The Western NY Rural Area Health Education Center (R-AHEC) will collaborate with University of Rochester's Edward G. Miner Library and Rochester General Hospital's Werner Health Services Library to facilitate access to medical information for rural and inner-city practitioners at 13 clinics in a 6-county region. The goal is to ensure that health care professionals have access to and know how to use NLM databases and digital libraries, so that they can provide quality care for patients.
Specific aims i nclude: 1) provide equipment, installation, and Internet access, if needed; 2) provide a Loansome Doc account for each clinic with free delivery from Miner or Werner; 3) provide hands-on training and follow-up support for health care professionals and administrative staff onsite at each clinic in the use of PubMed, Loansome Doc, and MedlinePlus, as well as additional training in using local digital libraries; 4) encourage communication about the practical use of medical information between the clinics' preceptors and medical students, using an Educational Prescription assignment; 5) conduct a pilot project at 2 sites by providing Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), PDA software, and instruction in their use to physician preceptors who complete the digital library training session. Health providers in rural and underserved areas can become isolated from colleagues and current medical information. Accessing information online is ideal for their situation. The 13 clinics participating in this project are either in Health Professional Shortage Areas (5 clinics), or serve Medicaid clients or other underinsured or uninsured patients; 11 clinics are in rural areas, and 2 in the inner city. Although these clinics have computers for administrative uses, very few providers have computer access for finding medical information. Although 7 clinics are members of Rochester General Hospital's Circuit Librarian program, and physicians at 7 clinics precept University of Rochester medical students, most providers surveyed were not aware of the available information options. The participating clinics all are committed to dedicating the necessary time for providers to learn how to use these resources.
