Assessing the Effectiveness of eTOC alerts in the Dissemination of Newly Published Literature in a Child and Adolescent Mental Health Specialist Library

ABSTRACT

This article describes an example of one librarian’s approach to academic literature dissemination, that of regular ‘electronic Table of Contents’ alerts (eTOCs) and examines its impact on the frequency of journal article access by a cohort of professionals working in a community based child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS). Weekly journal-specific eTOCs were sent to all health professionals (N = 90) and direct links to the full-text articles published in the latest edition of a selection of library subscribed journals (N = 13) were provided. Using tracking statistics available from publishers, article access was compared for a 1-year period before and after to assess the impact of eTOCs. The results demonstrate the efficacy of eTOCs as a means of increasing access to newly published literature of interest to the mental health professionals. Rates of journal access may also be relevant to budgetary planning and justification (or not) for ongoing subscriptions. Further research, planned by the authors, is necessary to establish whether increased access is linked with increased readership, and ultimately improved clinical decision making.

KEYWORDS:

• eTOCs
• journal alerts
• RSS