PATHWAY THROUGH THE ELECTRONIC MAZE Alice B. Kuller, MLS Health Sciences Library System University of Pittsburgh

THE VISION A decade ago our profession envisioned a “Virtual Library” with an array of electronic full-text books and journals at our fingertips. These resources would be accessible from desktops and laptops located anywhere.

THE VISION (continued) An underlying assumption of the vision was that these resources would be both seamless and intuitive for our end users to access.

THE REALITY The electronic publishing sector developed very rapidly, offering many choices for libraries and patrons. Web pages grew at an equally rapid pace allowing library users to link to the ever expanding body of full-text products. However, access has not seamless and for a significant number of our library system’s end users it is definitely not intuitive.

THE SETTING The Health Sciences Library System (HSLS) at the University of Pittsburgh is an academic health sciences library serving the six schools of the health sciences, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and its affiliated teaching hospitals. HSLS has an extensive outreach program comprised of twelve community hospitals..

THE SETTING (cont’d) DIVERSE END USER POPULATION Students - Undergraduate, doctoral, medical, dental, pharmacy, nursing and more Research assistants, technicians, fellows, staff Faculty - Interdisciplinary from across the enterprise: physicians, scientists, dentists, pharmacists, nurses, PTs, OTs, veterinarians and more

THE SETTING (cont’d) More than 3300 full-text journals and books are offered by HSLS. In addition, many hundreds of books and journals are available electronically through the University Library System, which is administratively separate from HSLS.

THE PROBLEM Patrons are aware of the Ovid full-text products, and access them easily through the Ovid databases. These were the first full-text products at HSLS and, initially, were the only ones.

THE PROBLEM (cont’d) When the full-text journal is not linked from the Ovid platform, typically the patron stalls, and contacts one of the HSLS reference desks for assistance. Conversely, in PubMed it is the full-text links that are the source of difficulty for patrons. With increasing frequency we are receiving questions by telephone, electronically, and in- person from users who are distressed when the needed full-text product is more than a click away. These queries are received from across the patron spectrum.

THE PROBLEM (cont’d) The Reference Desk staff are repeatedly required to “walk” our users through the process to determine if a particular title is available electronically, and if so, how to obtain it. In order to clarify this process we decided to develop a guide, linked to the HSLS Web page.

THE QUERIES One hundred sixty-three electronic reference queries were received January 1 - April 30, Thirty-five (21%) of these were directly related to locating the full-text literature. Though we do not have a tally of the in-person and telephone queries regarding the electronic literature, our sense is that the frequency is similar.

QUERIES (side bar) I am trying to get a copy of an article in “Technometrics”1971. After searching PITTCat and clicking …, an EBSCO HOST database page appeared. I entered my remote access user ID and password but could not gain entry. Is a different password required? I am trying to get access to full-text from “Nature Reviews:Cancer” via Nature Publishing Group. I cannot access the journal “Science” through your e- journals HighWire link, but other HighWire journals seem to work. Does the library subscribe to “Health Affairs” ? Cannot seem to find it in Ovid. Why can’t I see full-text access to “Journal of Clinical Oncology” via remote access login? Is it possible to access “Scientific American” online? If so, how?

I am looking for the article by Cooper et al. … in “IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering”. I cannot find the article using the E-journals database. Am I searching correctly? How do I access the full article (not just citation/abstract) for “International Journal of Obesity” 2003, p ?

I wanted a full-text nejm article and went to the electronic journals and found my citation. It only displayed links for the complete reference and library holdings, not the full-text. I checked for these articles (list provided by patron) on PsychINFO, and also went online at each publisher’s and journal’s Web site and was unable to find them.

THE SOLUTION A document was developed to outline the paths to follow in order to locate an electronic journal. This pathway is linked to the HSLS Web site. Reference Desk staff can now point to the pathway when assisting patrons seeking the full-text literature.

CONCLUSION Though is too early to evaluate the pathway’s impact, we are optimistic that a significant number of HSLS patrons will use it, finding it to be a worthwhile tool. Nevertheless, we anticipate that many patrons will continue to need guidance from HSLS staff. The pathway will be updated as needed to reflect any relevant changes in the databases, PITTCat, and other systems. A similar pathway for identifying the electronic book resources is being planned.