RE: Fascinating quotation

["Lora L. Thompson" <librarylora@yahoo.com>]

OK, I'll jump in too.

As the director of a teaching hospital library, two years ago I cancelled
50% of our print collection in order to fund electronic resources that
were much needed and demanded by our customers.  This was done in a
thoughtful way and nothing that was embargoed more than a month in the
databases was cancelled.
 
We have added back in a few titles that our customers like to browse, but
all in all, it has been a successful transition.  And yes, we do use
EBSCOHost.
 
Lora :-)

David Goodman <David.Goodman@liu.edu> wrote:
Dear Mark,

You would have us believe that medical libraries never discontinue
periodicals, and, if they did, availability elsewhere would not be a
factor.

First, even for a truly first rate medical library like Cornell there are
presumably some biomedicine related journals which you do not get, and for
which you rely on document delivery, from, among other places, the nlm. 
Unless there is a sharp discriminating factor between the worthwhile and
the worthless rather than an imperceptible transition, there must also be
a few journals of about the same importance to which you do subscribe. I
wonder if you mean you would not drop even the most scientifically
insignificant biomedical journal if 90% of its articles were CERTAINLY
available on line at the nlm?

Second, there are many fields of some relation to medicine at least
occasionally. A journal on the subject of bioethics, say, which you would
certainly get, might have any article referring to any imaginable major or
minor journal in philosophy. Surely you collect only the more important
philosophy titles, not them all, and would discontinue them much more
readily than titles in medicine, and availability elsewhere would be one
ofthe factors.

Third, I think the same argument you make also applies to key libraries of
major international status in their own subject fields. Chemistry
librarians regard their subject and its journals to be every bit as
important as you view medicine. They too will not discontinue anything
nontrivial in their central area until it becomes available otherwise--
then, there is a level of low use and quality that they will consider. 
Further, just as philosophy is a subject of secondary importance to you,
medicine might be a very secondary subject to them.

Finally, I can offer you direct proof that some medical research libraries
would discontinue some medical titles. They already have. All faculty in
medical schools do research, but there are many medical schools supported
by a considerably smaller library than yours. They, obviously, do not
subscribe to some of the biomedical titles that you subscribe to.

Dr. David Goodman
dgoodman@liu.edu