Michelle Maden, the Clinical Information Specialist at our Aintree campus library co-led a team of 15 clinical librarians that has just been awarded the Practitioner Researcher Excellence Award from the Library and Information Science (LIS) Research Coalition. Best selling-author, broadcaster, academic and full-time medic, Dr Ben Goldacre presented the award to the North West Clinical Librarian Systematic Review and Evaluation Group on Monday 9th July 2012 at the Developing Research Excellence and Methods (DREaM) conference at the British Library.
The Library and Information Science (LIS) Research Coalition offered the £500 award to mark the achievement of an individual or team that has made a substantial contribution to LIS research since its establishment in 2009.
The work undertaken by Michelle provides a clear example of how organisational practice can be improved through collaborative research initiated by practising librarians. Chair of the judging panel, Professor Hazel Hall said “The winners of this award have shown how a strong cooperative team approach to LIS research can have a wide impact on the service delivery of other practitioners, library users and, in this case, patient care”.
The research of the clinical librarians focused on two linked projects. In the first the team conducted a rigorous systematic review to develop guidelines for the evaluation of the effectiveness and impact of clinical librarian services. Following completion and publication of the review, they then undertook a follow-up project to put their guidelines into practice and carried out an evaluation of clinical librarian services throughout the North West region.
The judging panel commended this work for demonstrating the link between practitioner research and services delivery beyond the core community, and the key role of library and information services in healthcare provision. The panel also acknowledged the engagement of practitioners in all aspects of the research process, as well as an on-going commitment to research capacity building.
Well done to Michelle and the team. Michelle will be delivering part of the Learning Services staff development programme over the coming year, under the strand of Digital Researcher. Look out for our new dates and sessions at the start of the academic year.
Rachel Bury
Academic Liaison Manager – Faculty of Health