Alerting
Services/Research Forums
Allergic Diseases
Alternative Medicine
Anatomy and Embryology Anesthesiology
Arthritis and Rheumatism
Associations and Societies Biochemistry
Bioethics
Biology
Biotechnology
Bioterrorism
Books and Reports
Cancer
Cardiovascular Diseases
Citation Analysis/Manage-
ment/Ranking
Clinical Trials
Colleges and Universities
Communicable and
Infectious Diseases
Critical Care
Cross Cultural Medicine
Cytology
Death and Dying
Dentistry
Dermatology
Diabetes
Diagnosis
Disability and
Rehabilitation
Dissertations and Theses
Emergency Medicine and
Trauma
Endocrinology
Environmental and
Occupational Health
Epidemiology and Public
Health
Evidence-Based
Medicine/Nursing
Family Medicine and
Primary Care
Forensic Sciences
Gastrointestinal Diseases
Genetics/Medical Genetics
and Molecular Biology
Geriatrics and
Gerontology
Guidelines
Health Policy/Research/
Outcomes
Hematology
History of Medicine
Home Health Care
Hospices/Palliative Care
Hospitals
Immunology and Micro-
biology
Internal Medicine
Journals
Medical Education
Medical Informatics and
Imaging
Meetings and Conferences
Multimedia and
Audiovisuals
Nephrology
Neurosciences and
Neurology
Nursing
Nursing Homes
Nutrition
Obstetrics and
Gynecology
Ophthalmology
Orthopedics
Otorhinolaryngology
Parasitology
Patents
Pathology
PatientInformation/
Consumer Health
Pediatrics
Pharmacology and
Toxicology
Physical and Occupational
Therapy
Physicians
Physiology and
Biophysics
Preventive Medicine
Protocols
Psychology and
Psychiatry
Radiology
Respiratory Diseases
Sexuality & STDs
Sleep Disorders
Statistics
Surgery
Transplantation
Tropical Medicine
Veterinary Medi-
cine/Laboratory
Animals
Virology
Women's Health

Databases that cover multiple disciplines, such as Medline, EMBASE, Scopus, Web of Science, etc. are not listed for each, but appear under "Quick Links" and the Electronic Databases link.

A1.2. The Library's E-Journals, E-Books and E-Images files under "Quick Links", the Electronic Databases link, and the SEARCH icon near the top right and SEARCH box on the lower right of the Library's website provide rapid access to specific resources by title and in some cases by subject as well.

A1.3. The Library's online catalog, CALLCAT, under "Quick Links" on the Library's website contains comprehensive information on the Library's electronic, print and audiovisual resources, including links to electronic resources. Patrons can search by a specific subject, keyword, author or title. One click access to the online catalogs of the University's Richter and Law Libraries automatically reruns your CALLCAT search in one of these catalogs.

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Meet the Instructors

Q2. How Can I Learn to Search/Use Specific Databases?

A2.1. The Educational Tutorials link on the Library's website provides ready access to high quality, self-paced tutorials on the following databases and topics:

BIOSIS
BLAST
Cn3D
Current Contents
EMBASE
EndNote
Entrez
Evidence Based Medicine
  Ovid Web Gateway
Public Health Information and Data
PubMed
RefWorks
Scopus
Toxicology
UpToDate
Web of Knowledge

A2.2. The Online Information Classes link under the "About the Library" link on the Library's website gives registration information for the following 1-2 hour classes:

Ovid MEDLINE
PUBMED
Advanced MEDLINE
Current Contents
CINAHL
  Full Text Publications
Library Orientation
RefWorks
Evidence Based Medicine

Individual instruction on other databases, such as BIOSIS, EMBASE, Scopus, Web of Science, and Zoological Record can be arranged by contacting the Reference and Education Department at 305-243-6648.

A2.3. Individual Assistance with specific searches is available at no charge. For assistance with a search, please contact one of the following faculty members at 305-243-6648 or via e-mail.

Q3. Who are the instructional faculty?

A3. Following are the Library's Reference and Education Department faculty who teach online information courses and conduct library orientations for groups and individuals:

Mr. Joaquin (Joe) Arriaga has a masters in library science and a bachelors in anthropology summa cum laude from the City University of New York and is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and Beta Phi Mu. Mr. Arriaga was a reference librarian at the Museum of the American Indian Library and supervisory librarian of the Science Collection of the Mid-Manhattan Branch of New York Public Library before joining the Department in 1994 as a consumer health/reference librarian. Since 1996, Mr. Arriaga has served as Director of the Department. He serves on the University of Miami Curriculum Advisory Committee and the Medical Library Association Problem-Based Learning Special Interest Group. He was a collaborating investigator on a grant and has authored papers and presented posters on evidence-based medicine instruction. Mr. Arriaga's particular areas of expertise are the effective use of search engines, patient information/consumer health, creating user manuals and pathfinders, searching Dialog databases, indexing and editing. He is fluent in Spanish. E-mail Joe at jarriaga@med. miami.edu.


Mrs. Tanya Feddern-Bekcan has master degrees in library science and occupational therapy from the University of South Florida and Nova Southeastern University respectively. She is a member of Beta Phi Mu and a Senior Member of the Academy of Health Information Professionals. Before her appointment as an education librarian in the Department in 2001, she was circulation manager at the Health Professions Library of Nova Southeastern and reference librarian at the Southwest Regional Public Library. Mrs. Feddern-Bekcan's primary role is co-director of the Evidence Based Medicine component of the Doctoring Course. She is also co-developer/instructor of a certificate in evidence-based nursing for Jackson Memorial Hospital. She has presented papers at national and international meetings on developing an evidence-based nursing culture at Jackson and on integrating technology and evidence-based medicine into the medical school curriculum. She serves on the School's Curriculum Advisory Committee and the Freshman and Sophomore Promotion Committees. She is an approved CE instructor for the Medical Library Association course Providing Health Information Resources and Services in Other Languages. Her special interests are new technologies, health literacy and diversity, and the literature of evidence-based medicine, nursing and occupational therapy. Mrs. Feddern-Bekcan teaches MEDLINE, CINAHL, RefWorks, and Full Text Publications. E-mail Tanya at tfeddern@med.miami.edu.

Ms. Yanira (Jenny) Garcia-Barcena received a master of science in library service degree from Columbia University and graduated magna cum laude with a bachelors in Spanish and French literature from George Washington University. Prior to joining the Department in 1986, Ms. Garcia was a reference librarian at St. Luke's Hospital in New York and in the Business, Science and Technology Department of the Houston Public Library. In 1999 Ms. Garcia was appointed Senior Reference and Education Services Librarian. In 2001 she was appointed to the University's Animal Care and Use Committee, where she continues to provide guidance to principal investigators on searching techniques in the many databases they search to find alternatives to animal testing and use. In 2007 she was invited to work with the Bioethics Program on bibliographic projects. With her expert search skills and informationist experience, Ms. Garcia teaches databases such as BIOSIS, Current Contents, EMBASE and Web of Science, and the Advanced MEDLINE course. She conducts many of the challenging searches received by the department. Ms. Garcia is fluent in Spanish, French and Portuguese. E-mail Jenny at ygarcia6@med.miami.edu.

Mr. John D. Jones, Jr. received a masters in information science from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and a bachelors in psychology from Old Dominion University. Mr. Jones was an instructor at the Tompkins-McCaw Library on the Medical College of Virginia campus of Virginia Commonwealth University for eight years and an associate systems analyst at Martin-Marietta, Inc. before joining the Department in 2003. Mr. Jones is co-director of the Evidence Based Medicine component of the Doctoring Course and coordinator of the EBM component at the UMMSM@FAU in Boca Raton. Mr. Jones has extensive experience in and has presented numerous papers and posters at national meetings on EBM, PubMed, PDAs, pharmacotherapy resources, virtual reference service, web site usability, and distance education initiatives. Mr. Jones serves on the School's Curriculum Advisory Committee and the Freshman and Sophomore Promotion Committees. He teaches EBM, MEDLINE, Introduction to NCBI Databases, Full Text Publications, and Introduction to the Internet. His special interests are applying new technologies and educational methods to information skills instruction. E-mail John at J.Jones@miami.edu.

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32,000+ E-Books Now Accessible From ebrary

More than 32,000 full text electronic books and reports from hundreds of publishers are now readily accessible from the University of Miami Libraries' new ebrary Academic Complete subscription at: site.ebrary.com/lib/univmiami/. Included in Academic Complete are:

Health, Biomedical and Clinical Sciences
Life and Physical Sciences
Social and Behavioral Sciences
>2,100 titles
>2,400 titles
>7,000 titles

Also included, to support interdisciplinary searches, are: Business, Marketing and Economics; Computers and Information Technology; Engineering and Technology; Education; History and Humanities; and Law, International Relations and Public Policy.

Publishers include Blackwell, BMJ Publishing, Cambridge University Press, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, CRC Press, Marcel Dekker, Demos, Elsevier, Greenwood, Karger, Kluwer, McGraw-Hill, National Academies Press, Oxford University Press, Sage, Springer, Taylor & Francis, Thieme, Wiley, and the World Health Organization. 34% of titles were published since 2004, 35% were published between 2001 and 2003, and 31% were published in 2000 or before.

In addition to a full range of search capabilities, ebrary lets you save and manage your search results on your Personal Bookshelf to find them easily the next time you need them.

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