This is an article describing a practice reference interview for a consumer health librarianship course that I am taking this semester at SJSU. Since there is overalap with the medical field, I decided to use Vancouver Citation Style rather than APA.

When approaching the reference interview exercise, my partner and I both felt a bit of anxiety and uncertainty as to how to begin. The artificial situation felt contrived, but in many ways it mirrored real life in a way that would not have been possible in a face-to-face classroom. We had not spoken in person before and we both came up with our scenarios independently. Interestingly, we both picked situations where the librarian was helping the user find information about a family member’s condition.

I was the information seeker first and was looking for help understanding a cancer diagnosis. D–. asked really thorough questions including how I was planning to use the information, for my own knowledge, or to explain the diagnosis to my family member. She also had some bibliographic instruction for me, suggesting I use Wikipedia to identify different types of cancer. She deferred my question about heritability to my doctor, which was the right thing to do.

I received a really nice email with an attachment with resources listed in it. Some of them were what we discussed on the phone and some she searched for after our conversation. They included screen shots and were nicely laid out. D–. was really compassionate as well; she conveyed a lot of warmth and sympathy both on the phone and in her correspondence.

I am not sure if I conveyed the same amount of concern or not, it was hard for me to tell due to nervousness. The patient in question was an elderly person; my partner was pretending to be her daughter. I wish I had incorporated some different questions into the “script” I was going to use to narrow down the query. For example, I wish I had asked what her exact age was (I think I just forgot), and then followed up with some questions about mobility level and any other conditions that she might have.

It was an interesting query since the intended patient had not been to a doctor in several years and hence was not diagnosed. I did stress that it was important to get a diagnosis, so I included links to several geriatric specialists as well as some resources than addressed the specific concerns, which were bereavement and depression.

The biggest challenge for me with this assignment was not having much experience with reference interviews in general. I can see where having a standardized form, like the one in our textbook[1] on page 103, and similar in nature to a medical intake form, would be helpful due to the exacting nature of medical information.

 

[1] Spatz M. The Medical Library Association Guide to Providing Consumer and Patient Health Information. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield; 2014.