the new resources on the Knowledge for Healthcare blog6


, as a site with which


NHS librarians were already familiar. Scope of the response


By the beginning of March there were over 80 lab-confirmed cases and, on the 6 March, sadly the first death7


. It was clear


that health services across the UK were going to be affected in an unprecedented way due to Covid-19.


We wanted to facilitate knowledge sharing by NHS library staff in Eng- land so that they could better support the wider health system. Information products needed to be quickly developed and shared. We committed to developing resources that would directly meet the needs of health librarians and save them time. Out of this came the Covid-19 blog site pages8


which went live on the 13 March 2020.


We saw that work was being repeated across the system. Recognising that some knowledge services were under pressure, and that health librarians offer unique specialist skills into the system, we wanted to assist and encourage colleagues to share their work and avoid duplication, releasing their time to focus on priorities.


Evidence Sources


We wanted to bring all the evidence sources9


linked to Covid-19 into one place and highlight what information was freely available. Doing it in this way means that as things change, we update one nation- al page rather than several regional or local pages. This applies both to sources in the wider system and to sources for library and knowledge specialists. HEE’s Knowledge Management team compiled and updates resources for the interna- tional Coronavirus section on e-Learning


June-July 2020


Nightingale Hospital at Excel London Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/sludgeulper


for Healthcare, notably compiling essential guidance10


.


Database and e-resource providers opened a lot of resources relevant to Covid-19 for free, in a short period of time. The HEE Library and Knowledge Services team saw the need to collate information into one place11


opened e-resources12


. Additionally, publishers have also that are not directly


linked to Covid-19 for a limited time. We focused on selecting those resources that NHS librarians could make readily discov- erable for healthcare staff via the discovery platforms they already use. In this way we can enable and disable access quickly and easily as publishers change their position.


Search Bank The evidence sources page went live on the 24 March. By then it had already become clear, as NHS staff across the system began posing questions, that there was duplication of requests for literature searches and evidence summaries on different aspects of manag- ing Covid-19. The HEE team responded by forming a working group of expert searchers from across England with members of the HEE Library and Knowledges Services team. They worked together to plan and deliver a service, inviting colleagues to share their work to assist library and knowledge services


staff and better meet the needs of NHS staff in England.


Searches are received through a central email; they are then distributed to the expert group for assessment against the inclusion criteria before being added to the search bank [n=138 at 12 June 2020]13


. The page went live at the end of


March, and continues to be refined. It also links users to several ready-made search strategies. Naturally, other nations and organi- sations have similarly come together to streamline procedures around how their library and knowledge services teams are working to provide evidence and support librarians and knowledge specialists through the pandemic. We signpost work undertaken by Scotland14


and Ireland15


and other countries. At a strategic level, the national lead is in regular liaison with the NHS leads in the home countries, with Ireland, and across Europe through the European Association for Health Informa- tion and Libraries.


Current Awareness


One area where NHS library and knowl- edge service staff were struggling to support the healthcare workforce effectively at the start of the pandemic was information


INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL 23


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