OSU Health Sciences Library Receives National Library of Medicine Award

Posted by Darlene Kaskie on June 17th, 2019 Posted in: All of Us, Blog, Consumer Health, Funding, News from the Region, Outreach, Partner Outreach Libraries, Partner Outreach Libraries, Public Libraries, Success Stories
Tags: Columbus Metropolitan Library, Funding, libs4health, Ohio State University Health Sciences Library, public libraries and health, public library funding, Success Stories

The Greater Midwest Region of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine (NNLM) is pleased to announce The Ohio State University Health Sciences Library as an award recipient of the 2019-2020 NNLM All of Us Ambassador Program. Funding for this program stems from a critical partnership between the National Library of Medicine (NLM) and All of Us, an NIH research program that seeks to enroll one million or more people living in the United States to accelerate breakthroughs in precision medicine and advance treatment and prevention.

The Ohio State University Health Sciences Library will receive $94,000 to support the health information needs in the Columbus metropolitan area, which will enable individuals to make informed decisions concerning their healthcare. Individual projects will promote freely-available resources from NIH and NLM to increase health literacy while raising public awareness of the NIH All of Us Research Program. “This award will enable us to address the largest health risks facing our community,” reports Lynda Hartel, Associate Professor and Director of the OSU Health Sciences Library (HSL) who serves as the co-principle investigator of the award made to OSU, “and make more people aware of All of Us and the opportunity to track and improve their own health while expanding the data and tools available to our OSU researchers working on area health priorities including obesity, chronic and infectious disease, and addictions.”

Over the next year, Lynda and her experienced team of librarians including co-principle investigator Judith Wiener and Consumer Health Librarian Missy Creed, will collaborate with strategic partners including the Columbus Metropolitan Library (CML), the Ohio State University College of Public Health, Franklin County Public Health, Equitas Health, Nationwide Children’s Hospital (NCH) Library, and the NCH Healthy Neighborhoods Healthy Families initiative.  Together they will organize, and host health education programs and discussions for the public and provide training to CML librarians on how to identify, understand, and respond to signs of mental illnesses and substance use disorders.

The Ohio State University Health Sciences Library has an over 20-year history of serving outreach needs of the community as a designated Outreach and Resource Library within the Greater Midwest Region (GMR) of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine. The Columbus Metropolitan Library with its 22 branch locations inspires reading, shares resources, and connects the community through its numerous programs and activities, and is a primary partner in this program.

Find free and trusted health information with https://medlineplus.gov/. Learn more about All of Us at https://joinallofus.org/nlm.

ABOUT Darlene Kaskie
Darlene Kaskie, M.L.S. is Community Engagement and Outreach Specialist for Region 6 of the Network of the National Library of Medicine. She connects communities to training, engagement, and funding to improve access to health information and NLM Resources such as MedlinePlus. Advancing health literacy and digital skills training helps people make informed decisions about their health. She earned her Consumer Health Information Specialization (CHIS) from the Medical Library Association.

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