Evaluation of usage patterns and promotion of electronic resources in academic medical libraries: the case of the Central Library of the "Carol Davila" University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Bucharest, Romania

Abstract

The possibility to access information directly on the Internet, without the mediation offered by libraries and the fact that many users prefer electronic information services have led to the need for libraries to identify methods to promote and improve the services they offer. Along with the introduction of the new technologies, users can be considered among the most important collaborators of the library, but their experience in using electronic information resources and in searching and retrieving information in these resources varies greatly from one user to another and many still need assistance and training from librarians. Given that many academic libraries have focused in recent years on the development of large electronic collections in order to meet in a better way the information needs and preferences of users, we conducted research at the level of academic medical libraries in Romania which aimed to assess the quality of their services. We investigated how these libraries support the information and research needs of users and the advantages of access to electronic information resources for users. The situation in Romania seems to be different from Western countries in terms of not such a high use of electronic resources. In this paper we refer to some results of our research in the largest academic medical library in Romania, the Central Library of the "Carol Davila" University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Bucharest, and to possible solutions for increasing the use of information services based on electronic resources which include the need for intensive user education and promotion of these resources among the library users.