Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library
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The Cushing/Whitney Medical Library, a leading research library, serves the Yale-New Haven Medical Center and the health information needs of Yale University. The library is a comprehensive resource for research, patient care, and education materials. The Medical Library is a dynamic and busy place committed to providing students with a supportive place for study and learning, and faculty and staff with seamless access to information resources in the library and at their office workstations.
The library’s Web site is the gateway to an online library of clinical reference tools, databases, evidence-based practice resources, and electronic books and journals in support of programs in medicine, nursing, public health, and the basic sciences. Our rich collection of resources includes electronic and print journals and books, digital resources, images, educational software, and a large unique collection of rare medical books, medical prints, photographs, and memorabilia. Computers are available in the Information Room and the Computer Resource Laboratory (CRL). In addition, the CRL contains a digital imaging center. The CRL is open 24/7.
All Yale University students have access to electronic resources including electronic books, journals, and databases from any off-campus computer. Wireless access is available throughout the Medical Library. The library also lends laptops to Medical Center students.
Medical librarians provide reference assistance and in-depth consultation, conduct tours, teach classes, acquire and organize the collection, lend materials, and provide a photocopy and document delivery service. Librarians work to create seamless access to full-text electronic resources. Using YaleLinks, students can go from database to the full article with just a click of a button. We also develop self-help tools such as online tutorials for quick help at the student’s computer. To provide the highest level of service to library users, staff also provides an outreach service to each medical school department. The Library Liaison Program promotes communication between the library and the departments to ensure that the library is meeting the educational and research needs of busy clinicians and researchers.
The Medical Library offers a rich program designed to build competency in information management skills—skills that are increasingly important as a foundation for effective research and practice in health sciences. Our goal for this program is to foster lifelong information management skills by providing medical students a solid foundation throughout their four years of medical school.
During their orientation week, first-year students are introduced to the library, the Personal Librarian Program, and their “personal librarian.” Librarians become personal librarians for approximately twenty students and maintain contact with the same students throughout their four years in medical school. A personal librarian is able to recommend resources best suited for individual research needs, provide instruction in new technologies and resources, and guide students to specific resources as their research and learning needs change.
As the second-year students begin research for their thesis project, the library offers seminars on information management, including the use of bibliographic database management programs. At the end of the second year and just before the clinical years begin students attend a “Find it Fast” session. This session is designed to prepare students to find the answer to a clinical question efficiently and effectively.
Third- and fourth-year students participate in a variety of seminars, mostly focusing on evidence-based practice and advanced database searching techniques. Emerging trends and rapidly changing technology in academic medical curricula provide opportunities for faculty and librarians to work together using the Web and other electronic resources as teaching tools to enhance students’ educational experience at Yale.
The Historical Library contains one of the world’s finest collections of rare medical books, journals, prints, and photographs, as well as current works in the history of medicine. There are 325 medical incunabula, over 75 manuscript volumes from the twelfth through sixteenth century, and one of the best study collections of weights and measures in the world. Its holdings also include Yale medical theses to 1900, catalogues, yearbooks, photographs, and other publications and ephemera related to the Yale School of Medicine.
The Epidemiology and Public Health Library Web site contains online resources including databases, books, and journals on biostatistics, epidemiology, health policy and administration, environmental health, and global health. The print collection is housed in the Medical Library. The public health librarian provides library services to faculty, staff, and students at the School of Public Health.
Nursing library services are provided to Yale University School of Nursing (YSN) faculty, students, and staff through the Medical Library. The Medical Library provides YSN with a rich collection of both print and electronic materials. The print collection for the School of Nursing Library is housed in the Medical Library. The Nursing Library Web site gives the YSN community quick electronic access to important biomedical online resources, as well as other library electronic resources.
Sterling Memorial Library, Yale’s main library and the largest library on campus, houses more than four million volumes and serves as the center of the library system. Twenty-two libraries make up the Yale University Library system, including Kline Science Library, the Law Library, and the Social Science Library. EliExpress (Yale Library’s document delivery service) couriers transport library books daily among these and the other library units on campus
Associates of the Yale Medical Library
Gerard Burrow, M.D., Chair
Toby A. Appel, Secretary
Telephone: 785.4354
The associates were formed in 1948 to assist in augmenting the library’s services and collections. Membership information is available on the associates Web page, www.med.yale.edu/library/associates.
