Public Access and Use of Health Research: An Exploratory Study of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Public Access Policy Using Interviews and Surveys of Health Personnel

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“Background: In 2008, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Public Access Policy mandated open access for publications resulting from NIH funding (following a 12-month embargo). The large increase in access to research that will take place in the years to come has potential implications for evidence-based practice (EBP) and lifelong learning for health personnel.

Objective: This study assesses health personnel’s current use of research to establish whether grounds exist for expecting, preparing for, and further measuring the impact of the NIH Public Access Policy on health care quality and outcomes in light of time constraints and existing information resources.

Methods: In all, 14 interviews and 90 surveys of health personnel were conducted at a community-based clinic and an independent teaching hospital in 2010. Health personnel were asked about the research sources they consulted and the frequency with which they consulted these sources, as well as motivation and search strategies used to locate articles, perceived level of access to research, and knowledge of the NIH Public Access Policy.

Results: In terms of current access to health information, 65% (57/88) of the health personnel reported being satisfied, while 32% (28/88) reported feeling underserved. Among the sources health personnel reported that they relied upon and consulted weekly, 83% (73/88) reported turning to colleagues, 77% (67/87) reported using synthesized information resources (eg, UpToDate and Cochrane Systematic Reviews), while 32% (28/88) reported that they consulted primary research literature. The dominant resources health personnel consulted when actively searching for health information were Google and Wikipedia, while 27% (24/89) reported using PubMed weekly. The most prevalent reason given for accessing research on a weekly basis, reported by 35% (31/88) of survey respondents, was to help a specific patient, while 31% (26/84) were motivated by general interest in research.

Conclusions: The results provide grounds for expecting the NIH Public Access Policy to have a positive impact on EBP and health care more generally given that between a quarter and a third of participants in this study (1) frequently accessed research literature, (2) expressed an interest in having greater access, and (3) were aware of the policy and expect it to have an impact on their accessing research literature in the future. Results also indicate the value of promoting a greater awareness of the NIH policy, providing training and education in the location and use of the literature, and continuing improvements in the organization of biomedical research for health personnel use.”

URL : http://www.jmir.org/2011/4/e97/

Library Publishing Services: Strategies for Success Research Report Version 1.0

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Over the past five years, libraries have begun to expand their role in the scholarly publishing value chain by offering a greater range of pre-publication and editorial support services. Given the rapid evolution of these services, there is a clear community need for practical guidance concerning the challenges and opportunities facing library-based publishing programs.

Recognizing that library publishing services represent one part of a complex ecology of scholarly communication, Purdue University Libraries, in collaboration with the Libraries of Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Utah, secured an IMLS National Leadership Grant under the title “Library Publishing Services: Strategies for Success.” The project, conducted between October 2010 and September 2011, seeks to advance the professionalism of library-based publishing by identifying successful library publishing strategies and services, highlighting best practices, and recommending priorities for building capacity.

The project has four components: 1) a survey of librarians designed to provide an overview of current practice for library publishing programs (led by consultant October Ivins); 2) a report presenting best practice case studies of the publishing programs at the partner institutions (written by consultant Raym Crow); 3) a series of workshops held at each participating institution to present and discuss the findings of the survey and case studies; and 4) a review of the existing literature on library publishing services. The results of these research threads are pulled together in this project white paper.

URL : http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/lib_research/136/

Access to Scientific Publications The Scientist’s Perspective …

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Access to Scientific Publications: The Scientist’s Perspective :

“Background : Scientific publishing is undergoing significant changes due to the growth of online publications, increases in the number of open access journals, and policies of funders and universities requiring authors to ensure that their publications become publicly accessible. Most studies of the impact of these changes have focused on the growth of articles available through open access or the number of open-access journals. Here, we investigated access to publications at a number of institutes and universities around the world, focusing on publications in HIV vaccine research – an area of biomedical research with special importance to the developing world.

Methods and Findings : We selected research papers in HIV vaccine research field, creating: 1) a first set of 50 most recently published papers with keywords “HIV vaccine” and 2) a second set of 200 articles randomly selected from those cited in the first set. Access to the majority (80%) of the recently published articles required subscription, while cited literature was much more accessible (67% freely available online). Subscriptions at a number of institutions around the world were assessed for providing access to subscription-only articles from the two sets. The access levels varied widely, ranging among institutions from 20% to 90%. Through the WHO-supported HINARI program, institutes in low-income countries had access comparable to that of institutes in the North. Finally, we examined the response rates for reprint requests sent to corresponding authors, a method commonly used before internet access became widespread. Contacting corresponding authors with requests for electronic copies of articles by email resulted in a 55-60% success rate, although in some cases it took up to 1.5 months to get a response.

Conclusions : While research articles are increasingly available on the internet in open access format, institutional subscriptions continue to play an important role. However, subscriptions do not provide access to the full range of HIV vaccine research literature. Access to papers through subscriptions is complemented by a variety of other means, including emailing corresponding authors, joint affiliations, use of someone else’s login information and posting requests on message boards. This complex picture makes it difficult to assess the real ability of scientists to access literature, but the observed differences in access levels between institutions suggest an unlevel playing field, in which some researchers have to spend more efforts than others to obtain the same information.”

URL : http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0027868
doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0027868

Linking to Data Effect on Citation Rates in…

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Linking to Data – Effect on Citation Rates in Astronomy :

“Is there a difference in citation rates between articles that were published with links to data and articles that were not? Besides being interesting from a purely academic point of view, this question is also highly relevant for the process of furthering science. Data sharing not only helps the process of verification of claims, but also the discovery of new findings in archival data. However, linking to data still is a far cry away from being a “practice”, especially where it comes to authors providing these links during the writing and submission process. You need to have both a willingness and a publication mechanism in order to create such a practice. Showing that articles with links to data get higher citation rates might increase the willingness of scientists to take the extra steps of linking data sources to their publications. In this presentation we will show this is indeed the case: articles with links to data result in higher citation rates than articles without such links. The ADS is funded by NASA Grant NNX09AB39G.”

URL : http://arxiv.org/abs/1111.3618

Research Infrastructures in the Digital Humanities

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This peer reviewed document reflects on the centrality of Research Infrastructures (RIs) to the Humanities. It argues that without RIs such as archives, libraries, academies, museums and galleries (and the sources that they identify, order, preserve and make accessible) significant strands of Humanities research would not be possible. After proposing a wide-ranging definition of digital RIs – with the aim of reflecting on the meaning of infrastructure in the Humanities rather than on those parts common to other domains of science – it attempts to relate physical RIs to digital ones. By drawing on a number of case studies – chosen to showcase the variety of research around existing or emerging infrastructures – it demonstrates that digital RIs offer Humanities scholars new and productive ways to explore old questions and develop new ones.

URL : http://www.esf.org/media-centre/ext-single-news/article/humanities-researchers-and-digital-technologies-building-infrastructures-for-a-new-age-776.html

Not with a Bang but a Whimper The…

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Not with a Bang but a Whimper: The Politics of Accountability and Open Data in the UK :

“Can the pro-active release of raw datasets by the government lead to more participatory democracy and government accountability? This paper explores the limits of what is possible through open government data by examining the UK government’s recent release of historic data in its COINS database of public expenditure. The paper begins by examining the origins of the UK’s open government data policy. It shows that far, from constituting a radical departure from pre-existing practice, the use of open data as a tool of democratic consolidation is in fact the outcome of several long-term trends in British politics and administration. It then shows that these origins encouraged a limited view of the likely impact of open government data on the actual exercise of democratic accountability, one which emphasises the removal of institutional barriers to access and tends to be overly-optimistic about how widely these data are likely to be used by individual citizens. Although pro-active disclosure may make it easier for “the public” to obtain information, there are still numerous barriers to actually using it, including the technical challenge of processing the raw data itself, the expertise to understand it and the existence of opportunities to act effectively on it. Overall, the paper argues that far from encouraging direct participation, the resource requirements for using government datasets actually reinforce the importance of intermediary organisations capable of processing and interpreting them, and that a rights-based framework may not be a particularly informative way of understanding the effects of open government data on democratic practice. It also suggests that the experience of the COINS disclosure has thus far confirmed a number of key claims made by technological sceptics, including that information technology is likely to reinforce existing power relations rather than disrupting them.”

URL : http://ssrn.com/abstract=1899790

A Surfboard for Riding the Wave Towards a…

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A Surfboard for Riding the Wave. Towards a four country action programme on research data :

“The Riding the Wave report by the high level expert group on research data called for a collaborative data infrastructure that will enable researchers and other stakeholders from education, society and business to use, re-use and exploit research data to the maximum benefit of science and society. The Knowledge Exchange partners have embraced this vision and commissioned a report that translates Riding the Wave into actions for the four partner countries and beyond.

This paper builds on this report and presents an overview of the present situation with regard to research data in Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom and offers broad outlines for a possible action programme for the four countries in realising the envisaged collaborative data infrastructure. An action programme at the level of four countries will require the involvement of all stakeholders from the scientific community.”

URL : http://knowledge-exchange.info/Default.aspx?ID=469