PAN AMERICAN HEALTH FOURTH MEETING ORGANIZATION 14-18 JUNE 1965 ADVISORY COMMITTEE WASHINGTON, D.C. ON MEDICAL RESEARCH
PROPOSED REGIONAL MEDICAL LIBRARY CENTER FOR LATIN AMERICA
Ref: RES 4/12 9 June 1965
-? 4-
PAN AMERICAN HEALTH ORGANIZATION Pan American Sanitary Bureau, Regional Office of the WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION
WASHINGTON, D.C. RES 4/12
CONTENTS
Pa£e PREFACE i I SUMMARY 1
II NEEDS AND OBJECTIVES 1
III ORGANIZATION AND MANAGEMENT 5
IV FUNCTIONS AND SERVICES 7
1. Community to be Served 2. Information Services 3. Circulation of Materials 4. Communication Facilities 5. Publication
V PERSONNEL AND TRAINING 11
VI PHYSICAL FACILITIES 12
1. Choice of Site 2. Space Requirements
VII BOOK RESOURCES 14
VIII IMPLEMENTATION 15
IX BUDGET 16
Annex I Latin American Regional Medical Library Center: Recommendations.
Annex II Trip Report: Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Venezuela - i - RES 4/12
PREFACE
Effective and efficient communication of new biomedical information
is essential to the development and growth of medical research and
educational programs. The serious inadequacies in biomedical communication
in Latin America have been a cause of concern for the Advisory Committee on
Medical Research of the Pan American Health Organization. Resources in
medical school libraries in Latin America, for instance, fall considerably
below those in the United States where the median is 55,000 volumes as
against 8,000 in Latin America.
The National Library of Medicine through its overseas services has
been able to fill in a few of the lacunae in these resources and services.
Over half of the Library's interlibrary loans to foreign countries go to
Latin America. In the period March - December, 1964 it provided a total
of 7,816 loans to that region as against a total of 14,552 sent overseas
in that same period. Although these services demonstrate the great need
for improved information resources, they represent only a token ability to meet these needs. Adequate response to these needs will depend on effective
decentralization of these responsibilities.
In recognition of these needs, a meeting was held at the National
Library of Medicine on January 13, 1965. Representatives of the Pan American
Health Organization, the Library, the U. S. Department of State and the
U. S. Book Exchange met along with several individuals experienced in the field of biomedical education and research in Latin America. (See TableIl, p. 19). - ii - RES 4/12
The members of the group discussed the serious deficiencies in Latin
American informatión services and recommended strongly that one effective way of responding to the needs would be to establish a regional medical library center in Latin America. This center as well as supplying a strong central core of information resources upon which the entire Latin American biomedical community could draw, would also serve to introduce some of the newer communications technologies such as the MEDIARS program of the National
Library of Medicine, a computerized system of information storage and retrieval.
To assist in developing the resources of the regional center, the
National Library of Medicine offered to make available its more than half a million unit credits in the U. S. Book Exchange, a cooperative, private, service organi.ation which collects and disseminates surplus publications from its many member institutions.
To examine the feasibility of establishing such a regional medical
library center in Latin America, the Pan American Health Organization asked
Dr. David A. Kronick, National Library of Medicine, and Dr. Mortimer Taube,
Documentation Inc. to survey Latin American medical library and documentation
activities. Their trip report and recommendations are appended to this
proposal. RES 4/12
PROPOSED REGIONAL MEDICAL LIBRARY CENTER IN LATIN AMERICA*
I SUP4ARY
Under the joint sponsorship of the Pan American Health Organization and the Pan American Federation of Associations of Medical Schools, is proposed the establishment of a Latin American Regional Medical Library, located in a city which provides optimum service potential, and in association with existing medical library resources. This regional medical library will function to provide prompt access through photoduplication and other devices to a comprehensive collection of health-related literature in such a way as to supplement local medical library resources in Latin American states. It will also function to improve bibliographic access to these materials through operation of machine searches based on MEDLARS tapes, and serve as a demonstration and training center in promoting the development of medical library services in Latin America.
II NEEDS AND OBJECTIVES
Medical library resources and services in Latin America are clearly underdeveloped in terms of modern library technology and provision of the necessary information support for medical education, research and practice.
Earlier traditions and philosophies of medical education resulting in the survival of textbook-oriented instruction, and of medical research as typified by the self-sufficient individual researcher, have operated to inhibit the develop- ment of comprehensive collections of world journal literature and services based thereon. Funds for library support in all countries have been chronically scarce.
The result is that most of the libraries are small, insufficient, and under-supported (see Table I), their modest resources invested in textbooks,
* Prepared by Mr. Scott Adams, Dr. D.A. Kronick and Mr. Samuel Lazerow of the National Library of Medicine and by Dr. M. Taube of Documentation, Inc., for the Fourth Meeting of the PAHO/ACMR, 14-18 June 1965. Based on site visits to Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Venezuela, 17 April-7 May 1965, by Drs. Kronick and Taube,acting as PAHO Consultants. RES 4/12
2 their journal holdings limited to publications they can acquire by exchange for local publications, isolated by geographic barriers, and by barriers imposed by governmental regulations and tariffs.
This resource is inadequate as a base on which to develop programs for modernizing medical education, research training, and research. Of these three objectives, that of acquainting new generations of medical students with the vastly increased and complicated knowledge to which they, as the medical practitioners and researchers of the future are heirs, is all important. Progress in the medical sciences in Latín America is in their hands. In the face of accelerated medical research programs in the rest of the world, and the accompanying enormous increase in publication reporting the results of such research, inadequate library resources inhibit their progress. Medical education in the developing countries of Latin America today is disadvantaged compared to those in other areas of the world, and world-wide acceleration of publication unavailable in Latin American libraries is widening the existing gap.
Remedial efforts so far have been directed toward assistance to individual medical libraries, for example to the restoration of the library of the Faculty of Medicine, Santiago de Chile, following its disastrous fire. Similarly, use of U. S. Book Exchange, wher. AID funds were available for this purpose, has been by individual institutions, for partial, even competitive, advantage. The National Library of Medicine through its world wide interlibrary loan and reference service has been able to provide some relief for these inequalities. However, to permit the burgeoning growth of research in Latin America to continue, the nations of this area must begin to develop their own resources and services, and to look more to each other RES 4/12 3 for this kind of support. In addition there is much needed in Latin America
an indigenous center for training in modern information technology and good
library practice.
Important as it is to develop individual libraries to achieve a
higher level of availability of information -- and this proposal takes
cognizance of the need -- the generalized level of inadequate library
resources and services and economic feasibility suggest that this is a
long-range, rather than a short-range goal. In the final analysis any
effective network of medical library service must depend as much on the
effectiveness of the peripheral service points as upon the central source.
Funds are not available, however, in the amounts required, nor would space, equipment, and trained personnel be on hand to use them effectively. A fractionated library development effort could not make its impact felt over a wide enough area, nor could it show results fast enough.
There has been a growing awareness that centralized, cooperative institutions*, providing supplemental services on an international or national pattern can meet a great many of the needs of a widely dispersed clientele.
Thus UNESCO established a scientific documentation service in Mexico City,
FAO an agricultural documentation service in Turrialba, Costa Rica, and the Brazilian Conselho Nacional de Pesquisas' Instituto Brasileiro de Biblio- grafia .e DocumentaiTo in Rio de Janeiro. Experience gained by these prototype national and international activities Is pertinent to the medical library field.
Two other national institutions in other countries perform functions which are even more pertinent to medical library development: the National
Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland and the National Lending Library of
Science and Technology in Boston Spa, Yorkshire, England. RES 4/12 4
These institutions exist to guarantee the availability within the
United States and the United Kingdom respectively of scientific publications within their fields, and act to supplement existing library resources held by other institutions. They provide, in short, support on a level which would not be available to libraries over a wide area and which are both non- competitive with local institutions and economical because they are shared.
The creation of an analogous institution to provide such a backstopping function, of a continental scope, offers an economical solution to the development of medical library resources and services in Latin America.
Several factors exist which guarantee its feasibility and viability:
1. Sponsorship by the international organization with primary interests
in the development of the medical and related sciences in Latin
America -- The Pan American Health Organization.
2. Sponsorship by a primary user group, the Pan American Federation
of Associations of Medical Schools, which would provide an
immediate market for its services.
3. Technical assistance from the National Library of Medicine and
material help from the U. S. Book Exchange in the development of
its resources.
OBJECTIVES
It would be the purpose of the proposed Latin American Regional Medical
Library to support the advance of medical education and research in Latin
American countries through:
1. Providing increased access for workers in the health sciences
to a comprehensive collection of scientific and professional RES 4/12
literature, thereby aiding in the development of self-sufficiency
of medical library resources.
2. Utilizing modern photocopy and communications technology in
improving such accessibility.
3. Providing increased bibliographic access to these medical library
materials by the provision of mechanized search functions utilizing
MEDLARS tapes.
4. Promoting and encouraging medical library development in South
America through functioning as a demonstration and training
Center.
5. Fostering cooperative library and bibliographical programs among
its constituent groups.
III ORGANIZATION AND MANAGEMENT
1. The Director of PAHO, as the primary sponsor, is the authority responsible-for organizing the Governing Board, and for receiving the reports of its Chairman. As a creation of the international organization, the Regional
Library can enjoy relative freedom from customs duties, and can use the franking privilege under international postal convention.
2. Governing Board. The Library would be organized under the authority of a Governing Board, responsible for policy formulation and program review.
This Governing Board would be representative of the functional and national interests involved in the activities and services of the regional library.
3. Technical Advisory Group. In addition to the Governing Board, there will be a Technical Advisory Group, responsible for providing the
Director of the Library and the Board with guidance on technical aspects of RES 4/12 6
the Library's operation.
The Technical Advisory Group would have representation inter-
nationally from both the medical library world, and the world of scientist
users.
Role of the Director of the Regional Library Center
This proposal calls for an establishment in association with an
existing center of library excellence, and not creating a medical library
de novo. The Board, through the Director, will contract for space, services,
and use of existing library collections. The regional library will acquire
added materials, initially from USBE, later through subscription, to
supplement the collection of its host institution, and to pay for their
cataloging and binding.
The regional library center would be set up in space which was
part of or contiguous to an existing medical library. In turn for the
use of allocated space and use of the host library's collection and other
facilities, the regional library would supplement the host library's
collection and provide its services fully. Policy for the regional library,
however, would be established;by the Board of Governors appointed by PAHO, which would include representation from the Pan American Federation of
Associations of Medical Schools, and the member nations of PAHO, as well as a member of the host institution, and its services would be available to all eligible users in Latin America.
The Director would supervise the regional library's day-to-day operations, and manage the service and educational and training program. RES 4/12 7
The Director would have the responsibility of implementing the policy decisions of the Governing Board, and of developing the programs needed to provide the necessary services.
The following represents the proposed organizational structure:
PAHO
BOARD OF GOVERNORS TECHNICAL ADVISORY
ROUPI FUNCTIONSDIRECTORVICES
IV FUNCTIONS AND SERVICES
1. Community to be served.*
The proposed regional medical library would serve a geographic area covering some 6,850,000 square miles (U.S. 3,022,387) with a population of about 150,000,000 people (U.S. 183,742,000). The health professions community which would comprise the more immediate clientele of the library would be about 88,000 physicians with a ratio of about 1 to 1,600 of the population (U. S. 244,795 with a ratio of 1 to 760); about 22,000 dentists or 1 to 6,500 population (S. S. 105,000 and 1 to 1,800) in addition to other health professions personnel in South America numbering about 83,000. There are about 6,500 hospitals with a total of around 500,000 beds. The medical schools, including the ones recently organized number 75, with a total student enrollment of about 58,000, and with some 4,800 graduates annually.
To provide literature services to this vast complex of health services, there are about 216 medical libraries (U. S. 6,370, of which 87 are associated with medical schools, 3,178 with hospitals) which have been identified.' Of
*For the immediate future, the National Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Md., will satisfy biomedical information requests from Central America and Mexico, as necessaryo RES 4/12 8
these 115 are associated with universities and schools of medicine, 36 with
hospitals, and the remaining 65 with institutes, societies, governmental and
international organizations and with industry. It seems apparent first
that service must be provided on a supporting basis to the existing libraries,
and second that although the existing libraries will provide a primary
channel for service, additional channels must be provided both for direct
service to individuals and through the establishment of service points in
the hospitals and other health facilities. In order to encourage and assist the development of local resources, the regional center should require potential borrowers to exhaust local availability before applying to the center for assistance. In this way the center would function in relation to South American medical libraries in a manner similar to that of the
National Library of Medicine of the United States, which plays a supporting role to the other medical libraries of the nation.
2. Information Services.
The regional center would provide directly, or by referral to appropriate sources the full range of information services, including searches of the literature to produce both brief and comprehensive lists of literature citations on request from individuals or through medical schools and other biomedical facilities. The regional center would also prepare bibliographies to meet special anticipated needs. The identification and verification of citations on request, and the provision of directory and factual information should also be a service of the center. The library should also provide access to information about existing translations and other translating services. RES 4/12 9
The Center would also function as a referral center both for requests for information and for documents which cannot be supplied through its own or through local resources. This will require the maintenance of a collection of union cataloge of journal holdings built on existing information. These requests would be forwarded to the appropriate institutions both in and out of South America. In meeting these responsibilities the
Center will develop a number of extramural relationships and information sources about the availability of other resources and services.
The Center,after appropriate training of personnel,will function as a MEDLARS search agency for Latin American countries, receiving tapes prepared at the National Library of Medicine, and providing machine search services at cost to qualified requestors.
This will necessitate location in close association with appropriate computer capabilities located presumably at a commercial service bureau, and the development of plans for the operation and utilization of MEDLARS search service. Tapes can be made available in format acceptable by IBM computers, and programs will be available by January 1, 1966. Training in search formulation would be provided by the National Library of Medicine.
3. Circulation of Materials.
Monographs, journals, and other documents may be supplied in the original to the requester, but this would not be efficient under conditions existing in Latin America. In order to increase the maximum potential of the collection of the Central Library and to minimize the logistical problems, most of the documents would be disseminated in the form of photocopies.
Electrostatic printers (for example Xerox 914) have been successfully used for this purpose. A microfilm reader-printer capable of supplying full- RES 4/12 10
sized copy from microfilm should also be made available, since it is likely
that some of the literature resources may be available only in the form
of microcopies. The center would also explore the use of microcopies as
a means of disseminating documents and of resource building in the
peripheral libraries.
4. Communication Facilities.
Air mail should provide a primary medium for the transmission of
information requests and services and documents. The use of telecommunications
facilities such as telephone and TWX should be considered as routine methods
of transmitting messages.
5. Training and Demonstration.
In addition to attempting to fill its staff requirements with
available trained personnel from all the nations served, the Center will
cooperate with local library education facilities to provide training for medical science information personnel drawn from all parts of Latin America.
Support for a scholarship and fellowship program should also be provided.
In addition the Center will provide a demonstration project for exhibiting to visiting medical librarians the best techniques in library management.
6. Publications.
In meeting its responsibilities'the Center will disseminate widely information about its services and news of its activities, as well as the products of its bibliographic services. Success of the program will depend largely at least in its initial stages on informing its potential clientele about the availability of its services. Publications proposed are, a frequent newsletter, acquisitions announcements, bulletins and series of bibliographies. RES 4/12
V PERSONNEL AND TRAINING
The basic personnel required to initiate and carry on the programs
and activities of the proposed center are:
1. Director estimated salary $15,000
The Director-or Chief Administrative Officer should be a trained
librarian with considerable administrative experience in a research library
and the management of information services. His duties will be to develop,
implement and report on the program and to prepare a detailed budget for
approval of the governing body. The Director should have full authority
for the expenditure of budgeted funds and for building his staff. Salary
should be at an international standard, to attract the best qualified
individual.
2. Circulation Librarian estimated salary $10,000
Library school graduate. Experience in a research library is
desirable, as is subject background, although not essential. Lanaguage
competence is important. The duties would be to develop and supervise a
document procurement and delivery service using the most efficient and
expeditious means available.
3. Literature Search Specialist estimated salary $10,000
Experience in searching the scientific literature and training
in biomedical or related sciences, and language competence are essential;
library training is most desirable. The duties would be to develop access
to good information resources, to respond to information requests by preparation of lists of references, or providing factual information, and RES 4h/2 12
formulate machine searches from MEDLARS tapes.
4. Resources Librarian estimated salary $10,000
Library training and experience are essential for this position,
because one of the most important functions of the center would be both the
development of regional resources and an adequate guide to the availability
of materials from other sources.
5. Clerical Assistants (4 @ $1,500) $6,ooo
A minimum of four will be required to provide adequate staff
for the programs outlined. These should include one machine operator for
photocopy devices, two typists, and secretary.
TOTAL Personnel (8) $51,000
Each of the professional members of the staff should be involved in
planning and designing the proposed center. If possible, the staff should
include representation from several of the Latin American nations served,
but emphasis should be placed on competence and imagination to develop the
new and aggressive programs required.
VI PHYSICAL FACILITIES
1. Choice of Site.
The greater advantages of utilizing existing resources, and the concomi- tant savings suggest location in close association with an established medical library, rather than the establishment of a new totally independent
institution. This library should have strong basic collections, room for
physical expansion, and potential for vigorous growth. RES 4/12 13
The regional library should be located in strategic association with
modern transportation and communication facilities. Equidistance to all
service outlets is not so important, given contemporary facilities, as air
service and electronic communications potential. A second controlling
factor is location in conjunction with a large, active center of medical
education and research. Experience has shown that regional facilities are
utilized heavily by populations of the immediate neighborhood, and that such
service pressures constitute a positive influence on the quality and character
of the services to be provided. Daily contact with an immediate service
public is helpful, and adds to the development of excellence.
An obvious and fundamental consideration is the willingness and
interest of the host country and the host institution to accommodate the
regional library, and to provide continuing vigorous support. Factors of
concern to the host institution are:
1. Increase of material benefits. Availability for local uses of
expanded resources and services, and a continuing source of
revenue for services performed.
2. Prestige deriving from the association.
3. Any loss of independence and control occasioned by requirements
to assume larger responsibilities.
Preliminary evaluation indicated that three countries, Brazil, Venezuela, and Panama, were the most likely candidates from which to choose a site. In
Brazil, Sao Paulo was considered to be the city of choice because of its strong medical educational and medical library facilities. Sao Paulo also offers the advantages of a major commercial center with modern communications RES V12 Ik
and transport facilities. Caracas, too, has a strong medical research
^^ center, but its library resources are less well-developed than Sab Paulo.
Gorgas Memorial Laboratory in Panama ranks high, with its international
board of directors and an affiliated medical school and the Middle America
Research Unit, but a regional center in Panama might tend to be oriented
to North America, rather than South America.
In sum, the foregoing considerations point to Sab Paulo as the best
choice for a regional medical library center affiliated with the medical
library of the Escuela Paulista da Medicina for the reasons enumerated in
the recommendations of the consultants (Annex l).
2. Space requirements.
Assuming that the center will be housed in an existing facility, it
would be necessary to provide approximately 3>000 square feet of space as
work areas for the coordinating staff and for the special types of necessary
equipment. This equipment includes modern photoduplication devices, mailing
machines, instruments to facilitate communications with other libraries
(i.e., teletype, etc.).
Assuming rental space with a: supplementary core collection of 50*000
active volumes, approximately 6 to 7-5 additional thousand square feet would be required.
VII BOOK RESOURCES
The document services of the regional medical library center would
be provided primarily on a base of current periodical subscriptions and back files for the most part not exceeding twenty or twenty-five years. A minimum objective for the center would be to expand the subscription list of its host library to include most of the 2,UOO journals indexed by RES 4/12 15
Index Medicus. Some increases in the monograph collection would also be necessary to provide support for reference services as well as to supplement the existing collection of secondary reference tools (indexes, abstracts, bibliographies, etc.).
Utilization of NLM's credits with the United States Book Exchange would probably provide a large part of the initial supplementary book and journal stock. Most of the initial journal stock could be supplied from these credits within one year, with handling and shipping costs to be met from private funds. It will be necessary, of course, to use other means of procurement to fill in the gaps.
The initial outlay for procurement and shipping during the first year would be about $100,000, with continuing expenditures for books and journal subscriptions of approximately $40,000 annually.
VIII IMPLEMENTATION 1. In implementing the proposed Center, consideration should be given to an initial planning and design phase to determine in as much detail as possible:
a. Types of services to be provided b. Equipment requiremente c. Resources needed d. Provision for a recruitment and training phase for the necessary personnel to administer and staff the Center.
2. It may be expected that the planning and design phase will lead
to modifications in organization, equipment and services in order to more
effectively realize the basic aims of this proposalo RES 4/12 16
IX BUDGET
The following represents a preliminary unvalidated estimated in
dollars of the costs of the proposed Center:
First Year Second Year Third ]lear
1. Salaries $ 51,000 $ 73,000 $ 73,0(O0
2. Rents 4,000 4,000 4,0(O0
3. Contractural Services 8,000 14,000 14,000
4. Publicat iona 100,000 40,000 40,000
5. Equipment 24,600 8,000 8,000
6. Supplies 3,000 4,000 4,000
7. Printing 5,000 5,000 5,000
8. Travel 10,000 5,000 5,000 9. Scholarships & Fellowships 10,000 10,000
$205, 600 $163,000 $163,000 RES 4/12 17
NOTES
1. Salaries for first year:
Director $ 15,000 3 Librarians @ $ 10,000 30,000 4 'Assistants @ $ 1,500 6 ooo $ 51,000
Salaries for second year:
Director $ 15,000 Systems Analyst (MEDLARS) 12,000 Searcher 10,000 3 Librarians @ $ 10,000 30,000 4 Assistants @ $ 1,500 6,000 $ 73,000
2. Rents
Estimated @ 2,000 sq. ft. times $2 $ 4,000
3. Constractural services for first year: $ 8,090
Processing (20,000 pieces) 3,000 Cataloging (1,000 titles) 5,000
Contractural services for second year: $14,000
Processing 2,000 Cataloging 1,000 Computer rental (1 hour per week) 5,000 Programmer 5,000 Tapes 1,000
4. Publications for first year: $100,000
20,000 volumes, or 160,000 pieces
USBE Service charges @ 450 70,000 Shipment 1,000 Subscriptions 1,000 @ $15 15,000 Books 1,400 @ $10 14,000 RES 4/12 18
Publications for second year: $40,000 1,500 subscriptions @ $15 22,500 Books and other 17,500 5. Equipment
Xerox 914 (100 M pages) 4,000
Microcopy cameras, readers, printers - 7,500 Desks/chairs @ 200 1,600
Typewriters @ 300 1,500
Telex - mailing 10,000 $24,600 RES 4/12 19 TABLE I
NUMBER OF VOLUMES IN MEDICAL SCHOOL LIBRARIES IN THE U.S. & LATIN AMERICA
Number of Maximum No. Minimum No. Institutions reported by Median reported by Included any institution any institution
U. S. 1960-1 84 340,000 55,000 12,000
Latin / America 50 500,OOO 8,pOo 81
.~~ i m iii ~ ~~~~~ 1, Buenos Aires 2. Torreón, México
TABLE II
MEETING TO CONSIDER THE ORGANIZATION OF A LATIN AMERICAN REGIONAL MEDICAL LIBRARY CENTER*
Mr. Scott Adams National Library of Medicine Dr. Raymond Allen Pan American Health Organization Miss Alice Ball United States Book Exchange Dr. John Cooper Northwestern University Dr. Martin Cummings National Library of Medicine Dr. David Kronick National Library of Medicine Mr. Samuel Lazerow National Library of Medicine Dr. M. Martins da Silva Pan American Health Organization Dr. Jacques May Agency for International Development Mr. Louis Munan Pan American Health Organization Dr. John Rouleau Department of State Dr. Ronald Scantlebury Department of State Dr. Ramon Villarreal Pan American Health Organization Dr. Robert Watson Rockefeller Foundation Dr. Myron Wegman University of Michigan Dr. Kelly West University of Oklahoma Dr. Marjorie Wilson National Library of Medicine
* National Library of Medicine, 13 January 1965. ANNEX I RES 4/12 Tatin American Regional Medical Library Center: Recommendations
The Regional Medical Library Center to be established in Latin America should be set up as an independent agency reporting to the Pan American Health Organization, but in close affiliation with an existing library facility capable of providing the necessary support and cooperation. The center should be located in a geographic location
most proximate to the largest part of the clientele it will be serving, *nd in which a strong concentration of information resources
already are in existence to help support it.
The proposed center should not be a "documentation center" in
the narrow sense which now seems to be established in that area. Its energies should not be consumed in such activities as the preparation
of union lists of serials and registers of investigators. The para- mount purpose of the center should be to assist in the growth and development of biomedical research, through the developmept and execution of rapid and efficient information services and document delivery to biomedical investigators and educators. A subsidiary but Just as important an activity should be to assist in the training
of much needed information specialists in Latin America.
The center should cooperate with and encourage the development of union liste in the regional, state and federal documentation centers but primarily it should encourage and assist in standardization of records and the development of simple and efficient systems of infor- mation management, keeping in mind that the more complex the system, the more difficult it is to standardize.
The recommendations for the proposed center are to include: RES 4/12 2
1. Provision for a planning and design phase to determine: a. Types of services to be provided
b. Equipment requirements
c. Resources needed
2. Provision for a recruitment and training phase for the
necessary personnel to administer and staff the center.
On the basis of their survey the consultants wish to recommend
S'o Paulo, Brazil as the city where the center shoulc be established, for the following reasons:
1. There is a strong concentration of medical institutions with active research programs.
2. It has centrality of location with regard to both populatii:>n density and educational activities.
3. It has an active and progressive group of medical librariaJns who are cooperating effectively.
As the affiliated institution the consultants wish to recommenc1 the Escola Paulista de Medicina in Sao Paulo:
1. It has a separate building for the library which ie well adapted to housing the center.
2. Affiliation with this institution would simplify some of the administrative problems, since it is responsible to the national government directly through the Dean of the Medical School.
3. In contrast with some of the other institutions visited it plans to stay in ita present location, and there are already funded plans to expand its present quarters. RES 4/12 3
4. There do not appear to be any problems about the conflicts between the needs of centralization va decentralization found in other institutions.
5. The library is housed in a modern well constructed building with adequate room for growth of the collection.
6. The Library is well organized with evidence of good
housekeeping and management.
7. The Library's director is competent and has good relation- ships with other librarians in the city.
8. The problems of federal and state relationships with an international agency would be simplified.
9. There existe a good potential for developing an effective relationship with IBBD, the principal documentation activity in the
nation, without danger of being dominated by IBBD. 10. There is good prospects for the assignment of responsibility for medical documentation activities for the nation to the Library. While there were a great many positive elements in many of the
other libraries visited, none presented this unique combination.
There were too many internal problems both in Rio de Janeiro where the
libraries had too many problems of their own to cope with, and at the
University of SaBo Paulo where they had problems of decentralization, to ask them to join in the cooperative effort which the regional center would require. In some cases the size of collection was much
larger than that of the Escola Paulista, but size could not be considered a primary consideration, because some of the largest libraries visited were least suitable for this undertaking. RES 4/12 4
The possibility of building up a separate and independent
library as a basis for the regional center rather than using an
existing library was rejected out of hand, both because of the
economic factors and because of the advantages to be gained by
being associated with a library being actively used by a research
and teaching clientele.
The center should serve to utilize the new systems orientations
being developed in the United States, rather than to perpetuate some
of the FID/UNESCO traditions which are now limiting the activities
of some Latin American libraries.
Personnel from all countries in Latin America should be
involved in all phases of the design, the operation and the training
programs of the center.
A regional medical library will by no means solve all the problems of medical communications in Latin America. It may, however, assist in reversing the traditional patterns in underde- veloped countries in which people look toward Europe and the United
States for assistance rather than to their neighbors. The time is now ripe for this kind of development in Latin America. Other mechanism: must also be sought to deal with such problems as the, high cost and inadequate distribution of textbooks and monographs.
The regional library mechanism is not well suited to respond to this kind of need. Each Latin American medical library should be able to provide its own core collection of monographs and current subscriptions to meet the basic neede of its clientele. RES 4/12 5 Although considerations of place are important to the success of the proposal the paramount contribution which the center maybe able to make to Latin American medical librarianship is to attempt to provide a model demonstration unit, where some of the newer information technology and service programs can be seen, and where medical librarians from all of Latin America could come for both observation and training. ANNEX II RES 4/12
REPORT TO THE PAN AMERICAN HEALTH ORGANIZATION OF A TRIP TO BRAZIL, URUGUAY ARGENTINA, CHILE, COLOMBIA AND VENEZUELA TO INVESTIGATE THE FEASIBILITY OF ESTABLISHING A LATIN AMERICAN REGIONAL MEDICAL LIBRARY CENTER,
APRIL 17th TIIROUGH MAY 7th, 1965
David A. Kronick, Ph.D. and Mortimer Taube, Ph.D.
May 31, 1965 RES 4/12 1
We arrived in Rio de Janeiro on April 18th and our first visit took
place the following day when Dr. Bragas took us to the Office of the National
Research Council, where we met with the President of the Council, Dr. Chagas,
Dean of the School of Medicine, and Dr. Cury$ Assistant Director of the Institute of
Microbiology of the University of Brazil. After the purpose of our mission
was explained, as that of exploring the means and place to establish a
regional medical library center to serve all of Latin America, the question
of the value of the Latin American Bibliographic Center established in
Mexico to serve all of Latin America was raised. Dr. Chagas said that he
felt that the Mexican Center had not been adequately supported and that the
geographic location had not been properly chosen. We raised the question also
about the number of biomedical investigators in South America, but this was
difficult to answer. Dr. Chagas indicated that this was a very small scale
activity in Latin America compared to the rest of the world and that there
was a need for many more basic scientists to be involved in clinical research.
He ventured the guess that there were perhaps 15,000 investigators including
part time research workers in Latin America involved in biomedical research.
We explained that the services projected for the regional center were
essentially new ones, and no distinct pattern for this kind of an organization
existed even in our country. Dr. Chagas indicated that there was a great
need for better availability and distribution of biomedical information in
South America, and that he thought a regional center could serve toward this end, as well as serve to relieve some of the pressures on local facilities.
Many South American investigators, particularly the senior ones, had developed personal channeis for communication and access to the literature. This, of RES 4/12 2 course, was essentially true in our own country before adequate library
facilities were established.
The President of the Council said that the Instituto Brasileiro de
Bibliographia e Documentaaot -rhich reported to the Council, had established
service patterns and programs along the lines we were considering and hoped that we could build upon these as a firm foundation. Dr. Chagas added that a biomedical center was being planned for the new University of
Brazil campus. A children's hospital already exists on the site and a clinical center originally begun in 1946, was in process of being completed. The medical library for the center is being planned with a capacity of 500,000 volumes and it was hoped that it could be completed in 1968. Dr. Chagas said that space for the regional library could be made available in the new center, and that if this were chosen as the site, the schedule for completion could possibly be pushed up. Dr. Braga added that the State of
Guanabara was just beginning to provide support for medical libraries, and that while there were both state and federally supported medical libraries in Sao Paulo, agreement on establishment of the center would need to be made with the federal government no matter where it were placed. He added that a federally supported agency would have the advantage of official mail and special importation privileges for books and equipment.
We went next to the Office of the PAHO Zone Chief, Dr. S. Renjifo
Salcedo. Dr. RenJifo suggested that communications facilities should be thoroughly investigated as a part of the survey. He had on his desk a letter which had come that morning by air mail but which bore the dateline
April 4th when it had been sent from Urguay. RES 4/12 3
Next we visited the Instituto Brasileiro de Bibliographia e
Documentagao, a national documentation center which serves under the
National Research Council and has been in existence for ten years. It is in fact the oldest center of its kind in South America and has served as a model for the establishment of other national documentation centers else- where on the continent. IBBD also has regional centers at Para, Ceará,
Pernambuco, Minais Gerais, Bahia, Paraná, Rio Grande do Sul, and Sao Paulo, all of which are supposed to contribute to the development of a national union catalog for Brazil.
The IBBD has a staff of about 115 which concerns itself with a wide range of activities including translation and abstracting. Mrs. Sambaquy, the Director, indicated that most of the staff had some library training.
The Institute has very little in the way of substantive collections itself, but draws on all the special library collections of Brazil, and uses facilities outside the country when the occasion calls for it.
Dr. Braga took us over to this Institute which is quite close to the area in which the National Research Council is housed. The Institute occupies three stories in a building which is used by the Department of
Agriculture of the State. The first floor is a reading room which houses in two stack levels the primary reference collections which make up the bulk of IBBD's stack. We spent the entire afternoon discussing the problems of information services to special audiences and in touring the Institute.
Mrs. Sambaquy displayed a whole series of special bibliographies prepared at the center, including a union list of serials in Latin America prepared under the auspices of FID/CLA, the secretariat of which this year is in
Buenos Aires. The entire collection will be sent to us to the PAIHO office RES 4/12 4
in Washington. Cursory examination indicated that the publications are
directed largely to controlling Brazilian journal literature in the
sciences and technologies.
The IBBD regional centers are arrangements made with various
universities in Brazil to serve as sort of branches of IBBD,i.e., to monitor
local bibliographic output and send products to a central union catalog at
IBBD and maintain regional union catalogs. Two mission oriented subject
centers have been established as well, one, CENIM, a microbiological
collection and reference service, and the other a Petroleum Industry activity.
These are only two out of a series of such subject oriented centers which
have been projected but which never have come to fruition. Mrs. Sambaquy
also indicated that IBBD has attempted to institute a kind of small
Farmington Plan among Brazilian special libraries to help insure more
adequate coverage of the literature and reduction of duplication.
Some of the activities of IBBD represent the serious dangers which
result from uncritically broadcasting vague ideas at international con-
ferences and institutes, One example of an application of such an idea iS
a Filmorex which was acquired by the Institute at great cost, but which
now is lying unused in the Institute of Microbiology of the University.
We saw another example of this kind of unsystematic planning at the
Documentation Center of the University of Sao Paulo (q.v.).
When Mrs. Sambaquy was asked where the proposed regional center might best be established, she indicated preference for Brazilia and gave
as justification the fact that many new services are being centralized there, but it seemed fairly evident that this was largely a patriotic and sentimental
kind of a choice rather than one based on service considerations. She seemed RES 4/12 5
quite confident that the proposed service could be incorporated with IBBD's
activities, but could not supply any clear indications about how such a
service,reporting to an organization outside of IBBD, could be related
to IBBD's activities. She stated that she had no misgivings that an
independent but coordinated organization could work quite well with IBBD because of their long experience in cooperating with other organizations.
She thought that Sgo Paulo would not be a good choice because they tended
to define their interests too narrowly in personal terms. IBBD being
under the National Research Council would, she thought, have a much broader
and more national point of view. She added that Sao Paulo used IBBD more than any of the other Brazilian areas, but this could be easily explained by the greater amount of industrial activity in Sao Paulo as against the other areas. She also indicated that higher education is well supported in Sao Paulo since 3% of their state revenues went to education.
A tour of the Institutes gave the impression of a great many activities crowded into inadequate space, and operating with marginal equipment. It has been proposed that the Institute should move to the new area being developed for the University of Brazil, but this would be some time in the future. There does not seem to be any space in the inadequate quarters to provide for any new activities, unless they were completely integrated with existing activities. Sufficient time was not provided for close study of the photoduplication equipment available. Two planetary microfilm cameras were seen, as well as automatic film development equipment of
Dutch manufacture. Mrs. Sambaquy said that much interlibrary loan activity went out in the form of photocopies, but little evidence of this activity was seen on the tour. The head of the Reference Services Department, a RES 4/12 6
young librarian who had had her training in Columbia School of Library
Service, indicated that about 50% of their inquiries came from physicians.
This data seems to have been recorded in their annual report which will be
forwarded with the other IBBD publications for study. This young lady also
has responsibility in relation to the program for training special
librarians, a one year program in cooperation with the University of Brazil.
About 30 students are currently enrolled, from many of the Latin American
countries.
The general impression is one of much activity with inadequate
resources. Although IBBD does already provide some of the services that would be provided by the proposed center, neither facilities nor space seem to be
available for any expansion of these services, nor to provide housing for
supplementary collections.
April 20, 1965 - Rio de Janeiro
In the morning we visited with Dr. Alfred S. Lazarus, NIH representative
in South America at his office on the Avenida Presidente Vargas. His opinion was that Brazil in general would not be a good place for the proposed center, first because of the evidence of economic instability, and secondly because the postal service within the country was so poor. He recommended
Lima, Peru as a preferred site, although he was not able to make a very strong case for it. He said that Brazil does not usually use international carriers for transporting air mail. Currency exchanges between the countries might also be a problem if fees were charged for services, unless something like
UNESCO coupons were used. He added that Latin American countries did not RES 4/12 7 ordinarily or voluntarily go to other Latin American countries for services, unless active service programs are developed. One significant factor was
local pride which made it difficult for inhabitants of one Latin American
country to admit they were dependent upon another, and that for that reason
they preferred to go to Europe or the United States for their services.
Dr. Taube spent the rest of the morning with the IBM representative
in Rio, while Dr. Kronick went on to the Instituto de Microbiologia of the
University of Brazil to meet with Dr. Cury the director and with Dr. Braga.
Dr. Cury outlined the work of the Institute, a primary center for microbiological training in Brazil and in Latin America. The library of the Institute is a
small one but seems well organized and well selected. The Institute
serves as an information center for IBBD but what this means primarily is that IBBD may use its resources and advice in responding to inquiries made to IBBD.
The rest of the morning and part of the afternoon was spent at the
Faculdade de Medicina of the University of Brazil which is in an old colonial building built before the turn of the century. The library occupies a good part of one floor, but obviously has suffered from a long period of neglect.
In fact, it was stated that no new monograph had been added since 1956.
Some effort had been made to keep up the important journals, but all of them during this period had been permitted to lapse for two years. There seemed no evidence of any organization in the collection, nor any kind of visible record. Some reconstruction was going on at the time which undoubtedly contributed to the impression of disarray. Huge binding backlogs were apparent, RES 4/12 8 and the collection in general showed evidence of many years of neglect. A large part of the collection was obviously only of antiquarian interest - very little current material was seen. There were many bound volumes of ancient theses. The Librarian, a recent transfer from Oswaldo Cruz, pointed with pride to a second folio Vesalius - and many other historically interesting volumes were seen. Incidentally in an exhibit in the Institute of Microbiology was a first edition of Hooke's Micrographia which is not even in NLM's collection. It would obviously take a tremendous amount of effort and funds to get this library in any organized form, and there did not seem to be much evidence of this kind of capability on the premises.
The Library of the Institute Oswaldo Cruz which we visited in the afternoon obviously had a much better research collection which had made some effort to maintain currency both in monographs and periodicals.
There was very little evidence of trained library technology having been applied to their problems and no adequate record of holdings. Overcrowding in stacks contributed to the impression that the library had suffered some recent disorganization, perhaps due to the departure of its librarian in
February to the Faculty of Medicine Library. In none of the Libraries visited in Rio including IBBD was there a copy of the Cumulative Index
Medicus. Price was an excuse given in one case, but in several others they did not even seem to know about it.
In the afternoon at 5 p.m. Dr. Taube gave a talk at the IBBD - attended by the students enrolled in their courses, the President of the National
Research Council, Dr. Braga and other visitors. Mrs. Sambaguy expressed warm appreciation for the assistance that the National Library of Medicine had supplied to Latin American libraries. There was evidence of great interest in automation. RES 4/12 9 April 21st - Sao Paulo
In the morning of the 21st we flew along with Dr. Braga to Sao Paulo.
In the afternoon we met with a group of about six English-speaking librarians belonging to the biomedical library study group of the Associacao Paulista de Bibliotecarios, and representing the major medical libraries of the city.
The meeting was held in the periodical reading room of the medical library of the University of Sao Paulo which represented a striking contrast in the relatively modern appointments and order, to the libraries which had been seen in Rio.
We discussed the parpose of our visit and the needs of Latin American biomedical libraries. They showed evidence of cooperative activities within the state such as a regional periodical catalog which is a branch of the regional union catalog of the state. Efforts are being made to publish this, but problems of cataloging were being encountered. Most of the libraries represented at the meeting, except one which uses NLM classification, used U.D.C and there was a great deal of interest in developing a Portuguese translation of the tables. A professor of paristology who attended the meeting as a member of the school's library committee showed us the parasitology Journal which is published here and which uses U.D.C. numbers to classify the articles and also provides them on 3x5 card abstracts in
Portugueseand English which are printed at the end of each issue.
Dissatisfaction was expressed with the University's photocopying services because of the long delays involved in getting material back. There seemed to be some discrepancy between these statements and the statements about the availability of photocopy services in the various libraries. We were RES. 4/12 10 presented with collections of data and statistics which had been gathered together for our visit, and the schedule of visits for our stay in Sao
Paulo was discussed. The group appeared to be bright and eager librarians who were most willing to consider the possibilities of a regional center.
The problem of mail service was discussed and the opinion was expressed that these problems were confined to the intra-Brazil mail and did not affect international mail.
April 22, 1965
In the morning we went directly to the library of the Escola Paulista de Medicina in the company of Dr. Braga, where we were met by the librarian
Miss Dinah P. Aguiar. The library is in a separate building on the campus of the medical school which was until recently a privately supported school, Lwhen it was taken over by the Federal government. The library was built some 5-10 years ago with the help of funds from the Kellogg
Foundation and is in a relatively modern.building. The reading room is on the second floor and is bright and cheerful. The library uses the NLM classification as the basis of a classed catalog with a subject index using
MESH. We toured the third floor and the fourth floor devoted to monographs and journals respectively, and in general the impression was of a well-ordered and well-managed library. In the technical processes section there were about 2 book trucks full of material which had been received on MLA exchange.
Also seen were two photocopy interlibrary loans received from NLM. There was no date sent indicated on one of the ALA forms, but the other indicated that it had been sent late in December. The NLM receipt date on both of them indicated that they had both arrived in NLM sometime in the middle of RES 4/12 11
February. Miss -Aguiar stated that both had been received the previous
Monday,i.e.,something like four months after they had been requested. The
first floor of the building is devoted to a duplicate periodical collection which is quite extensive. The duplicate collection seemed particularly rich
in South American materials.
Following this we went across the court to the Biochemistry/Phamacology building of the Escola Paulista to visit the Departmental library of Dr. Jose
Ribeiro do Valle, Chairman of the Department, who spent some time with us
telling us the function of the library. The library consists of about 50
current titles with fairly good back files in most of them. Dr. Ribeiro
explained that he made very little effort to keep up with the monographic
literature because he felt that his meager resources, which were accumulated
from financial gifts from friends and from industry,were best expended for
journals. Except for a few fairly recent monographs, the monograph collection
seemed rather out of date. Dr. Ribeiro said that the reason he maintained his little library was because he could not depend on the consistent and continued support of the administration to maintain the periodical titles for him, and that as soon as he was sure this was so, he would be glad to
surrender his library to a central facility. He compared Brazil to the coexistence in his country of the primitive oil lamp which hung on his wall and on the fluorescent lamps which lit his library, as illustrating the contrasts which existed. Communications problems he felt were serious in not permitting Brazilian science to develop as quickly as it might. He himself depended heavily on reprints which he bound and controlled by means of a Keysort card system especially designed for this purpose but which like similar systems established in some U.S. special libraries, now seemed to be defunct. RES 4/12 i·*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ i~~~~12
We visited also with Dr. Bier, a Professor of Microbiology at the
Medical School and a Vice President of the National Research Council. He
was well informed about and critical of the activities of IBBD which he
felt had undertaken a much larger role than it could carry out. It would
help, he said, to decentralize its activities by creating a medical
documentation center in Sao Paulo to which IBBD could delegate these
responsibilities. This would have the advantage of preserving the ideas
of IBBD and provide in Sao Paulo a national agency with which the proposed
regional medical center could coordinate.
The next visit was to the Butantan Institute on the outskirts of
Sao Paulo where the new campus of the University of Sao Paulo is in an
active state of development and many buildings already in existence. The building in w hich the library was housed was constructed about the turn of
the century and the library quarters have been expanded into halls to
accomodate the growth of the collections. Despite the evidence of considerable
binding backlogs, the collection was in fairly orderly condition. The
monographic collection with few exceptions was rather out of date. We met
and spoke with two members of the research staff, a geneticist and a bio-
chemist. The geneticist expressed strongly his need for better bibliographic
and reference services - particularly the problems of keeping up with the
current literature in genetics which was scattered over a large number of
journals. In this library as in others encountered thus far, monthly issues
of Index Medicus were in evidence but no copies of the Cumulative were to be
seen except in the Esiola Paulista, which had the cumulative volumes only
for 1960. It was difficult to elicit reasons why this was so. At the RES 4/12 13
Escola Paulista and at least in one other place, the answer was that the
other cumulations were on order.
We visited next the Servigo de Documentaçao of the Universidade de
Sao Paulo on its new campus and spoke to its director, Dr. G. Camtiglia. The
primary purpose of the center as far as we could discover was that of acting
as an offset printing plant for those university publications that required
this service, although the director also claimed to take care of 80% of the
interlibrary loan photocopying for IBBD there was little evidence of the
kind of facilities and equipment to accomplish this. He said they produced
some 285,000 pages of microfilm in the previous year, but it was difficult
to determine what this material consisted of - the impression was that it
was largely newspaper type material. A tour through his shop confirmed the
fact that it was largely a printing plant, though he also showed us
facilities for editing and dubbing sound in film, for making photographic
enlargements, and microfilm processing as well as two planetary cameras.
While we were in his office he showed us a systems manual for a Miracode
system which he said was shortly to be delivered to the University for the use of the law school.
We next visited the University library which is in temporary quarters
in the same administrative building which houses the documentation center.
Mrs. Monteiro da Cunha, the University Librarian, met us and told us about the plans for developing the library which was to include all the collections from the arts and humanities, and a union catalog for all books in the state of Sgo Paulo. At present the serials part of this catalog is housed in the
School of Medicine Library of the University. The Library is in quite small and cramped quarters but in apparent good order. Mrs. da Cunha did not know RES 4/12 14 when the new building would be ready but said that space had been allocated in a dormitory building that was being completed nearby, which was also to house the new library school program that was being developed.
We toured the extensive new grounds of the university which covers a large area and already contains many of the uníversity departments which will eventually come together in this area including,it is said,the School
of Medicine.
April ?3, 1965
In the morning we visited the University of Sao Paulo Medical School and the University Hospital where we were shown one of about 13 typical departmental libraries. This library seen was in one of the surgical clinics, a library seminar room that was stacked to the ceilings with bound runs of
standard surgical periodicals mostly in English. Some of the sets were not up to date and there was obviously no more available space for additional volumes. We spoke to two of the young surgeons, one who had just returned from a postgraduate course in London, about literature problems, which they both agreed were acute in S¿o Paulo and indeed all over Latin America. One of the primary problems they said was the inabilty to secure current text books and monographs, largely because of their expense. One of the surgeons said he was buying Bockus' new Gastroenterology on the installment plan.
Neither of them seemed to think that IBBD was of great help to them in securing current literature. Their comments seemed to reflect Dr. Bier's critical remarks of the previous day, i.e., that IBBD did not seem to have the subject competence to cope with the biomedical literature. RES 4/12 15
Our next visit was to the Centro de Medecina Nuclear of the University
where we met with Dr. Veronica Rapp de Eston, Chief of the Division of
Education and Biological Sciences of the Institute. The library was a small
one of about 700 to 800 volumes devoted almost entirely to radiation
medicine and biology. Dr. Rapp's library until recently had been serving as
a depository for AEC reports in STo Paulo in addition to the Institute of
Nuclear Energy now situated on the new campus, but has been informed that
AEC could no longer continue to send her the reports. Unfortunately the
Institute of Nucelear Energy has been uncooperative in sending reports or
request, and this represented a serious deficiency in their information
services. This points up one of the deficiencies of disseminating materials
on' the basis of source (e.g. Atomic Energy Commission) rather than subject
(e.g. Nuclear Medicine). Dr. Rapp had what she believed was the only
complete set of Nuclear Science Abstracts which she had gathered herself in
her trips to the U. S. (Another complete set was encountered later in a
trip at the Library of the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Cientificas
at Caracas).
We next met with a number of the members of the Faculty of the
Medical School in the library where we discussed the purpose of our mission.
The members of the faculty were in general agreement that space could be
providedin the present building as a contribution of the University to
the project, when the biochemistry department moved to the new campus. Up
to 8,000 sq. feet could be made available on the fourth floor, which is two
floora above the present library quarters. The very fact of space being
available on this basis pointed up one of the problems of placing the
* 0 proposed center here, since this involved the move of one of the important RES 4/12 16 basic science departments to a new campus at some distance from the medical school. There was a great deal of uncertainty about whether the medical school itself would ever move to the new area; some of the younger men seeming to favor such a move while some of the older men seemed strongly opposed. They expressed themselves strongly on the desirability of the proposed center in Sao Paulo, because of the concentration of research workers in the area, and their tradition of cooperation in educational and other programs with other countries in Latin America. Again, the lack of current monographs and textbooks was pointed out as a serious problem. Several
solutions, including subsidies to cover part of the costs have been proposed but not adopted. Some of the members of the group were critical of IBBD's failure to meet their problems of literature accessibility and expressed the feeling that some of IBBD's energies were used on problems which were perhaps not paramount - such as the special bibliographies. The need for a center for scientific translations was pointed out. The group as a whole expressed themselves as being most hospitable to a regional library center in the medical school, and offered full cooperation up to their capability
to supply it.
We toured the library of the school next. The general impression was that despite the fact that periodical resources on the whole were fairly good - housekeeping was on a fairly low level, and monographic resources were very poor - probably because most of the recent textbooks or mono- graphs were in the special institutes and departments. The library maintains its own binding studio where all its volumes are hand sewn and bound in half leather with hand gold tooled titles. The Library also had assumed responsibility for the continuation of the bibliography of Brazilian RES 4/12 17
Medicine which has not been published since 1958. The catalog contained
on cards, entries covering the intervening period and were awaiting a decision about publishing it. IBBD which had published some of the earlier volumes apparently is not in a position to do this one, and other support
is being sought.
We finished the day with a tour of the Instituto Adolfo Lutz, a state
hygienic laboratory and research institute which supplies public health
laboratories all over the S.tate of Sao Paulo and manufactures vaccines and
other biologicals. The library is located in what was formerly an old
infirmary, an attractive one-story building in colonial style that dates
back before the turn of the century. The present librarian had been given
the building after it had been abandoned for several years, and has done a
remarkable job in converting the interior into a modern well-functioning
library while still maintaining its exterior charm. It was obvious that
this was a well managed library.
The Union List of periodicals which is maintained in the Adolfo Lutz
is a forerunner of the Union List of periodicals which is being compiled by
the University Library and is now housed in the Medical School Library. The
evident physical and organizational separation between the State's health
and educational facilities as pointed up by the Adolfo Lutz and the School
of Medicine, underlined some of the difficulties of achieving cooperation
on even a local basis. The Library is close to being filled to capacity.
A new research building is beginning construction in which the library has
been promised a floor, with a coipletion date some two years or so hence.
Because of this delay plans are being made to expand the present facilities
to double the stack collection. It was not clear how tentative either of
these plans are. RES 4/12 18
April 24, 1965
We met this afternoon socially with a group of about ten Sao Paulo
librarians including those from the major medical libraries and the librarian
of the University of Sao Paulo Library and the former Dean of the Medical
School, President of the Sao Paulo State Research Council.
April 26, 1965
In the morning we visited the Biblioteca Municipal and spoke to
Mrs. Laura Russo, the Municipal librarian. She showed us a table of library
salaries established last August and told us that due to the general inflation
these were now 80% higher. She said a copy of these salaries had been sent
to Mr. Samuel Lazerow of NLM. She placed special emphasis on a new
certification law for librarians, which required certification before librarians
could be assigned to certain posts. The Municipal Library was being prepared
for the state funeral of the former mayor who had died the previous day so we had no opportunity to visit the Library.
Mrs. Russo expressed herself strongly in favor of a separate and independent regional library responsible to neither the University of Sao
Paulo, or the Escola Paulista. When queried about possible leadership for the regional library she said she knew such an individual but could not be persuaded to divulge the name.
We lunched at the home of one of the University's benefactors with the Dean of the University of Sao Paulo Medical School, the director of one of the surgical Clinics, two young surgeons and several librarians. The chief of the surgical clinic indicated that it was extremely likely that the RES 4/12 19 medical school would move to the new campus, and offered facilities on the new campus for the regional center.
To indicate the problems involved in consolidating collections, we were later informed that not only had there been no attempt to consolidate
some of the book collections in the clinical center, but that there had even been no success in consolidating some of the medical records held on the separate services.
We then visited the School of Dentistry and Pharmacy of the University of Sao Paulo and met with a group of the Faculty and the Dean. They seemed very pleased and delighted with the idea of a regional center and said it was particularly needed in the field of dentistry in which new dental centers were being established in other parts of Sgo Paulo without library resources to support them. In fact to meet this problem, the Dental School was in process of receiving a grant from the Kellogg Foundation to establish a documentation center in dentistry as a branch of IBBD. The librarian showed us a mimeographed announcement bulletin which listed articles in dental
Journals received by the library which is sent out to the various dental centers who could request articles from the documentation center in the form of photocopies. Indeed the only book copying machine seen so far in the survey was in this center - a German machine which seemed to use a process similar to Verifax. The Dentistry Library is in extremely crowded quarters.
The removal of pharmacy materials to the new campus will relieve the situation somewhat as far as books are concerned but reading space will still be critical. The Dean said that students were encouraged to use the library by assignment of library topics and instruction in library techniques. RES 4/12 20
In the evening we met at the Hotel with the Dean of the Escola
Paulista, who spoke no English so Dr. Magid Junes of his faculty served as
interpreter. The Dean welcomed warmly the idea of a regional center and
offered the facilities of his school and his library which we had visited
earlier. Plans were in process he said to extend the first floor level of
the library by about 2,500- sq. feet. Funds for this existed in the budget
and plans had been drawn. Additional funds probably would be required for
any other necessary construction to house staff in other activities. The problem of establishing a medical documentation branch of IBBD at the
Escola with which the regional center could colobrate was broached to him, but he did not seem to receive it very warmly, beoause as he explained, dependence on the National Research Council for support would not assure any real stability. He thought that the chain of command would be too long.
It was suggested that an agreement with the federal government recognizing the ERcola Pautiáta aá the national medical documentation center, woujd recognize IBBD's contribution to documentation in Brazil, but need not assign any administrative responsibility to it. A representative of IBBD could perhaps serve as a member of an advisory board for the documentation center.
The problem of state vs. federal support was raised and whether the competition for funds of all the other Brazilian federal medical schools might mean lower level of support than the U.S.P. could provide. He responded that the
Escola Paulista was a unified medical school with all pre-clinical and clinical faculties under one program, whereas at the U.S.P. the various faculties had to compete with each other and the other faculties of the university. RES 4/12 21
April 27th - Montevideo
We left Sgo Paulo for the Campinas Airport at 7:45 in the morning and arrived in Montevideo about 2:00 p.m. where we were met by Dr. Francisco
Mardones, the Uruguayan representative of PAHO.
Our first stop was at the Centro de Cooperación Cientifica de la
UNESCO para America Latina where we spoke for about two hours with the
Unesco officer in charge. He said that it was sometimes more difficult to achieve contact between Latin American countries than from one Latin American country to Europe or the United States. It was not a political problem, he said, but rather that Latin American scientists tended to pay more attention to sources outside Latin America and wanted to make their work felt outside the South American continent. There might also be a fact of pride in one underdeveloped country seeking assistance from another underdeveloped country.
UNESCO has established regional groups in various fields such as physics to get more cooperation among Latin American countries in these disciplines. Financial problems were acute in dealing between Latin American countries; it was difficult for instance for a scientist in Chile to buy instruments from Brazil. Very few Latin American countries, he said, were able to use UNESCO coupons because of the complications of bureaucratic red tape.
He said there was no necessity for a documentation center for all of
Latin America such as had been attempted in Mexico, and that therefore its function had been changed. National Documentation Centers such as the one in Bolivia, Venezuela, and the new one being organized in Paraguay were much more effective. Discussions were being held about the possibility of establishing a center for Technical Translations into Spanish in Buenos Aires RES 4/12 22
perhaps under the direction of Mr. Cardon. Where the problem of Portuguesé/
Spanish was raised, with the statement that Brazilians were more capable of
coping with Spanish than other Latin American countries were able to cope with
Portuguese,he said, that this might be true on the professional levels, but
that it might create problems on the clerical level where t.his proficiency
was not nearly as often found.
He pointed out that documentation knows no national boundaries; that
those needing information tended to seek out that source which was easiest
to use or best known to them no matter what the national origin, and that
therefore Latin American scientists might still perfer to go to the United
States for service rather than a regional medical library.
Transportation problems in relation to books were a problem. It takes
some 2 to 3 months for books to come from the United States and books going
from, say, Buenos Aires to Chile by boat, might take as much.as seven months.
In his own experience in sending out publications it took an average of 4-5
months to receive acknowledgements from other Latin American countries.
Customs clearance also created problems in shipping materials, and sometimes
involved delays of several days after the material had arrived. On the
question of the PAHO franking previleges it was pointed out that the PAHO
representative exercised this frank though the Minister of Health of his
own country and this covered surface mail only and not air mail.
We next visited the Bibliotheca Nacional a large handsome building
next door to the University administration building. The librarian and
director of the National Documentation Center, so called, was not available but we spoke to one of the members of the staff. The library seems to have
fallen on evil days. It seemed largely unfrequented, with the halls dark and RES 4/12
'·r~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~23 the large reading room closed. They said they had over 300,000 volumes, but
there was no card catalog in evidence in the public catalog area where the
drawers were all empty. The "documentation center" seemed to.be little
more than a eclectic conglomeration of abstract Journals in a number of
disparate fields without any great indication of use. We collected some
material for analysis and were promised a copy of a proposal for a national
union catalog of periodicals which had recently been presented to the
administration.
Dr. Mardones took us to visit his office in the Building of Ministry
of Health and en passant showed us the Ministry library which was a collection
of about 5-10,000 volumes largely bound in half leather as seems the general
custom in this part of the world, but with very little current material of
significance. There was no evidence, for instance, of any indexes of any
kind, or any other kind of record.
The rest of the afternoon and part of the evening up to 8:00 p.m. was
spent in a visit to the library of the Faculty of Medicine of the University,
where we met with three members of the library staff, members of the library
committee and a representative of the student body. Primary interest seemed
to be in the establishment of the center in Montevideo, but they appreciated
the fact that Montevideo might not be able to contribute to the support of
such a center. The Library itself seemed to be fairly rich in resources and
showed evidences of energy in organization of collections and records, even
though some of it may have been misdirected. The building is quite old and
the collection is divided according to language groups, with monographs all
in one room, except for a large part of the collection which was in storage.
As in other Latin American libraries we visited, the monographic collection
seemed the weakest, and not many recent monographs of the past five years or RES 4/12 24
so were in evidence. One room was devoted to students, about 400 square
feet without any books at all, the rest of the collection being closed to
them. The student member of the entourage who made the rounds with us
seemed to find this quite acceptable.
The card catalog was a classed one based on the Boston Medical
Classification, with subject index to the class, and separate author and
title catalogs. The librarians were considering changing to NLM
Classification and had translated part of the MeSH list into Spanish but
primarily as a basis for the index of publications in the Faculty Medical
Journal which was used for exchange. New space was being developed on a
floor above the library as a result of a rebuilding program which had been made necessary by a recent fire. This was the first library in South America we visited in which we found a complete set of the Cumulative Index Medicus.
April 28, 1965
In the morning we visited the Servicio de Fisiologia Obstetrica in the Hospital de Clinicas of the Faculty of Medicine and spoke to the director, Dr. Roberto Caldeyro-Barcia. Dr. Caldeyro-Barcia has a small
scientific information center in the field of reproduction physiology which he has designed and installed himself, although somewhat modeled after
Hans Seyle's systems in Montreal. The Service subscribes to around 30 journals which are routed to the 15 or so members of the staff who check articles for indexing and abstracting where indicated. Each article checked is requested by reprint from the author. Such services as Excerpta Medica also seemed to be checked for relevant materials. Reprints are assigned and filed by sequence numbers, which are added to an author file on 5 x 8 RES 4/12 25 cards. Each file is arranged in a rotary tub file which make it easily aecessible. Reprints are filed in boxes in cases. This file is frequently used to answer requests received from elsewhere in Latin America. The
Service has its own Thermofax machine which can be used only for flat copy.
When a request for subject information is received, the cards can be removed from behind the relevant subject guide and copied. The Service has developed its own coding system for the file based on a two part number, one representing a major break down of subject material and other two smaller break downs. Dr. Caldeyro-Barcia indicated that although they had found this information file extremely useful, if not absolutely necessary because of the inability of the Faculty of Medicine Library to provide the kind of service required, he would be glad to relinguish it to a center. He also said that the Bibliography of Reproduction a new abstracting service published in England might reduce the necessity for maintaining the ceTter.
We next visited the Department of Neurology in the Hospital and spoke to the editor of the Acta Latino Americana de Neurologfa. His major library resource was at home where he had a collection of about 3,000 volumes, on which one of the Faculty of Medicine librarians had done considerable work and organized. The service itself had only a small library and not very current. The problem of location of the center was discussed, and Santiago was recommended as a good possibility because of the strong interest in medical libraries.
The Escuela Universitaria de Enfermería (the nursing school) library is also located in the Hospital de Clinicas. The Directory of Medical Libraries indicates that the library has 220,000 volumes and receives 2,000 journals, but 2,200 volumes and 20 journals is probably much nearer the truth. It is RES 4/12 26 a small well-organized library with some of the standard nursing journals and indexes. The Nursing Association Handbook on libraries (U.S.A.) has been used as a guide, e.g. a simplified Dewey Classification has been accepted, but used as a basis for a classed catalog, with author, title and subject index to the classification much like that of the Faculty of Medicine Library.
The Office of the Pan American Postal Union was visited in the company of Dr. Mardones, but they had no readily available information they could give us, e.g.,about average transmission times from one point to another by surface and air mail. When he was asked for an expression of opinion of the best center for this kind of communication network in terms of traffic, etc.,he said he thought that Buenos Aires was far superior to either Rio or
Sao Paulo. He promised to extract some of the data we requested and to send it to us via Dr. Mardones.
In the evening before we left we met Dr. Washington Isola, Dean of the Medical Faculty and one of his young professors who acted as interpreter.
Dr. Washington expressed the eager interest of his faculty in the establish- ment of the center in Montevideo and said that geographic and political conditions made it a place of primary choice. He said that an entire floor of the Hospital de Clinicas could be made available for this purpose if necessary, because it had much greater capacity than needed for clinical purposes. He agreed to write a memorandum of intent and send it to PAHO in Washington.
April 29th - Buenos Aires
We arrived in Buenos Aires on the evening of the 28th and checked in at the Hotel Claridge. Our first appointment in the morning was with RES 4/12 27
Dr. Penido, the PAHO zone representative who met us in his office to
discuss our two day schedule in Buenos Aires. At 10 o'clock we visited the
library of the Academia Nacional de Medicina where we were received by an
assistant librarian. The library is a collection of about 35,000 volumes
most of it housed in closed areas, and in rooms with 20 foot high shelves.
One large assembly room was completly lined with books up to 30 feet with
a balcony. Ulthough there was a catalog for the recent accessions, most of
the older books were simply accessioned with a number tacked on the back of
the book. Miss Elsa A. Filardi, the assistant librarian, did all the
cataloging herself in the half day she spent at the library, the rest of the
day she spent working at the library of the Ministry of Health. The library
itself was open from 8 in the morning until 8 p.m., she said, although most
of the time without professional attendance. There seemed a fair display
of current journals. Miss Filardi said they received more than 1,000, but
it was not clear how many of them were on exchange with the Anales of the
Academia now in the 120th year of publications. There was not much evidence
of use of the library, although it was said to be open to the public.
Our next visit was to the ConseJo Nacional de Investigaciones
Cientificas y Tecnicas, where we met with Dr. Bernardo Houssay, President
of the Council, and Dr. Raul L. Cardon, Director of the Council's documentation
center which had been established about two years ago to serve the nation's
documentation needs in science and technology. The Center has made a modest beginning in this direction by publishing a Union List of Periodicals for
Argentina, which they were in process of bringing up to date, and creating
a file of research institutions and investigators by means of continuing
questionaires. The pattern which seemed to be followed was that of the IBBD RES 4/12 28 in Rio, because Dr. Cardon also spoke of publishing a Argentinian national bibliography in science and technology to cover periodicals as well as monographs. Dr. Cardon provided us with reports of the service rendered by the Institute. Interlibrary loans requested from the Institute are accomplished by asking libraries in Buenos Aires to make microfilms of the request and forwarding them to the Institute. There were some few (lO or so) strips of 35mm microfilm in evidence in the interlibrary loan office which had been prepared in response to request. There apparently are no book copiers like Verifax, Thermofax, in use in any of these libraries, although flat copy machines have been acquired in some places. There was one Xerox copy from NLM on the desk which the head of the section said had taken a total of 14 days from the time the request was initiated until it was back in Rio (the request was for a 1946 article in the American Heart Journal).
Dr. Cardon is the President of the Latin American Section of FID and publishes several news bulletins in connection with this activity. He toured us through the rest of the center which occupies several floors in the Research Council's building and includes a translation section, i.e. a register of translators to whom the requestor is referred - the Council pays half of the translation costs and the requestor the other half.
The Institute shares its documentation responsibilities with at least three other federal documentation centers, one in agriculture, one in atomic energy and one in space research, as well as a very active center in the general field of technology.
Dr. Cardon felt that a center such as proposed by PAHO for medical libraries was entirely feasible, and thought that Buenos Aires should be a prefered site for the center for many reasons, including the strong concentration RES 4/12 29 of materials, the number of trained people, although he saw no reason why it could not work equally as well elsewhere. He suggested as an alternative establishing several centers, perhaps three of four, in a kind of network, with a program for cooperation written into their missions. Each might be assigned a apecial aspect of documentation activity such as translations, reprography,etc.
April 30, 1965
In the morning we visited with four members of the Faculty of the
Library School at the Facultad de Filosofia Library. On the question of the orientation of South Americanlibrarianship toward Europe, FID, and such developments as UDC, the consensus was that although this might be true of the older generation of Argentinianlibrarians, the younger ones tended to look more toward U. S. methods and techniques. All the teachers at the library school are part time, e.g.,the two men, Emilio R. Ruiz was the librarian of the law courts, and Jose Marfa Martinez was the new librarian of the Inter American Development Bank in Buenos Aires. The only central facility of the University for libraries is the Instituto de Bibliotecología, which we did not see, but whose purpose we were told was to serve as a bibliographic center for the entire university and included a union catalog.
They showed a great deal of interest in U. S. documentation activities and were seeking to invite someone from the U. S. to lecture to the library school for a session.
We stopped in at the USIA library in Buenos Aires, the Bibliotica
Lincoln, and spent some time with Miss Garneata Kramer, the USIA librarian.
We learned something of the function of the USIA library as a channel for RES 4/12 30 answering inquiries from South Americans about U. S. science and technology.
Miss Kramer stressed the importance of providing for continuity of support
for the proposed center, and agreed that some South American libraries tended
to dissipate their energies on meetings and positions with high sounding titles.
We visited also with.Dr. Arturo Onativia, the Argentinian Minister
of Public Health and members of his staff. Dr. Oiativia expressed interest
in the proposal, but offered no concrete proposals about how they could
be implemented.
The last visit of the day was to the Faculty of Medicine of Buenos
Aires University where we met first with Dr. Horacio H. Hernandez, the
library's director, and his staff and then with Dr. Ostvaldo Fustioni, dean
of the Faculty. This library is housed on several floors of the medical
school and with around 500,000 volumes is easily the largest medical library
in South America, but in terma of housekeeping and organization it seemed to
have some serious deficiencies. Despite the size of the collection, there
seemed very little evidence that many current monographs were being added.
There were many copies of out dated text books in multiple copies for students.
The student reading room was on a separate floor and generally devoid of
texta, except for those in an adjacent stack. There are some 17,000 medical
students (the description submitted by Dr. Hermandez shows some discrepancies)
and seats in the reading room for 600. The general level of lighting in
most of the South American libraries seemed to be argreat deal below minimum
acceptable levels in the U. S. but here particularly it seemed quite low.
A report which Dr. Hernandez prepared gives further particulars about the
collection, but our examination gave clear evidence that this library was
quite outside the accepted modern library technology. The classification
'1 · RES 4/12 31 system was an interesting one, being non-hierarchical in character, and the shelf location system for journals was also unique to the library, being based on the assignment of arbitrary numbers, a different one for current, and a different one for bound journals. Dr. Hernandez showed us a Spanish translation of the NIM MeSH list which had been prepared at Medellin in
1961 - of which general knowledge does not seem to be available. Again as in many other libraries we visited instead of acquiring the clumulated edition of Index Medicus, the Library bound the separate monthly issues. The second book copying device in a library seen on the trip (the first being in the library of the Dental School at Sao Paulo) was to be seen in this library, a rather elaborate French device, utilizing a wet process and direct one to one copying. We met briefly with the Dean and again failed to elicit any suggestions on alternatives to sites other than'that in which we were visiting. The Dean expreesed strong interest in the center being established in Buenos Aires.
MaY 1-2 - Santiago We left Buenos Aires for Santiago, Chile on the morning of May 1st.
Due to the failure of the PAHO regional officer to coordinate with the local librarians we miesed making contact with Miss Sylvia Anabalon, Librarian of the University of Chile Medical Library who had driven all the way out to the Airport to greet us. In fact we were not able to see the regional representative until Monday afternoon when we took the initiative to contact him.
We did not meet with any of the local people until Sunday evening when Mies Anabalon was able to contact us, and to join us with Dr. Marco Penna, RES 4/12 32 a pharmacologist on the Medical School staff, who had spent some time in graduate studies in the United States. At this time we made arrangements for a schedule on the following day.
May 3, 1965
We began the day by touring the library of the School of Medicine of the University of Chile. The library is in a rather old, rather makeshift building, but in spite of a great number of handicaps, they have succeeded admirably in organizing and administering what seemed like a very well run and heavily used library. This was one of the few libraries we saw in our trip in which the students were actually permitted access to the books and were encouraged to use them. There is a small bibliographic collection which contains most of the major medical and basic science indexes. A small crowded reading room contains collections of recent monographs for student and faculty use. In distinction with most Latin American medical libraries we saw, very little special space was provided for faculty. Again the emphasis on currency was on the Journal collection and not on monographs, because there were obviously serious olmissions both in clinical and basic science texts. One of the contributions a regional library might make, would be to make it possible for some of the Latin American medical libraries to reduce some of their marginally used subscriptions and use these funds for texts. This kind of activity, however, calls for an active acquisitions program, with carefully exercised selection of books, rather than the kind of automatic selection that results from keeping up journal subscriptions. RES 4/12 33
The organization of the collections seemed very simple and workable.
They use their own classification system based on broad classes, with a mnemonic code, e.g. An for anatomy, Ga for gastroenterology. There is a divided catalog with subjects based on the MéSH list and an author title catalog.
The Journal collection is arranged in one alphabetical file. The current issues being displayed in one end of the reading room on slanted shelves. They number about 800 of which only a few are received on exchange. Back files of Journals and older monographs are in two closed stack sections which were orderly but rather crowded. A new library had been planned in the past as a part of the development of a new basic science building which has been partially erected, with no definite time table for completion.
They did not seem to be pleased with that part of the library structure which had been erected because they did not feel that the original plans of relating each basic science department to a level of the library was a workable one. In the meantime there are some tentative plans to expand the bibliography out into a central court which is available for this purpose.
The cataloging department is located on a mezzanine overlooking the stacks and is in charge of a young man. He uses the MeSH list in English which he translates into Spanish as he assigns headings. The translation of the lst edition in Spanish in 1960 by Alcera Meya Andion at the Inter-
American Library School at Medellin which was brought to our attention in
Buenos Aires, was known to him. He said, however, that it had proved unsatisfactory.
We met next with the Head of the Pharmacology Departzpent, Dr. Mardones, who seemed most interested in problema of biomedical communications. He spoke with enthusiasm about the use of 35mm microfilm as a means of RES 4/12 34 disseminating Journal articles, which he said was a primary necessity for
Latin American scientists. He said that enlarging equipment is readily
available and that photographic paper for this purpose was relatively cheap
in Chile. He again raised the problem of communications and the
unreliability of the mails.
In the light of earlier complaints we had conducted a little
experiment by sending two airmail letters from Sao Paulo addressed to
ourselves in Buenos Aires and in Santiago. The letter was at one Hotel in
Buenos Aires waiting for us when we arrived some four days latter, and the
letter received in Santiago was post marked April 22 in Sao Paulo, and
April 26 in Santiago. While we can hardly generalize on the basis of this
small sample, it does indicate that mail difficulties may sometimes be
exaggerated. Phone difficulties however, may be just as acute. When we
inquired in the PAHO representatives office about placing a call to Bogota
we were told it would take a minimum of four hours. Before leaving the
University we spoke briefly with the Dean Dr. Neghme, who expressed warm
interest in the proposed center and offered the full support of the Pan
American Federation of Medical Schools. While the Federation has not yet
been able to give special attention to the problems of medical school
libraries, he recognized that this was as necessary as establishing a
regional center. In fact, for the regional center to work effectively it
is important to develop good and effective libraries on the periphery.
We went next to the PAH0O office where we spoke briefly with Dr. A.
Sanches de Almeida the regional representative. Dr. Almeida had been at his RES 4/12 35 post for only a very short time and had few positive contributions to make to the discussion.
We went next to the Centro Nacional de Documentación of the Consejo
de Rectores and spoke to the sub-director Mrs. Betty Johnson. This is a new center established in the tradition of IBBD, and the center of Dr. Cardon
in Buenos Aires, and is planning to carry on the same kinds of programs and activities, although Mrs. Johnson seemed to have much more positive point of view about developing service programs. The Center and the Chilean
Government has had the advise of several American experts including Dr. Carl
Heuman and Mr. Iglesrud. As a result of a substanial grant from AID which
may be as much as $800000 dollars, a program to equip the center with
duplicating equipment, microfilm readers and other devices has been initiated,
and Mrs. Johnson was expecting delivery of a number of 3M reader printers which she was hoping to place in several Chilean libraries. They were in process of preparing a union list of periodicals in Chile and hoping to get funds to publish it, and were about to complete a bibliography of Chilean theses which the librarian of the Catholic University Medical School was editing. Mrs. Johnson seemed very alert to problems in modern documentation and very eager to learn about them.
Our last visit of the day was to the Catholic University where we visited the library of the Medical School and spoke to Miss Francisca
Martinez, the librarian, and to the University Librarian, Miss Maria Teresa Sanz. Miss Martinez supplied us with a collection of interlibrary loan requests which they had not been able to procure locally. These total 160 requests which they had not been able to fill in 1964. Of these 61 (38%) were not available from the library they had been requested, primarily the RES 4/12 36
University of Chile Medical School Library. Of these 34 fell in the period
1960 to date, 21 in the period 1950-1959 and only 6 before 1950. In terms
of country of origin for the citations:
British 6
French 19
German 2
South American 3
United States 21
Other 10 Total 61
The 61 requests represented 47 different titles.
Her library is quite a small one despite the fact that it serves some
300 medical students. It is quite new and its acquisitions and cataloging
are done by the central library. They receive about 300 current periodicals.
Miss Martinez is a former Medical Library Association Fello*. She got her
MS from Catholic University and worked for a while in the Medical Library at
Emory , which reflected in the organization of the library. She uses NLM
classification, a divided catalog, and MeSH headings. She was hoping to get
new space for the library in the near future.
We met briefly with the University Librarian Miss Sanz, who is i- occupying temporary quarters because the main reading room was severely
damaged by the quake of March of this year.
In the evening we had another opportunity to discuss the concept of
,1 regional library service with the Library Director of the Pan American
_k> Agricultural Center at Turrialba and Mrs. Johnson who had formerly been an
agricultural librarian and trained at this center. The Director of the
Turrialba Center said that her experience indicated that regional service
was feasible, since she received and responded to requests from many parts
,-
*A RES 4/12 37 of South America. She promised to send us some additional data about the center.
May 4th - Bogatá (Dr. Taube)
We left Santiago on the last leg of our trip. Dr. Taube got off the
plane at Bogatá and Dr. Kronick continued on to Caracas. On the afternoon of May 4, I visited the Facultad de Medicina of the
Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, and met with the Dean of. Studies, Dr. Bernardo Moreno MeJi'a, and the Chief Librarian. The library seems to be a relatively new institution, and the Medical Library is part of the general University library. As in other places, I was told here of the plans to provide additional space and develop the collections for the Medical Library. There was a great deal of uncataloged and unorganized material in the library, which condition can be attributed to its recent establishment. On the other hand, the building was attractive, and apparently the new librarian, F. Rafael
Arboleda, is very energetic and trained in American library practices. I was assured by the Dean of Students of a complete lack of competition and a real spirit of cooperation between his university and the National University. Although the Dean saw no reason why the Regional Medical Library
Center should not be placed in his university, he was much more interested in convincing me that Bogotá or some other city in Colombia should be selected by the Center. After leaving the Universidad Javeriana, I visited the library of
the Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional. The librarian is a doctor, Dr.
Jose Perea-Sasiain. The library was orderly and well organized according to established American library principles. It was also quite busy. It is RES 4/12 38 worth noting that in this library, and in the library of the Universidad
Javeriana, I did not encounter the separation of student reading rooms and faculty reading rooms. In both institutions, many students were using the library in the presence of the book collections in the reading rooms and stacks.
On the morning of May 5, after a brief visit with the Rector of the
University, I spent several hours, including lunch, with the Associate
Director and several members of the staff of the Asociacion Colombiana de
Facultades de Medicina. The former Executive Director, Dr. José Felix
Patino, has recently been appointed Rector of the National University. The
Acting Director, Dr. Raul Paredes Manrique, was very enthusiastic about the purposes and promise of the Association. This was the only place in which we encountered an active association of medical schools dedicated to countrywide development of medical practice and research. The very existence of this situation was regarded by the Bogotá people as an argument for putting the Regional Medical Library Center in Bogotá. They felt since they had already learned to cooperate with one another, they could pioneer in the direction of cooperation among the Latin American countries.
It is the case that the Medical Library of the National University rivaled in order, appearance, organization, and use, the Library of the
Escola Paulista de Medicina. A decision in favor of the latter would have to be made-in terma of other considerationa, e.g., central location, the amount of medical research in Sáo Paulo as opposed to Bogotá, etc. It is worth noting that the political situation in Bogota seemed more unstable than in other places we visited. This, of course, is just a superficial observation. All countries seemed to be suffering from inflation; but as RES 4/12 39 I was leaving Bogotá, the peso began to deteriorate rapidly. Furthermore,
the doctor who took me to visit the Asociacion Colombiana de Facultades de
Medicina removed the windshield wipers from his car before parking it.
May 5th - Caracas (Dr. Kronick)
I spent the day visiting the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones
Cientificas (IVIC) which is a general research institute some 10-15 miles
up in the mountains from Caracas. This is a government center for
fundamental and applied research in biology, medicine, physics, mathematics,
and chemistry and is said to have the best scientific library in Venezuela.
The Institute is under the Ministry of Health as a result of its origins in
a national neurological institute. The IVIC has a staff of about 30 full
time investigators, and a total staff of about 200. The library is in a
separate building in a most beautiful physical setting in the mountains and
connected with the other institute buildings by covered walks, and stone
stairs leading down the various levels on which they are situated. The
library is spacious and very attractively designed, in fact the most attractive
of any I had seen in South America. The library contains about 24,000
volumes covering all of acience and technology, and about 1,300 current journal1
titles of which only 200 are received by gift of exchange. Dr. Tulio Arends,
Chief of the hematology department who accompanied us on our morning rounds,
estimated that about 60-70% of the collection was devoted to medicine and
related basic sciences. While this may be true of the Journal collection
a brief inspection of the monograph collection indicated that this percentage must be considerably lower for this part of the collection. Dr. Arends
indicated that biomedical research also accounted for about 70% of the RES 4/12 40 institutes activities. He said that their funds for acquisitions were spent primarily for journals because he felt this was the most important part of the collection. The Chief Librarian Marta Turk said that book funds were ample and that she vas able to procure any title requested. The annual budget for the current year is about $100,000 U.S. This might be explained by the fact that the demand generated by the small number of investigators is relatively low, although from time to time the Institute does have graduate students involved in its programs, at the time of the visit these only numbered three according to Dr. Arends because their standards of selection were extremely high.
Some of the library's services are provided by mail through the means of photocopies, and the library is open to the public though little used in this way, primarily because of the distance from town. In 1964 a total of only 858 non IVIC people had used the library, although this represented more than 10% of the total use of the library, e.g., 7,402 readers. In terms of organization, records and management this library was easily the one closest to United States standards and techniques, indeed it was probably the best organized library seen in the trip. This is explained somewhat by the fact that the librarian Miss Turk, visited U. S. libraries and studied
U. S. techniques extensively before organizing the library. The catalog is a divided one with subjects in one file and authors and titles in another.
The librarian uses the Dewey classification for the entire collections and says she finds it quite adequate. The Library has complete sets of many of' the leading index abstract tools such as Chemical Abstracts and QCIM, Nuclear
Abstracts and others. They had acquired Citation Index and Dr. Arends reported that it has been used sucessfully, although he did not elaborate this point. RES 4/12 41
The Biomedical bibliographical apparatus seemed fairly good, although I can not speak with as much conviction for other fields of science and technology. Many of the journal titles are avialable in complete sets
such as the Comptes Rendus des Academie de Sciences, Paris, although Dr.
Arends explained that they carefully screen other Venezulean libraries before acquiring expensive back sets. An unusual acquisition was the complete
file of Sherrington's reprints which had been acquired by purchase for the library, along with Sherrington's own card indexes to the file, which is preserved in special wooden boxes with plastic covers made in the Institute.
The Library has had for some time a Thermofax book copier and in 1964 produced some 20,000 pages of which almost 7,000 were for non-Institute
personnel. In this same period they solicited and received 177 interlibrary
loans from NLM, which Miss Turk said took on an average of 20 days to complete. During my visit the Library received delivery of a Xerox 914 which was the only one I saw during the entire trip and as far as I know one of the first few to be received in South America. We were told later
by an employee of an American firm in Caracas that this was made possible because Xerox have recently been able to reacquire their South American rights from the Rank Co. in England who had not been able to exploit the
South American market.
We had lunch with Dr. Marcel Roche, Director of the Institute and a member of the PAHO advisory committee. He said that the Institute was quite capable and rilling to cooperate with the proposed center if it were established at the Institute, and Dr. Arends indicated that space could readily be constructed for this purpose if it were necessary. On the RES 4/12 42
geographic basis for determination of site Dr. Roche said that if service
were to be provided primarily by air, air traffic should be more important
than central location. He did agree that the proposed center could if
established and sucessfully carried out its assigned mission, make a
significant contribution to South American biomedical research. His
convictions about the importance of the literature in the research effort,
are mirrored in the high level of support provided the Institute Library.
I met also with Dr. Miguel Layriss¡ Head of the Physiology Department,
who said that he hoped that translations would also be an assigned
responsibility of the proposed center, and that although he managed very well
with English, French and German, it was difficult to find translators in
Venezuela for Slavic and Oriental languages.
The Institute Library was most impressive both in the beauty of its
setting and the excellent design of its physical facilities. The librarian
complained about the shortage of work space, a matter frequently overlooked
in many library designs. Its relative physical isolation and the generality
of its collection and the lack of good supporting resources in the area, along with its geographic location probably rule it out as a place of choice for the proposed center.
May 6. 1965
In the morning I visited with Dr. Garcia Gutierrez, the PAHO zone chief before proceeding to the library of the Ministerio de Sanidad y Asistencia
Social at the Universidad Central de Venezuela. Dr. Garcia said that at a
February meeting in Washington he had suggested that the medical library at
Kingston be considered as a possible site for the center. At the University RES 4/12 43 9) I met first with Dr. Ricardo Archila, who is the editor of the Venezuelan
Medical. Bioliography of which 3 volumes have been published and a fourth
covering the literature from 1959-1963 was being prepared for the press.
Dr. Archila has also written two works on the'history of Venezuelan Medicine
and is very much interested in the history of medicine. He was in process
~;* also of editing for the Ministry the collected works of a noted Venezuelan
surgeon which was to be published in some ten volumes. The library of the
Ministry which specializes in public health is not very large, consisting of
some 4,642 volumes of monographs (of which 501 were published in Venezuela)
1' and 8,887 periodical volumes (1,299 Venezuelan). The monographic collection
was largely older material, with a fair amount of public health reports
including those of WHO, and the number of current periodicals'fairly
small, probably less than 100. As with most of the Caracas libraries I
[~ visited, with the exception of that of IVIC, the collection.was classed with
Boston Medical Library classification, and the catalog was a divided
dictionary catalog. Dr. Archila compiles the Venezuelan Medical bibliography
in his office by having 3x5 cards made on all articles in new Venezuelan
medical periodicals as they come to his desk, so that the file is kept
constantly up to date. He also answers inquiries concerning citations from
the Venezuelan medical literature.
I also visited the Central Library of the University, a large modern
structure built to house some million volumes and which presently contains
some half million. These buildings including the medical school and the
various institutes are all parts of a large homogeneous university campus
situated somewhere near the center of the city. Although the building had RES 4/12 44 been designed with the aid of American library experts, the librarian who conducted us on the tour considered it not entirely functional, e.g.,the relationship between reading room and stacks, the large areas of unused
space in the entry area. Although the librarian indicated that the collection was a general one it seemed apparent that it was largely devoted to the literature of the humanities and social sciences. The Central card catalog contained records of some of the separate institute collections but not all of them. There were some eight of these separate collections devoted to biomedicine of which the largest was less than 14,000 volumes.
This is the library of Instituto de Medicina Experimental at the
University which Dr. Archilla indicated was the third largest medical library in Caracas, the first being that of IVIC and the second that of the
Asociacion Venezolana para el Avance de la Ciencia, which I visited later in the day. The library of the Institute of Experimental Medicine was started with the assistance of the Rockefeller Foundation of about $10,000 in 1941 under the Direction of Professor Augusto P. Suner, and some help from pharmaceutical industry. The Director of the Institute, Dr. H. Garcia
Arocha applied to the Kellogg Foundation for additional assistance in 1961 but without success. The list of periodicals in the library collection recently published contains 529 titles of which perhaps half are no longer received for one reason or another. The collection seemed well ordered, considering the physical facilities that were available. They prided themselves on having a complete set of the Bulletin de Societe de Biologie de Paris, and also the American Journal of Public Health, a complete set of which had also been seen at IVIC, where the possibility of consolidating the several separate medical libraries into a single strong one was broached, there was no evidence of great interest in this idea. RES 4/12 45
I spc.xe briefly also with Dr. Aagard, the Assistant Dean of the
Medical School, and a member of his staff. When Sao Paulo was mentioned
as a possible site, the problem of language differences and Brazilian insularity
was raised. Dr. Garcia Arocha, on the other hand, said that he had many
contacts in Brazil and that he saw no reason why a center in Brazil should
not be effective. The fact that the new government in Brazil has not yet
been recognized by the Venezuelan government may be a consideration in these
viewpoints.
The last visit of the day was to the Library of the Venezuelan
Association for the Advancement of Science which was in process of having
its annual meeting on the University campus. The library itself is housed
in the headquarters building some distance from the campus. The building
was in process of reconstruction and the stacks were sealed off and could
not be examined but were said to contain the most complete Oet of Venezuelan
medical periodicals in the country. The librarian was maintaining an
author and subject card file of Venezuelan medical periodicals and adding to
it currently in duplication of Archilá's work, because she said she also
received requests for citations to Venezuelan medical literature. She said
the bibliography had originated here at this library, and she was unhappy
that Dr. Archila had failed to cite her as co-editor. The library itself,
despite the fact that it serves a general science organization, is largely biomedical but has not been kept up to date except for a handful of current
medical Journals. The book collection, except for some recent texts on
sociology and urban renewal is quite old. It was difficult to place this
library in the context of the other libraries in Caracas, and one received the impression it was not a very viable or heavily used library. It had RES 4/12 46 originated in an industrial library which had been made available to physicians and then given as a gift to the Association.
SUMMARY
Among the general impressionswe gained from this brief and rapid tour of the medical libraries and some of the documentation centers of South America are the following: 1. That although there are some medical libraries of considerable size in terms of number of volumes, there does not appear to be anywhere in South America a medical library comparable to those in our major bio- medical research centers both in terms of available resources, or services. 2. The primary flow of influence in terms of bibliographic techniques and principles seem to be from Europe, particularly through the influence of UNESCO and FID, rather than from the United States. 3. That there is no obvious consensus about the best location for a regional medical library to serve all of South America. Most of the sites visited indicated their willingness to cooperate with the project and thought it should be located on or near its premises. There were very few suggestions about second choices for the center in case their own were not selected. 4. That there was, however, general agreement about the need for supplementation of existing collections, and for the extension of present services and the introduction of new ones like translation services. That there was need for a training center for South American librarians where modern information technologies could be studied and acquired, as well as RES 4/12 47 for better training for medical librarianship in general.
5. That the site chosen for the proposed center is not as important as the development of an effective and successful program of assistance to
South American biomedical scientists in meeting their information needs.
The center will have to follow an aggressive program of making known and disseminating its services before the established patterns of information seeking among individual South American biomedical scientists are significantly changed.