Virtual Health Library

The project

The databases have been seeking to include different types of documents, particularly those that are considered as unconventional, without commercial ties, and that have have limited circulations and, thus, as hard to come by.

Theses and dissertations are included in this classification, as they involve research, prove hypotheses, and take years to be prepared.

For approval, during defense, they are analyzed by renowned specialists.

Although considered great reference sources, much of the information they contain is not fully used by peers, since most are unaware they even exist.

Most of the time, these theses and dissertations are only found in the Library of the Institution where they were defended and have limited circulation.

Objective

• Perform as a facilitator for the collaborative work among public health academic institutions, offering a holistic view of the public health dissertations and theses.
• Use Web content management tools and other Web services.
• Integrate the information contained in the several public health area theses sites.

Justifications

• Lack of a tool that can articulate the entirety of the information and content produced and presented in public health theses and dissertations.
• Diversified search and recovery language and lack of structured organization.
• Low level of dissemination of the collaborative work culture among academic institutions, researchers working similar research lines, and among researchers developing complementary research lines.
• User demand (explicit).

Specific Objective

• The Thesis Portal project’s main objective is to drive the dissemination and integration of the knowledge on health and health practices contained in public health theses.

General Objectives

• Offer a holistic view of the dissertations and theses in the public health area.
• Digital treatment and electronic transmission, with ongoing material updates.
• Render access to this content more dynamic, including integration with the Brazil Public Virtual Health Library.
• Contribute to the development of Virtual Libraries on Public Health in Brazil via the dissemination of academic scientific information.

Project Development Stages

• Mapping of the institutions that are interested in participating proactively in the project
• Creation of an Advisory Committee or Focal Group to follow-up on, validate, and control project quality
• Definition of the Responsibility Matrix among participating institutions
• Definition of the forms of cooperation with other thesis and dissertation portal initiatives
• Definition of the FIs that will compose the Thesis Portal (news, directories, LIS, etc.)
• Preparation of documentation to collect publication authorizations (Author’s Rights)
• Development of a prototype of the tool that will manage the Thesis Portal and work as an interface
• Initiative assessment reports and Advisory Committee meetings
• Statistics on hits and on the increase in the volume of data that is available
• Announcement on news regarding theses defenses, usage and impact, in addition to related links

Responsibilities

• ENSP Library: Coordination and operation of sources of information
• BIREME: Methodological and technological support

Thesis Portal operation is guided by a Focal Group composed of the following institutions:

• Rio de Janeiro State University (Libraries belonging to the Institute for Social Medicine and to the Senior Citizen University)
• University of São Paulo ( College of Public Health Library)

The Focal Group will operate as the Editorial Committee for the Thesis Portal, and it will have the following attributions:

• Be responsible for its content;
• Guide its development, defining priorities, strategies, and procedures.
• Establish and improve quality control and define selection criteria
• Drive the development of sources of information;
• Assess and certify the content to be integrated or referred to in the VHL;
• Promote the division of responsibilities and of the available resources.

Result

• Bibliographic index of the Brazilian theses on public health, linking to full texts or identifying the library where the original can be found.
• Collection of full-text theses.
• News on defenses, related sites

Literature

BIOJONE, M. R. El Modelo SciELO. In: Reunión de Coordinación Regional de la Biblioteca Virtual en Salud, 1. 1999, Washington. Available at: http://www.bireme.br/bvs/reuniao/E/public.htm. Accessed on: Mar 16 2005.

LONG, J. BVS - Saúde Pública, teses em texto completo. Reunião da Rede Brasileira de Informação em Ciências da Saúde, 9; Reunião de Coordenação da Biblioteca Virtual em Saúde Brasil, 1. 2002, Recife. Available at: http://snbu.bvs.br/xml2html/xmlRoot.php?xml=reuniao_bvs/xml/pt/module.xml&xsl=reuniao_bvs/xsl/home.xsl&lang=pt. Accessed on: Mar 16 2005.

PACKER, A. L. SciELO - A Model for Cooperative Electronic Publishing in Developing Countries. D-Lib Magazine, v. 6, n. 10, 2000. Available at: http://www.dlib.org/dlib/october00/10inbrief.html#PACKER> Accessed on: Mar 16 2005

PACKER, A. L., BIOJONE, M. R., ANTONIO, I. et al. SciELO: a methodology for electronic publishing. Revista Española de Salud Publica, v. 75, n. 4, p. 291-312, Jul./Aug. 2001. Available at: http://www.scielosp.org/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1135-57272001000400004&lng=pt&nrm=iso. Accessed on: Mar 16 2005

" PACKER, A. L. Scielo and scientific electronic publishing in Brazil. Journal of Venomous Animals Toxins, v. 8, n. 2, p.189-190, 2002. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0104-79302002000200001&lng=pt&nrm=iso. Accessed on: Mar 16 2005