DACEHTA
How do you nurse your journal collection?
Drea Eskildsen Stenbaek
Health Information Services, the Library
National Board of Health – established 1909
 Operational tasks
 E.g. certification and licensing of health care
professionals; hospital planning
 Monitoring tasks:
 E.g. running and development of patient and disease
registries
 Advisory tasks:
 E.g. Minister and Parliament, counties and
municipalities; information campaigns to the public
 Developmental tasks:
 E.g. health technology assessment; evaluation; clinical
guidelines
Why a study of the journal collection?
Major purpose of the library is to support the use
of literature based documentation in solving the
Board’s tasks (developmental, advisory)
Requires the library to follow the development in
the Board’s need for documentation and
information
Do we have the right journals?
Objectives
 Ensure ressource efficiency
 Ensure relevancy of content of journal collection
according to needs
 Ensure compliance of journal collection with the
strategic and professional development of the
Board
 Establish process model regarding evaluation of
journal collection
 Contribute to future policy-making regarding
maintenance of journal collection
Methods
 Quantitative
 Usage statistics (circulation, TOC alerts, loans,
downloads)
 Electronic questionnaire (satisfaction, expectations,
needs)
 Qualitative
 Comparative analysis (interview with 5 libraries)
 Focus group interview (heavy library users representing
different departments of the Board)
Results: usage statistics
 Small group of heavy users responsible for 30%
of circulation
 19 journals represent 47% of TOC alerts
 332 articles from 94 journals (12%) downloaded
from our Elsevier journal package (16,76 €)
 41 articles from 21 journals (4%) downloaded
from our Springer journal package (26,14 €)
Results: electronic questionnaire
 55% don’t use e-journals (33% don’t know why,
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27% don’t need journals, 21% prefer print)
Large variation in relevant/interesting subject
areas
Difficult to point at specific journals to subscribe
to / cancel
High degree of satisfaction with journal collection
and service of the librarians
Lower degree of satisfaction with library intranet
and availability of journals
Results: comparative analysis
 None has overall strategy for maintenance /
development of journal collection
 Most have chosen democratic model (researchers
/ library committee work out future directions
and action plans)
 One makes strategic choices on the basis of a
SWOT analysis
 All use usage statistics and user requests in
decision making
Results: focus group interview
 Conflicting demands: journal collection must
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possess professional depth and breadth vs.
demands of the users
Panel could discuss conflicting demands
Strategy should be flexible but not subject to
popularity criterion – consideration for demand
should be combined with professional debate
Active dialogue with users important
Library should be more visible, market itself
more, improve availability of e-journals
Recommendations for a 3 pillar process model
Quantitative monitoring
(loan statistics, utilization, user satisfaction)
Qualitative assessment
(ensure importance and relevancy to
present and future activities based on
professional priorities to avoid purely
demand-driven decisions)
Economic considerations
Action plan for the library
Strategic goals, e.g.:
 Prioritize electronic services more
 Attract new/more users
 Eliminate unnecessary administrative procedures
and inappropriate utilization of resources
 Competence development plan for the librarians
What then?
 Marketing (visibility, new/more users)
 individual library introductions, department visits
(dialogue with users and non-users)
 Availability of e-journals
 new journal administration system
 Library intranet
 better position on Board intranet, reorganization of
library pages
Conclusion
Quantitative data cannot stand alone, not possible to set out
rigid criteria for the journal selection
A rarely used journal may be a core journal within a highpriority but small area
 Only few employees engaged in many subject areas results in
low usage statistics
 Subject areas of priority constantly change because of
political demands to the Board

Must be supplemented by qualitative assessments which
requires active dialogue with the users to ensure
compliance with strategic and professional development of
the Board