The Duke University Medical Center Library & Archives provides biomedical information, innovative services, educational programs, archival preservation, knowledgeable staff, and collaborative spaces.
We license, curate, and provide access to information resources for Duke Health, including:
Selected library resources have been integrated into MaestroCare and were viewed over 741,104 times in fiscal year 2023.
Centralized buying saves money: one of the lowest cost-per-use for a library-subscribed article is only $0.14. Independently buying an article directly from most publishers averages $40 per article.
In this photo, our new graphic medicine collection is available in the Reading Room.
We teach evidence-based practice, literature searching, and information synthesis.
We have liaisons to all of Duke’s academic health professions programs, Graduate Medical Education, and Duke University Health System nursing. We also teach on demand classes and create online tutorials to make learning available online, any time.
In the 2022-2023 academic year, librarians:
In this photo, medical students come to the library for the Finding the Best Evidence class.
We maintain administrative and historical records for Duke Health, including the records of 2 Nobel Laureates, World War II surgical teams, School of Medicine and School of Nursing departments, and student groups.
In fiscal year 2023, we:
Some examples of the new materials added to our collections this year are the records of the Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Environmental Physiology; records from the North Carolina Licensed Practical Nurses Association; and new additions to the Student-Faculty Shows Collection.
We collected oral history interviews with members of the Duke Midwifery Service and Durham County Health Department through a Trent Endowment funded-project to document the history of maternal health in Durham.
In this photo, students explore archival materials at the Halloween “It Came From the Archives” event.
The library may have been quiet at times but it was constantly in use in 2023. We facilitated over 14,000 hours of room reservations for study, classroom use, meetings, and medical student interviews.
Deploying a space tracking project in the fall gave us measurable insight into popular study spots and times. Our most frequently used spaces are our reservable study rooms, followed by the 3rd floor individual carrels, 2nd floor carrels, and 3rd floor open seating. The most popular time of the week is Wednesday afternoon.
Our biennial survey showed us how valuable our spaces are to students and faculty. Students rated individual and quiet study places as the most important to them. One faculty member noted "I cannot overstate how critical and wonderful a place university libraries offer to scholars. Nor can I imagine any university (worthy of the title) without libraries and all the nooks and crannies they provide for study, reflection, and thought.”
Looking to the future, our staff and School of Medicine leadership have begun to explore what a renovation campaign could mean for the Seeley G. Mudd building and our library. Our space is loved by many but we are daring to dream of a completely new and innovative library for someday in the future.
In this photo, students use the library for study and collaboration.
Librarians partner with faculty, staff and students to strengthen Duke research.
Systematic Reviews: Over one-third (39%) of our 1,840 research consultations with Duke faculty, staff, and students are regarding systematic reviews or other evidence synthesis work. We have provided methodological expertise for more than 171 synthesis projects in the 2022-2023 academic year.
Research Impact: In the 2022-2023 academic year, our staff worked on 25 research impact projects to demonstrate the research impact of departments and research teams using publication data. Our staff collaborate across Duke to showcase the potential for using Scholars@Duke publication data.
Animals in Research - Searching for Alternatives: Librarians construct comprehensive literature searches for Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUC) protocols in order to seek methods of reduction, refinement, and replacement. We conducted 44 searches to support these protocols.
Championing Open Science and Open Access: Librarians guide researchers through funders’ open science initiatives, such as the NIH Public Access Policy and the new NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan Policy. Librarians facilitate open access to research through transformative subscriptions, such as one with PLOS, which allow Duke researchers to share their research more openly with the world.
In this photo is a network map of Duke organization affiliations. Network maps and other publication reports can show relationships of authors, subjects, and other components of publications.
Duke Health faculty, staff, and students work hard in labs, clinics, classrooms and the library. In an effort to provide opportunities to engage other facets of our patrons’ needs and identities, the library offers collections and programming to invigorate and care for our patron community.
This year, we launched a graphic medicine collection. This collection contains a variety of healthcare related topics discussed through the medium of comics. The books provide individual and sometimes surprising perspectives on living with a chronic or serious illness and can build empathy and connection between providers and patients.
We also hosted several events, including the SCOPES art reception, which featured medical student artwork, the Halloween-themed “It Came From the Archives” event, which featured spooky or unusual artifacts from our archival collections, and a mid-semester de-stress visit from miniature horses, which brought smiles to over 200 staff, faculty and students who came to visit with the therapy animals.
In this photo, students, faculty, and staff visit with miniature therapy horses from Stampede of Love.
In 2023, our interlibrary loan software hit a major milestone: 250,000 requests! This means our small staff has brokered more than a quarter of a million articles and books requests since the software went online about 20 years ago.
Our interlibrary loan and document delivery service have evolved over the years. Early interlibrary lending required heavy use of photcopiers, fax machines, and cardboard shippers. The advent of e-journals and e-books has not made interlibrary lending obsolete: publisher licenses and copyright law limit libraries from simply opening up our electronic collections to each other.
Duke faculty, students, and staff can now request articles or books at no cost: the Medical Center Library subsidizes the cost of borrowing to enable equitable access to research for the Duke Health community. This is an increasingly important service because the number of journals continues to grow and we will never be able to subscribe to all of them.
In this photo, Document Delivery & ILL Manager Louis Wiethe scans a book.
“All of my interactions with the medical center librarians have been overwhelmingly positive. They are easily the best resource we have. Anytime that I have encountered a hiccup with resources available through the library/library website the librarians have gone above and beyond to connect me with the services/resources I need.” - Faculty member on 2023 library survey
Our staff has expertise in information technology, administration, collection curation, archives, access services, and research and education.
In 2023, we co-authored 59 peer-reviewed journal articles – most of which are the result of collaborations with Duke authors on systematic reviews and other research projects. Staff also delivered presentations at conferences and served the university community and our professional networks through committee work, peer review, and leadership roles.
In this photo are many of our 25 staff members. Staff work a mix of hybrid and on-site schedules and offer services to the Duke community in person and online.