Safer Better Healthcare

National Standards for Safer Better Healthcare  have been announced by HIQUA, the Health Information and Quality Authority.

The Standards are intended to place patients at the heart of the healthcare process and to ensure clarity of expectations for all in the drive to improve the quality of services.

There are specific themes on the importance of quality information management in patient care and access to evidence based information in clinical decision making. Appropriate information governance in healthcare services is recommended to provide a framework to bring together all the legislation, guidance and best available evidence that applies to the handling of information.


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PubMed and Google Scholar compared for clinical questions

A recent paper published in Health Information and Libraries Journal compares the performance of PubMed and Google Scholar in retrieving studies to answer clinical questions. Both systems identified unique and relevant studies in the initial set of results. Google Scholar tends to present highly cited studies first while PubMed presents results in chronological order. The authors conclude that both systems should be used in a complementary manner.


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Setup your Google Scholar to link to RCSI Library

When you search Google Scholar on campus, you can link to subscribed journal articles available via RCSI Library. You can also set this up to work at home:

1. Go to Google Scholar and click on "Settings" top right.
2. Select "Library Links"
3. Enter Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in the Library links box and click "Find Library"
4. “Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland – Full-text @ RCSI Library” will appear in the list, simply check the box and click Save.

When you search Google Scholar from home you will be able to link to RCSI full-text journal articles by entering your network username and password when prompted.

 http://scholar.google.com

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PubMed citations into Endnote

PubMed has changed the way citations are exported to Endnote. It is now simplified via  the "Send to" menu box in the results display screen - now simply select the option for citation manager and then click on the create file button. This will save a file called citations.nbib to your local drive. The contents of this file can then be imported using the PubMed (NLM) import filter in the EndNote import menu.

Up to 200 PubMed references can be exported this way. If you want to export more than 200 references, use "Send To File" and import them from that file into EndNote.

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Integrating information skills into the curriculum

• Are your students over -reliant on general web sources to complete assignment tasks?
• Do you want your students to be able to find and use peer reviewed reference, data and journal sources?
• Can your students competently compile an up to date bibliography on a topic?

Irish university libraries have collaborated to produce guides outlining the wide range of information skills training incorporated into courses in many different academic disciplines. See our Information Literacy page for more.

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