A year long pilot programme jointly established between JISC Collections, Academic Health Science Centres and major STM publishers and database suppliers will seek to develop sustainable models for enhanced provision of access to high quality e-content across NHS and academic staff.
What are Academic Health Science Centres?
Academic Health Science Centres (AHSCs) are formal partnerships between a university and healthcare providers and aim is to improve the quality of health services and the health of the population by bringing research, education and patient care closer together [1]. Five AHSCs were officially recognised by government in March 2009:
* Cambridge University Health Partners
* Imperial College AHSC
* King's Health Partners
* Manchester AHSC
* UCL Partners
The right content to the right people?
Currently both the NHS and universities purchase e-content separately and have access to different content from different suppliers. However, despite the richness of content available within the academic and health sectors the differences can cause problems, Within the context of Academic Health Science Centres, this uneven access to content is a barrier to high quality research, clinical care and education and constitutes an administrative burden for AHSC managers.
Whilst there has been some purchasing of e-content from publishers and suppliers across the academic and health sectors, in the absence of a consensus on the best way to price access to content for NHS and academic staff at AHSCs, there has been a reluctance to enter into agreements that will open up access to the high quality content for all staff.
Towards consensus
The pilot programme, organised by JISC Collections, the UK academic community e-content procurement and negotiation service, will allow the universities at the centre of the AHSCs to extend to their partner NHS organisations access to their subscribed content from Elsevier, Nature Publishing Group, Springer, Thomson Reuters and Wolters Kluwer Health.
All of the publishers have granted this extended access at no additional cost for 2011. Over the course of the year all stakeholders will work together to review the impact on usage, administration, and licensing requirements arising from the pilot.
It is anticipated that a successful model may be scalable beyond the original group of participating AHSCs. An interim report will be produced in the third quarter of 2011.
[1] NHS patients to benefit as top flight Academic Health Science Centres named. Department of Health News Release issued by COI News Distribution Service. 9 March 2009. Accessible at:
http://www.wired-gov.net/wg/wg-news-1.nsf/0/12F26C3313D994838025757400470B87?OpenDocument
Further information
Further information is available from:
Liam Earney
Head of Licensing
JISC Collections
T: 020 3006 6002
M: +44 (0) 7585 967684
E: l.earney@jisc-collections.ac.uk
Peter Morgan
Head of Medical & Science Libraries
Medical Library
Cambridge University Library
Addenbrooke's Hospital
T: +44 (0)1223 336757
E: pbm2@cam.ac.uk
Rosemary Brownhill
Faculty Support Services, Team Leader: Medicine
Imperial College London
T: +44 (0)20 7594 8842
E: r.brownhill@imperial.ac.uk
Sarah Lawson
Senior Information Specialist (NHS Support)
Research & Learning Support
Information Services and Systems
King's College London
T: +44 (0)20 7848 6764/ 5543
E:sarah.lawson@kcl.ac.uk
Betsy Anagnostelis,
Librarian, Royal Free Hospital Medical Library &
Joint Academic Support Manager: Biomedicine,
University College London
T: +44 (0)20 7472 6781
E: ucylbet@ucl.ac.uk
Helen McEvoy
Faculty Team Librarian (School of Medicine)
The John Rylands University Library
The University of Manchester
T: +44 (0) 161 2757386
E: helen.mcevoy@manchester.ac.uk
