Development and implementation of an LGBT initiative at a health sciences library: the first eighteen months

Abstract

Background: The University of Louisville School of Medicine is the pilot site for the eQuality project, an initiative to integrate training for providing care to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) patients into the standard medical school curriculum. Inspired by and in support of this School of Medicine initiative, Kornhauser Health Sciences Library staff have developing our own initiative. Because of past and current lack of competent provider training and the resulting need for patients to be knowledgeable self-advocates, however, our initiative was broadened to include the goal of providing LGBT individuals in our communities—both on campus and in the broader public—with the resources and tools that they need to access information about their own health.Case Presentation: This paper describes the development of that twofold initiative and the tangible methods used in its implementation, including collection development, interdepartmental collaboration, electronic resource guide creation, and community engagement through outreach.Conclusions: Outcomes of the initiative to date will also be discussed, along with plans for further development.

Providing real-time resources in support of LGBTQ+ and HIV+ populations as information experts on the ECHO hub team: a case report

“…In the past few years alone, health sciences librarians have been involved in many aspects of LGBTQ+ information creation, dissemination, preservation, and delivery. Health sciences librarians have created LGBTQ+-specific health archives, worked to advance LGBTQ+ Wikipedia engagement, built inclusive collections at their institutions, researched better ways to improve access to resources, and created safe spaces at their libraries for LGBTQ+ patrons [6,7,8]. The US National Library of Medicine (NLM) has developed multiple, freely available web databases and online resources for health practitioners and the general public to access information about HIV and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome See end of article for supplemental content.…”