I think on reflection, Caroline wanted to know if all hospitals have medical librarians who can be accessible to humanitarian workers in times of emergency. The answer could no in that we have many types of Libraries namely: public and private or special libraries, academic, hospital and medical. Whatever the situation each library operates according to the specifications of the parent organisation.This means their collection and clientele ate pretermined. However, potential users like humanitarians are allowed. Let me cite some examples which have cited before, the university of Zambia operates in the grounds of UTH. In 1980s doctors used to ask us medical librarians to take journals needed when they were stack with information. During 1990s when an emergency of cholera occurred for the first time, medical librarians where called upon to provide necessary data and information to health workers who were in the fied. So there no specific libraries and Librarians playing that role, we will appreciate if such innovation could be replicated in low and medium countries after training of our cadres.
HIFA profile: Kenneth L Chanda is Associate Consultant and Lecturer at National Institute of Public Administration where he is lecturing in Records Management. He is co-author of The development of telehealth as a strategy to improve health care services in Zambia. Kenneth L. Chanda & Jean G. Shaw. Health Information & Libraries Journal. Volume 27, Issue 2, pages 133139, June 2010. He recently retired as Assistant Medical Librarian at the University of Zambia. klchanda AT gmail.com
