Thank you WHSLA 2021 Executive Board, Committees, and Volunteers

We would be remiss if we didn't put out a blog post thanking the WHSLA 2021 Executive Board, Committees, and Volunteers for all their work to keep WHSLA going and strong in 2021. Thank you, thank you, thank you! 

As you know, professional associations like our state health science association run solely on volunteers. Thank you to everyone who volunteered for WHSLA in any capacity in 2021. Please consider volunteering in 2022. Watch your email for more information. 

Here's what we accomplished together this year...

Kathy Koch, Librarian Senior at Aurora Medical Center-Grafton, will be assuming the WHSLA Presidency in January 2022. 

Kathy Koch

See you in 2022!

It's time for the BMJ Christmas issue!

This probably makes me a giant nerd, but one of the things I most look forward to in December is the BMJ Christmas issue.  I love that it's silly, but they still "do not publish spoofs, hoaxes, or fabricated studies."  Side note, I also love their use of the Oxford comma.

This year, I particularly enjoyed their unsystematic review examining the poisonous plants of the holiday season and this interactive article inviting readers to spot real article titles vs those generated by AI.  It's harder than you might expect.

A plea from Minnesota

After nearly two years into this pandemic, I know we're all sick of talking about COVID-19.  Unfortunately, that won't make it go away, and many people outside of health care don't seem to grasp how serious it still is.

Earlier this week, leaders from several Minnesota medical systems took out a full page ad to express what health care workers face every day:

Little Annie Clabsi

Fred King & The Avenging Chicken present a dramatic reading of Little Annie Clabsi, a poem about central line infections.

Many of us know Fred King from MLA and Medlib-L.  Just thought you might enjoy this.

Honestly -- How many poems are there out there about CLABSI?

From the abstract on YouTube: 

Steps taken to eliminate central line-associated bloodstream infections in a hospital ward.

Abstract: Little Annie Clabsi and her evil cousin C Diff visit a hospital and are vanquished by proper hand hygiene.

Note: THIS IS NOT MEDICAL ADVICE. It's a reading of a poem I wrote about central line infections. I'M NOT A DOCTOR. Any opinions expressed are my own and are not necessarily shared by my employer, members of my profession, family, or any of my household pets. DON'T TAKE IT AS MEDICAL ADVICE.

How Sars-Cov-2 Evades Our Immune System

 

A discovery by researchers at the Texas A&M College of Medicine could lead to new therapies to prevent the virus from proliferating in the human body.

The immune system is a complex network of cells and proteins that is designed to fight off infection and disease, especially those like the coronavirus, or SARS-CoV-2, that can cause numerous issues in the human body. But many individuals are still at risk of being infected with the coronavirus, letting it replicate in the body and further transmitting to other individuals.

The underlying mechanism of how SARS-CoV-2 escapes from the immune system has been poorly understood. However, researchers from the Texas A&M University College of Medicine and Hokkaido University have recently discovered a major mechanism that explains how SARS-CoV-2 can escape from the immune system and replicate in the human body. Their findings were recently published in the journal Nature Communications.

Read more ...

This article was recommended by Kelle Selden at Ascension Wisconsin. 

The Good Listening Project & Podcast

 

 

The Good Listening Project cultivates resilience and wellbeing in healthcare communities.

As a 501(c)(3) non-profit, our programs help ease the emotional burden of hospital staff and other healers in an effort to fight burnout.

 

Poems & Origin Stories

Our poems are inspired by the stories of healthcare staff, medical students, patients, and their communities.

When a curious person takes up our offer to write them a poem, we ask: “What should the poem be about?”

Listener Poets create spaces where people can speak openly. Then they write poems inspired by our conversations to celebrate and commemorate these stories.

View all of our poems or use the search tools to find specific poems.

 

The Good Listening Podcast

Over 250 medical educators and students from the Association of American Medical Colleges shared their stories with us.

In each of the 15 episodes of our first season, Listener Poets bring you three poems inspired by conversations with healthcare leaders, heroes, and healers. 

LISTEN HERE

 

 Thought I'd share this handy website, as I had to use it a few times this week:

Down for Everyone or Just Me

This site checks if a website is down for everyone or just you.

Just plug in the url and click the blue "or just me" button.  

For example, if you can’t load or login to Facebook you can check if Facebook is down here and we will tell you if it is down when our servers check. 

This can be handy to know if the problem is with everyone or just something with your ISP or local area.

Here's what the down message looks like:

Guess I'll just wait it out ...

How Do You Celebrate the New Year?

How should you celebrate the new year? 

[Download the PDF version for a readable copy.]

Dora Davis wanted to share some holiday cheer from Wiley Publishing.

Referencing Wiley's flow chart above, Dora's family does the grape tradition from Spain.  

• Do any other Librarians already do any of the traditions listed 
• Or do you have your own not on the flow chart?

Feel free to share in the comments or on the WHSLA Listserv.  

Happy Holidays from Wiley with their Festive Collection

 

The Wiley Festive Collection gathers ten articles from across their journals to help answer the crucial questions at this time of year. We hope you enjoy reading them!

Among the questions examined are:

• Have you ever wondered what is the best formula for setting achievable New Year resolutions? 
• What is the chemistry behind the most familiar festive scents?  
• Could Santa be a virus superspreader?

 

Posted on behalf of Dora Davis.

Dear Pandemic: Those Nerdy Girls Fighting Misinformation via Social Media During the Covid-19 Pandemic

Those Nerdy Girls: Fighting Misinformation via Social Media During the Covid-19 Pandemic (about 1 hour)

Nursing Ethics Special Interest Group 11/27/2021

If you missed the keynote at the joint 2021 Midwest/MCMLA Joint Annual Meeting in October, you can still get the gist of the session as Aparna Kumar, Ashley Ritter, and Shoshana Aronowitz talk about the Dear Pandemic Project in this 1-hour session.

Their goal was to provide the public with facts about COVID-19 in the face of rampant misinformation. 

Annie first introduced Dear Pandemic on The WHSLA Blog back in January 2021.

Docline Winter Webinar Scheduled for Dec 15, 2021 at 2pm

 

Having trouble viewing this email? View it as a Web page.

DOCLINE Winter Webinar - Wednesday, December 15 at 2:30 PM ET / 1:30 CST

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Please join the DOCLINE Team for an overview of key system features. We will also provide a glimpse of our roadmap for the next year!

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When: Wednesday, December 15, 2021, 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM ET.

To Register:  Registration and an NNLM account are required at DOCLINE Winter Update | NNLM. 

Questions: Please submit your question(s) in advance. Additional questions will be taken as time permits.

Note: The webinar will be recorded.

◊

Questions about DOCLINE? See the DOCLINE User Resources page for quick tour videos, FAQs and more. 

Contact your Coordinator for help using the system.

Write to the Help Desk with feedback or to report technical issues. 

The Good Part about Waning Immunity - From The Atlantic

 

Confused about waning immunity and why we need boosters for the Covid vaccines?

This article by The Atlantic's science writer Katherine J. Wu, does a great job of explaining for the rest of us: 

• How the immune system works
• Why waning immunity is a natural part of the process
• and Why we shouldn't necessarily be afraid of it.  If we do get infected with with Covid, B-cells and T-cells will take over the attack to minimize the infection.  

Wu, K., 2021. The Good Part About ‘Waning’ Immunity. [online] The Atlantic. Available at: <https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2021/10/waning-immunity-not-all-bad/620436/> [Accessed 3 December 2021].

There really is a journal for everything

Thinking about trying to get published but feeling anxious about the process?  Why not start by submitting your work to the Journal of Universal Rejection?

From the journal's home page:

The founding principle of the Journal of Universal Rejection (JofUR) is rejection. Universal rejection. That is to say, all submissions, regardless of quality, will be rejected. Despite that apparent drawback, here are a number of reasons you may choose to submit to the JofUR:

• You can send your manuscript here without suffering waves of anxiety regarding the eventual fate of your submission. You know with 100% certainty that it will not be accepted for publication.
• There are no page-fees.
• You may claim to have submitted to the most prestigious journal (judged by acceptance rate).
• The JofUR is one-of-a-kind. Merely submitting work to it may be considered a badge of honor.
• You retain complete rights to your work, and are free to resubmit to other journals even before our review process is complete.
• Decisions are often (though not always) rendered within hours of submission.