EFFECTIVE USE OF HEALTH CARE INFORMATION

A review of recent research

By Peter Merry

Bowker-Saur 262 pages pounds35

This book is a useful overview of recent projects funded by the British Library and of other studies that have looked at improving the collection, management and use of information in the healthcare sector. The author, a former editor of the Journal, provides the reader with a dizzying array of sources for obtaining healthcare information. There are chapters on how health information can be obtained in the US, the European Union, and both locally and nationally in the UK. He includes many contemporary references and a selection of very helpful Internet web sites throughout the text. For example, there is an extremely handy web site address for the European Clearing House on health system reforms.

The book also presents the potential hazards when assessing the validity and rigour of healthcare information, especially the abuse of public access sources such as the Internet. On the same topic, the book could have dealt with the neglected area of the mass media's influence in determining health behaviour among the general public. Recent media scares - the BSE scandal, concerns over the oral contraceptive pill, for example - have shown that people are prone to erroneous selective processing of health information.

A positive aspect of the book is the excellent chapter on the 'Influence of information services on clinical practice' and its overview of the principles of evidence-based medicine. The chapters on health information available locally and nationally in the UK are also invaluable.

However, the acronyms used by some organisations, projects or databases make for interesting reading. For example, SCHARR is not an unsightly after-effect of a wound but Sheffield University's centre for health and related research. CLINT is not a Hollywood actor/director but a clinical information network. The author also covers many traditional information resources including MEDLINE, BIDS, CINAHL and Cochrane databases.

One chapter focuses on developments in information for health promotion, community care and healthcare in rural areas. The chapter on the US looks at the variety of resources available, including the US National Library of Medicine, the Unified Medical Language System project, and the Rochester study into the impact of library and information services on clinical decision making. Canadian information resources are also mentioned, while the same chapter briefly looks at telemedicine and the education and training of health services librarians.

Most importantly, the author emphasises the impact of government on health information and the collection and management of this information. Although there are some dated references to the 1996 white paper A Service with Ambitions, the 'Looking ahead' chapter still raises pertinent issues about the problems of maintaining medical library facilities with dwindling resources. Overall, I found the subject matter to be somewhat dry, but the book was probably not intended to be read from cover to cover. Instead, Effective Use of Health Care Information is a comprehensive, accessible reference text, which will provide the health service manager with the main routes to obtaining up-to-date healthcare information.

GLENN WILLIAMS

Research officer, Parkside Health trust.