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United States National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Over the past half century, the nation's investment in scientific research has resulted in unprecedented revolutionary progress in biological, medical, and material sciences. Information technology holds the promise of delivering specific knowledge in a timely manner to billions of people worldwide, in ways undreamed of even a short time ago. The National Library of Medicine (NLM), in pursuit of its longstanding mission to acquire, organize, and disseminate health-related information, now has the opportunity to provide near-instantaneous reliable access to high quality health information resources when and where decisions are made. Careful planning and visionary thinking are needed to assure that we can reach this ambitious goal.

This Long Range Plan contains four overall goals:

  1. Organize Health-Related Information and Provide Access to It
  2. Encourage Use of High Quality Information by Health Professionals and the Public
  3. Strengthen the Informatics Infrastructure for Biomedicine and Health
  4. Conduct and Support Informatics Research

Within these four goals are eleven objectives and over one hundred specific program plans. Ongoing emphases—such as providing basic library services—will continue.

Additionally, the NLM Board of Regents has identified its highest priority new initiatives for special emphasis in the next five years. They are introduced below and are discussed in the following chapters.

Recommended Priorities for New Emphasis

Health Information for the PublicPhoto of couple biking

NLM has historically focused its services and products on an audience of health professionals and biomedical scientists. With widespread deployment of computers and telecommunications, the time is now right for NLM to provide access to health information that is useful both to the general public and to practitioners who need information outside their particular field of expertise. The managed care environment is pushing members of the public to take responsibility for their health by becoming well-informed patients. Increasingly members of the public and health professionals turn to the Internet for information, where there are already thousands of health-related Web sites, including many with inaccurate, out-of-date, or misleading information. As the world’s largest medical library, NLM has a responsibility to develop technologies and information systems that meet the public’s interest in accurate, current, and understandable health information. NLM should partner with federal agencies, voluntary health organizations, and others to identify gaps, arrange for development of understandable content, and help the public make effective use of electronic health information. NLM should also promote research on ways that information services can i m p rove personal health care decisions and outcomes. (see Goal 2)

Molecular Biology Information Systems

NLM should continue its commitment to organize genomic data to meet the rapidly evolving genome research agenda. The explosive growth in the fields of genetics and molecular biology, spurred largely by the worldwide success of the Human Genome Project, has resulted in staggering volumes of data that have increased by many orders of magnitude over the past decade. Looking beyond the sequencing and mapping achievements of the Human Genome Project, the research focus turns to analysis of the whole genome and application of this knowledge to medical practice. NLM should continue to play a key role in developing the genomics resources needed for comprehensive analysis of the human genome. The challenge for the next decade will be to keep pace with the flood of genome data, while also designing the tools and databases for the gene discoveries of the 21st century—discoveries that will advance understanding of molecular processes affecting human health and disease. (see Goal 4)

Training for Computational Biology Photo of researcher

The nation’s biomedical research enterprise needs more trained professionals in computational biology, including mathematical modeling in the life sciences, imaging and molecular biology. NLM should contribute to National Institutes of Health (NIH) efforts to increase the number of people who are trained in computational biology, by building on its unique informatics training program that bridges the gap between basic and clinical research. (see Goal 3)

Definition of the Research Publication of the Future

NLM should play an active role in defining the research publication of the future. Electronic methods for disseminating biomedical research results (such as PubMed Central) are being developed, keeping pace with the rapid improvements to electronic computing and communications technologies. As a major player in the management of scientific information, NLM should contribute to the development of new forms of publishing which can provide m o re rapid exchange of information, increased multimedia capabilities, the opportunity for lower dissemination costs, and wider global accessibility. Increasing the usefulness of and speed with which information can be disseminated and exchanged contributes toward the NLM’s underlying goals of furthering science and improving public and personal health. (see Goal 1)

Permanent Access to Electronic Information

The rapid increases in electronic publishing and technological change make the problem of ensuring long-term access to electronic information difficult. NLM must be a leader in responding to the problem of impermanence of electronic information. As a creator, organizer, and disseminator of information in electronic form, NLM has a responsibility to contribute to the development of technical methods and afford able collaborative strategies. Success will require collaboration with other libraries and a range of stake holders to develop the necessary technical standards, and scalable national and international approaches required to ensure permanent access. (see Goal 1)

Fundamental Information Research

Advances in computing, storage, and communications provide new opportunities for productive basic research in such medical informatics areas as data and knowledge capture, knowledge and concept representation, the marriage of expert and clinical information systems, medical natural language processing, indexing, and information retrieval, and integration of disparate information sources, including multi-media resources. Technical advances also enable research and development in Digital Libraries, including large scale image and multimedia databases. NLM should increase resources for extramural and intramural research in these areas. A major problem for research is how to build robust systems that tailor “just in time” answers to specific questions that occur to busy clinicians in the context of direct patient care. NLM should explore the potential of research and development in information systems that move beyond information retrieval to provide specific knowledge needed for clinical decision-making. A related research issue is how to help patients and families find information specific to their immediate health concerns. (see Goal 4)

Global Health Partnerships

 The increasing globalization of knowledge has made it clear that domestic and international functions of the NLM are not separable. The international mission of NLM is reaffirmed. NLM should implement the recommendations contained in the recently completed planning panel report, “A Global Vision for the National Library of Medicine.” In particular, the library should focus on establishing new partnerships to leverage its resources. It should also seek to improve the effectiveness of the international initiatives of others (e.g., health science centers and libraries, research funders, donor organizations, non-governmental organizations, etc.) through improved access to and use of new computer and information technology and knowledge management tools. It is important that NLM carefully select targets of opportunity for involvement in areas of the world where NLM can make a difference. (see Goal 3)

 

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Last updated: 18 March 2001
First published: 18 March 2001
Metadata| Permanence level: Permanent: Stable Content