A member of staff at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has co-authored a book chapter set to be published later this year.
The book is entitled “Strategic Collaborations in Health Sciences Libraries” and looks at the positive reasons to collaborate in health sciences libraries and encourages mutually beneficial collaborations to form.
Tracey Pratchett, Knowledge and Library Services Manager at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals has co-authored a chapter within the book about her work co-leading the MAP community.
The chapter is entitled ‘Finding our way without a road MAP: Cultivating a UK-wide community of practice.’ MAP is a community which helps frontline NHS library staff to demonstrate the impact of their services. MAP keeps members informed about current NHS drivers, hot topics and policies and offers a forum to share good (and bad) ideas.
The chapter explores Tracey and the team’s approach to a community of practice to share learning and includes reflections on the benefits of communities of practice from an individual and group perspective. It also explores the impact of this project on the wider health library community.
Tracey said: “This chapter is about my role as joint lead of the MAP community of practice, working with a network of librarians to share learning and demonstrate the value and impact of NHS library services.” “Involvement in this project has been great for our organisation as it has raised our profile nationally and provided opportunities for me to shape library services that are aligned to our organisational priorities. Personally it has been invaluable, enabling me to work with librarians across the country, with loads of opportunities to learn from others.”
