On 6 November, NHS library assistants from across England took part in ‘Sip, Share, Spark’, a virtual meeting to mark KNOWvember with lightning talks and Randomised Coffee Trials.
KNOWvember is an annual campaign by NHS Knowledge and Library Services nationally to promote knowledge mobilisation: making sure the right knowledge gets to the right people at the right time, so that they can make better decisions and spark positive change. Randomised Coffee Trials are a tongue-in-cheek twist on Randomised Controlled Trials where two or three people are paired up for a relaxed chat over their beverage of choice (make that a decaf for me, thanks!).
I had volunteered to give a lightning talk about my experience of working with an online repository in the form of the West Midlands Evidence Repository (WMER) (soon to get a new name – but more on that later). WMER is a platform that showcases publications and grey literature by authors based at our Trusts. Authors can send their own work to us to be uploaded, and we also run monthly sweeps of various databases to make sure we catch as many new journal articles and other works as possible when they appear.
“They found that information because I put it there.”
For my talk, I shared a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into managing the repository. From metadata tagging to open access publishing, I spoke about how repositories like WMER can help a wider audience find grey literature that might otherwise be hidden or lost. I touched on the upcoming merger of WMER and the East Midlands Evidence Repository (EMER) to form a new combined resource. I also mentioned the benefit of discoverability via the NHS Knowledge and Library Hub, and how AI tools like Microsoft Copilot are making some of the work, like formatting citations, slightly less onerous. Be it uploading a report or poster that can’t be found anywhere else, or giving healthcare colleagues access to a copyright-friendly version of that article that’s stuck behind a paywall, our work helps ensure that key decision-makers can access the evidence they need, with potential for real impact on patient care. As I said in the talk, there’s a quiet pride in knowing: “They found that information because I put it there.”
There were three speakers in total, including colleagues from NHS England and Gloucestershire Hospitals, who gave great talks on After Action Reviews and Randomised Coffee Trials. Each of us had five minutes, followed by a lively Q&A session. The group was enthusiastic and asked more questions than we could cover live, so I was glad of the chance to follow up by email afterwards.
Lightning talks over, we were assigned to breakout rooms for our own Randomised Coffee Trials. I found this part really valuable – a chance to meet colleagues across the country, swap ideas and share challenges. All in all, I’d highly recommend this and other Communities of Practice as a brilliant way to network, learn and collaborate.
This post was edited with generative AI assistance from Microsoft Copilot.