Role of Medical/Health Librarians in Promoting the Use of Medical Library Resources and Services

Abstract

Doctors and other health workers are in constant need of quality and timely information. To this end, medical/health librarians have critical roles to play. Their major duty is to advance access to available health information resources and services. However, reports abound of low library usage due to inadequate awareness of the availability of most of the information sources and services in medical libraries. Considering the need for the effective delivery of medical library services, the aim of this chapter was to highlight new roles and duties of medical/health librarians. It also discussed some of the skills that are needed by medical/health librarians. The chapter concludes that medical/health librarians must be engaged in newer roles and duties to be able to provide value-added services that will promote awareness and improve medical library use.