High level search skills

Editor's Notes

• #2: Bore Da Pawb – Good morning everyone. We would like to thank CILIP Cymru Wales for giving us this opportunity to speak to you today.
• #3: Let’s first explain who we are and what we do! NHS Wales Library and Knowledge Service is a partnership between NHS Wales and Cardiff University health libraries. We provide a library service to NHS staff in Wales as well as students on placement, to support their patient care, education, training and research information needs.   The partnership supports a Resource Discovery Tool which is NHS Wales LibrarySearch, and is hosted by Cardiff University.  LibrarySearch also includes the national online resources of the NHS Wales e-Library.  A resource sharing agreement is in place, and health Libraries can request books and journal articles from any of the other libraries within the partnership. The parternship is also a forum for members to share knowledge and ideas, it also aims to develop the skills of library staff and to enable networking through an annual conference and meetings. As members, we are committed to improving the standards of Health Libraries through accreditation and guidelines.
• #4: There are 25 health libraries within NHS Wales each managed by a professional librarian and in most cases, supported by library assistants.
• #5: Investigative survey in [WHEN WAS THAT DONE?] on training needs identified a need for training in literature searching, particularly from relatively new staff but also more experienced staff, not confident to call themselves expert searchers. So all members keen to develop search skills and collaborate where possible. With broadening of types of searches being requested by users of NHS wales L&KS – not just clinical searches, e.g. Teaching session /presentation, Audit, Preparation of a business case Patient information: creating information resources for patients or searches to help inform service change and planning e.g. ‘What is a community? Encourage collaboration – searching often done in isolation, able to collaborate with more experienced colleagues, someone else in NHSWLKS may have done a similar search previously From this survey the group had a broader discussion around consistency of service across NHS Wales in reference to all the different kind of searches L&KS staff may be asked to complete and of course there is no qualification. Most members trained ‘on the job’ by experienced predecessors. Receive training from suppliers on how database products work and some offer certification e.g. Scopus Certification Program for Librarians but there in no recognised ‘searching’ qualification Plan to introduce some guidance for approach to and presentation of searches also important to note that searching is an art not a science and we don’t want to produce searching by rote but guidance for staff on how different types of search may be approached, and a move towards standardisation of presentation including disclaimer.
• #6: New to NHS Wales and/or newly qualified staff/staff taking on Masters qualification – may be considering professional registration, relevant for PKSB and professional development Succession planning – when experienced searchers move on to other roles/organisations or retire has that knowledge been transferred – a knowledge management issue! Sustainability – continue to develop search skills among the workforce, planning for training when new members of staff join the service. CPD – searchers are always learning – even if you know your techniques well, there is always something new to learn or try – others colleagues may be more expert in using a certain resource or carrying out a certain type of search e.g. for a systematic review. Looking at this from a workforce planning angle we need to help staff develop and sustain their literature search skills, preparing new staff by using the experience existing across the membership and giving some guidance on literature searching for different requests. Some of the questions searchers ask themselves are; Where to look? How long should I be spending on this? When should I stop? Quality Improvement – project to give guidance to standardise approach to searching and presentation of search results?
• #8: The document is based on the London Kent, Surrey and Sussex Regional Searching Guidance, produced by the Regional Searching Protocol Working Group, 2nd edition, April 2021 https://sites.google.com/site/healthliteraturesearchers/Home/search-guidance  The NHS Wales Library Service would like to thank all those involved and especially Adam Tocock for permission to adapt the original. Adapted by Working group lead by… Generic advice and more specific guidance for searches for Care of a specific patient Service change, guidelines, or policies Teaching session /presentation Audit Preparation of a business case Patient information: creating information resources for patients General updating /Continuing Professional Development (CPD) Quality Improvement (QI) project Research support Searching to support a paper to be submitted for publication Searching to support systematic reviews 
• #9: The NHSWLKS Training group & Events group have been instrumental in arranging; Specialist Unit for Review Evidence (SURE) training on Critical Appraisal arranged for May 2022 – CA being a vital component of the whole literature search process, better understanding, train and advise our users better. Resources training – arrange with resources suppliers e.g. OVID Romper search training or in tandem with NHS Wales e-library where appropriate Buddy up – four eyes always being better than two when looking at a search strategy! Working in pairs allows discussion and sharing of tasks Journal club – looking at articles on searching but also other topics, the experience of a journal club helps us to understand how journal clubs function how the might generate ideas for literature searching
• #10: There had been discussions between members of the NHS Wales Library and Knowledge Service around the standardisation and consistency of literature searching skills. We have had new librarians appointed to posts within the health libraries and we felt that a more common approach to literature searching would be beneficial for all. In line with CILIP’S PKSB an investigative survey for NHS Wales health library staff was carried out last year. The results of the survey indicated that staff would welcome training sessions in both basic and advanced literature searching as well as in critical appraisal skills. Another incentive in terms of ensuring standardisation and quality in literature searching, was the adoption of Health Education England (HEE)’s Quality and Improvement Outcomes Framework that sets the standards for Healthcare Library and Knowledge Services, replacing the former Library Quality Assurance Framework (LQAF). One of the six Quality and Improvement Outcomes is: …..
• #11: To support the need to standardise literature searching skills of our members a Literature Searching Skills Group was formed last autumn. The group’s remit is to provide a forum for discussing various aspects of literature searching processes including peer reviewing, measuring the impact of searches within our Health Boards. To date we have had a session to discuss and learn more about the use of the standard PRISMA-S guidance for literature search reporting in systematic reviews as well the PRESS checklist practice guideline for the peer review of electronic literature search strategies for librarians and other information specialists who perform literature searches for Systematic Reviews. Our latest group meeting was on the subject of Challenging Searches. A presentation was given by one of the group members, describing how one library team worked collaboratively, to carry out a complex search. This team effect ensured that the work of carrying out the literature searching across a range of resources could be done in a robust but timely manner. We also hope to invite guest speakers to future meetings.
• #12: Another development has been the setting up of an Expert Searchers Group. The aim of the group is to assist in finding evidence based information for researchers based at the Health Education Improvement Wales. HEIW is a Special Health Authority within NHS Wales and sits alongside Health Boards and Trusts. It has a leading role in the education and training of the healthcare workforce in Wales. To date 12 literature searches have been carried out by the group, (5 of which have had two or more people working on the search). Some of the topics requested include: simulation in education and training, nurse staffing issues and quality frameworks for healthcare education. The impact of these searches on the research carried out is yet to be collated