Donald A. B. Lindberg: Inspiring Leader and Visionary in Biomedicine, Healthcare, and Informatics.

BACKGROUND: As Director of the US National Library of Medicine (NLM) for 30 years, Dr. Donald A. B. Lindberg was instrumental in bringing biomedical research and healthcare worldwide into the age of genomic and translational medicine through the informatics systems developed by the NLM. Lindberg opened free access and worldwide public dissemination of all the NLM's biomedical literature and databases, thus helping transform not only biomedical research like the Human Genome Project and its successors, but also the practices of medicine and healthcare internationally. Guiding, leading, and teaching-by-example at national, regional, and global levels of biomedical and healthcare informatics, Lindberg helped coalesce a dynamic discipline that provides a foundation for the human understanding which promotes the future health of our world. OBJECTIVES: To provide historical insight into the scientific, technological, and practical clinical accomplishments of Donald Lindberg, and to describe how this led to contributions in the worldwide interdisciplinary evolution of informatics, and its impact on the biosciences and practices of medicine, nursing, and other healthcare-related disciplines. METHODS: Review and comment on the publications, scientific contributions, and leadership of Donald Lindberg in the evolution of biomedical and health informatics which anticipate the vision, scholarship, research in the field, and represent the deeply ethical humanism he exhibited throughout his life. These were essential in producing the informatics systems, such as the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS), MEDLINE, PubMed, PubMed Central, and ClinicalTrials.gov, which, together with NLM training programs and conferences, made possible the interactions among researchers and practitioners leading to the past quarter-century of rapid and dramatic advances in biomedical scientific inquiry and clinical discoveries, openly shared across the globe. CONCLUSION: Dr. Lindberg was a uniquely talented physician and pioneering researcher in biomedical and health informatics. As the main leader in developing and funding innovative informatics research for more than 30 years as Director of the National Library of Medicine, he helped bring together the most creative interdisciplinary researchers to bridge the worlds of biomedical research, education, and clinical practice. Lindberg's emphasis on open-access to the biomedical literature through publicly shared computer-mediated methods of search and inquiry are seen as an example of ethical scientific openness.

Updates to the Symbol Nomenclature for Glycans guidelines.

The Symbol Nomenclature for Glycans (SNFG) is a community-curated standard for the depiction of monosaccharides and complex glycans using various colored-coded, geometric shapes, along with defined text additions. It is hosted by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) at the NCBI-Glycans Page (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/glycans/snfg.html). Several changes have been made to the SNFG page in the past year to update the rules for depicting glycans using the SNFG, to include more examples of use, particularly for non-mammalian organisms, and to provide guidelines for the depiction of ambiguous glycan structures. This Glycoforum article summarizes these recent changes.

Ebola outbreak response: the role of information resources and the National Library of Medicine.

The US National Library of Medicine (NLM) offers Internet-based, no-cost resources useful for responding to the 2014 West Africa Ebola outbreak. Resources for health professionals, planners, responders, and researchers include PubMed, Disaster Lit, the Web page "Ebola Outbreak 2014: Information Resources," and the Virus Variation database of sequences for Ebolavirus. In cooperation with participating publishers, NLM offers free access to full-text articles from over 650 biomedical journals and 4000 online reference books through the Emergency Access Initiative. At the start of a prolonged disaster event or disease outbreak, the documents and information of most immediate use may not be in the peer-reviewed biomedical journal literature. To maintain current awareness may require using any of the following: news outlets; social media; preliminary online data, maps, and situation reports; and documents published by nongovernmental organizations, international associations, and government agencies. Similar to the pattern of interest shown in the news and social media, use of NLM Ebola-related resources is also increasing since the start of the outbreak was first reported in March 2014.

175 años de la National Library of Medicine, de los EE.UU. de NA: un tesoro científico y cultural digno de admiración / 175 years of the National Library of Medicine, of the Unites States of America: a scientific and cultural treasure worthy of admiration

The National Library of Medicine (NLM) of the United States of America, celebrates in 2011 its 175th anniversary. This Library, the largest biomedical library in the world, has a proud and rich history serving the health community and the public, especially since its transfer to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, in 1968. It holds 17 million publications in 150 languages, and has an important collection of ancient and modern historical books as well as original publications of Vesalius and other founders of biomedicine. Its modern document collections illustrate the progress of medical sciences. These collections include laboratory notes from many scientists whose work forms the foundations of contemporary life sciences. The Library also provides several services for health research and for the public, including databases and services such as MedLine and BLAST. The NLM constantly strives to fulfill the information needs of its customers, whether scientists or the public at large. For example, as the Hispanic population of the Unites States has increased in recent years, the NLM has made larger and larger amounts of data available in Spanish to fulfill the health information needs of this population. NLM programs train professionals in library science and biomedical informatics and link biomedical libraries of 18 academic centers throughout the United States. The NLM funds competitive grants for training at the Library, organizing short instruction courses about library science and informatics, and writing books on health related matters including the history of medicine and public health. The NLM is managed and maintained by an outstanding and farsighted group of professionals and dedicated support staff. Their focus on serving and reaching both the biomedical community and the public at large has been crucial to its development into a world icon of biomedical sciences, information technology and the humanities.

Sea-change or change challenge? Health information access in developing countries: The U.S. National Library of Medicine experience.

Health professionals in developing countries want access to information to help them make changes in health care and contribute to medical research. However, they face challenges of technology limitations, lack of training, and, on the village level, culture and language. This report focuses on the U.S. National Library of Medicine experience with access: for the international medical/scientific community to health information which has been published by researchers in developing countries; for scientists and clinicians in developing countries to their own literature and to that of their colleagues around the world; for medical librarians who are a critical conduit for students, faculty, researchers, and, increasingly, the general public; and for the front line workers at the health center in the village at the end of the line. The fundamental question of whether or not information communication technology can make a difference in access and subsequently in health is illustrated by an anecdote regarding an early intervention in Africa in 1992. From that point, we examine programs to improve access involving malaria researchers, medical journal editors, librarians, and medical students working with local health center staff in the village. Although access is a reality, the positive change in health that the information technology intervention might produce often remains a mirage. Information and technology are not static elements in the equation for better access. They must function together, creating a dialectic in which they transform and inform one another and those whom their combination touches.

[175 years of the National Library of Medicine, of the United States of America: a scientific and cultural treasure worthy of admiration]. / 175 años de la National Library of Medicine, de los EE.UU. de NA: un tesoro científico y cultural digno de admiración.

The National Library of Medicine (NLM) of the United States of America, celebrates in 2011 its 175th anniversary. This Library, the largest biomedical library in the world, has a proud and rich history serving the health community and the public, especially since its transfer to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, in 1968. It holds 17 million publications in 150 languages, and has an important collection of ancient and modern historical books as well as original publications of Vesalius and other founders of biomedicine. Its modern document collections illustrate the progress of medical sciences. These collections include laboratory notes from many scientists whose work forms the foundations of contemporary life sciences. The Library also provides several services for health research and for the public, including databases and services such as MedLine and BLAST. The NLM constantly strives to fulfill the information needs of its customers, whether scientists or the public at large. For example, as the Hispanic population of the Unites States has increased in recent years, the NLM has made larger and larger amounts of data available in Spanish to fulfill the health information needs of this population. NLM programs train professionals in library science and biomedical informatics and link biomedical libraries of 18 academic centers throughout the United States. The NLM funds competitive grants for training at the Library, organizing short instruction courses about library science and informatics, and writing books on health related matters including the history of medicine and public health. The NLM is managed and maintained by an outstanding and farsighted group of professionals and dedicated support staff. Their focus on serving and reaching both the biomedical community and the public at large has been crucial to its development into a world icon of biomedical sciences, information technology and the humanities.

Characteristics of project management at institutions sponsoring National Library of Medicine MedlinePlus Go Local.

OBJECTIVES: Through interviews with the National Library of Medicine's MedlinePlus Go Local collaborators, an evaluation team sought to identify process characteristics that are critical for long-term sustainability of Go Local projects and to describe the impact that Go Local projects have on sponsoring institutions. METHODS: Go Local project coordinators (n = 44) at 31 sponsor institutions participated in semi-structured interviews about their experiences developing and maintaining Go Local sites. Interviews were summarized, checked for accuracy by the participating librarians, and analyzed using a general inductive methodology. RESULTS: Institutional factors that support Go Local projects were identified through the interviews, as well as strategies for staffing and partnerships with external organizations. Positive outcomes for sponsoring institutions also were identified. CONCLUSIONS: The findings may influence the National Library of Medicine team's decisions about improvements to its Go Local system and the support it provides to sponsoring institutions. The findings may benefit current sponsoring institutions as well as those considering or planning a Go Local project.