Disruption to EBSCO databases and journals Friday 30th May

EBSCO, who supply some of our databases (namely CINAHL and Health Business Elite) and electronic journals, will be carrying out a network upgrade between 4 pm and 6 pm on Friday the 30th of May.

During this time there may be intermittent access to some or all of their products and it may not be possible to access some of our e-journals or carry out any searches on the affected databases.

Library computer upgrades May 27th - 30th

All of the computers at each of the library sites are going to be upgraded.

The schedule for upgrades is as follows:

• Tuesday 27th May Berrywood Hospital Library
  
• Thursday 29th - Friday 30th May Richmond Library, Northampton General Hospital

The schedule is approximate and may change depending on any technical issues (Isebrook Library will be done on an ad hoc basis).

The process will inevitably lead to some disruption and there may be times when PCs are unavailable. We may also need to ask you to move between PCs to enable the technicians to get on with the upgrade.

Once the upgrade has finished all of our PCs will be moved from Windows XP to Windows 7, many of them will have been replaced with newer machines and there should be a significant improvement in performance and reliability.

We apologise of any inconvenience the process may cause, but the end result should deliver an improvement to our service.

Spring bank holiday closure

All the Libraries will be unstaffed on Monday the 26th of May for the bank holiday.

24 hour access is available as usual to our registered members by swiping in using your library card at the Berrywood and Richmond libraries.

We reopen as normal on Tuesday the 27th at all of our sites.

We have a new selection of books to review

The Bookworm by Spitzweg

We have just taken delivery of a new set of on approval books. The scheme gives you the chance to browse a selection of newly published titles covering a variety of health and related topics and let us know if there are any you would like us to buy for the Library's collection.

Our current selections are available at the Berrywood and Richmond libraries until the 20th of June. The topics covered include:

• Anaesthetics
• Autism
• Dermatology
• Epidemiology and medical statistics
• Mental health & psychiatry
• Neurology
• Nursing
• Paediatrics
• Psychology
• Public health
• ...and more

Of course, we are always happy to have recommendations for new stock on any health related topic.

You can also find a list of titles we have recently purchased (including previous on approvals) on our web site, and all of our stock via our catalogue.

Severe traffic disruption around Northampton General Hospital, Wednesday the 7th of May

There are going to be a large number of road closures on Wednesday the 7th of May in central Northampton that are liable to have a substantial impact on traffic around the hospital. The closures are for The Women's Tour cycling event which is coming to the town.

The road closures will start at 4.30 am in the town centre and last until 7 pm. Additionally, there will be more closures around the hospital itself between midday and 2 pm including Cheyne Walk, Victoria Promenade and the Bedford Road from the junction with Cliftonville Road (which will include the Midsummer Meadow car park).

The scale of the disruption is uncertain but you are advised to allow extra time onto your normal journey (see the advice from Northamptonshire Highways on how much time to allow).

For more details on the road closures see the Northamptonshire County Council web site.

Web site of the month: The Campbell Library

The Campbell Collaboration Library of Systematic Reviews is a collection of high quality evidence on the effects of social interventions in three interlinked areas, social welfare, crime and justice, and education.

Similarly to the Cochrane Library in health, the Campbell Collaboration is a research network that conducts systematic reviews with the intention of supporting evidence-based decision making.

The Campbell Library is simple to search and offers free full text of all of its published reviews (click here to see an example of a systematic review on mindfulness).

The advance search feature enables searches to be filtered by area of interest, type of document and publication year. The search history feature enables you to combine different search terms for more accurate searching. There is a user guide on the site that takes you through all the searching features.

If you are looking for high quality, non-clinical evidence around social interventions, education or criminology, the Campbell Library is a really good place to start.