Outreach News

Internet Grateful Med - An Imminent Demise

For those of you familiar with Internet Grateful Med (IGM), we have sad news to report. IGM is due to officially retire in September, 2001. Since April 1996, IGM has been providing free access to the National Library of Medicine's (NLM) MEDLINE database as well as 14 other NLM collections.

How did this wonderful system come to be? In 1986, NLM recognized that many health professionals, particularly those in rural areas, needed access to the biomedical journal literature, but were without a medical library. To answer this need, the Grateful Med (GM) software was born. GM was created to enable health professionals to put together a search strategy offline and then dial up the computers at NLM, run the search, and pull down all pertinent references from the MEDLINE database. Users could then use the Loansome Doc feature of GM to order the full text of articles they needed from distant medical libraries.

The growth of the Internet lead to the Internet Grateful Med version, which was free to not only health professionals, but also the general public. Since 1997, anyone with an Internet connection has been able to access NLM's databases free of charge. PubMed, another NLM search system, has grown in conjunction with IGM and has replaced IGM for MEDLINE access. PubMed also offers the Loansome Doc service. NLM is currently transferring data from the following databases into other systems. When completed, NLM's Gateway will provide one-stop shopping for searching NLM's various information systems including PubMed and LOCATORplus, NLM's online catalog. Links to the individual systems such as TOXNET and PubMed are also available on the Gateway homepage. All information originally found on IGM will be accessible at NLM's Gateway. Please see the January-February issue of the UAMS Library News for information on using NLM's Gateway at: http://www.library.uams.edu/newsletter
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Below is a list of databases on IGM and where they currently link users:

If you currently use IGM for MEDLINE access, we strongly encourage you to move to PubMed now. If you would like training in how to use PubMed, please see the class schedule below. Training is free and open to all health care professionals in Arkansas. If you cannot attend training, a tutorial is available on the PubMed site at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PubMed/. Based on NLM's current timeline, as of September 2001, Internet Grateful Med will no longer be available.

If you have any questions regarding this transition or would like additional information on training classes, please contact: Susan Steelman, MLIS - Coordinator of Outreach Services, UAMS Library, 501-686-6737 or email: SteelmanSusanC@uams.edu.