Friday 15 January 2016

A day in the life of a clinical librarian

For those of you who are new to our blog, each month we share what a day in the life of a clinical librarian looks like. This month we're interviewing our new clinical librarian, Keith Nockels!



Who are you and where do you work?
I am Keith Nockels, and I am based at the Odames Library at the LRI.


How long have you been there?
Only since 9th December 2015!


What attracted you to Clinical Librarianship?
I fell into medical librarianship by accident years and years ago when looking for a graduate trainee position prior to library school.  Finding out about medicine and health, working with medical students and with medical books and journals, was fascinating and rewarding and I was hooked.  Realising that at the end of our work was a patient was also quite a thought and has kept me motivated. I did have a few years in other library work, and although it was very good, I moved back into health librarianship as soon as I could.

I have been at the University of Leicester Library since late 2003, supporting medical and operating department practice students, postgraduate students in the Department of Health Sciences, and social work and biological sciences.   I went part time in 2008 on the arrival of my younger son, so have returned to full time working by taking on this clinical librarian role at UHL.  I would make a very bad doctor or nurse, but being a librarian in a hospital setting is helping them care for patients, and I look forward to putting my literature searching and other library experience to use in patient care.

I am at the LRI for three days a week, jobsharing with Sarah Sutton, and am at the University the other 2 days.   I am already seeing places where my work in one institution will have a positive effect on my work in the other!


What does an average day at work involve?
It’s part of the attraction of health librarianship that there is no “average day”, but it might involve answering email requests for help, answering the phone, meeting people to help them use a database or other resource, or doing a literature search to help someone care for patients or do research.   As a new member of UHL staff, I have found out about how my clinical areas work and tried to find excuses to contact my areas to introduce myself or send them useful information.  I have also been reading books about cardiology, genetics and cancer (other areas are on the list!).  And I have been thinking about journal clubs and about the reference management system RefWorks.


If you weren’t a Librarian, what would you be?
I have no idea!  


Tell us a joke or a non-work fact about yourself
I should probably run any jokes past my younger son, so safer might be the non-work fact that I am a Morris dancer.  Not in the Library, though.   Not so far.

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