Iveta Lewis
Iveta Lewis has been a library and archives manager at Holland Bloorview Hospital since 2020. She is very familiar with the health sciences librarianship context from the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of Toronto, and as a solo librarian at North York General Hospital. One of her most gratifying projects was setting up a children's library for the 519 Community Centre in Toronto. She served at the Health Sciences Information Consortium (HSIC) Management Board from 2020 -2022. She has been an active Council member of the Ontario Health Library and Information Association since 2021. At Holland Bloorview, her mission is to integrate and promote the library’s services to all departments and programs. She represents the library and collaborates with the Holland Bloorview IDEAA committee and Bioethics Forum. She is very passionate about constructing literature searches and thinks of herself as a detective when she finds what a patron is looking for. She was awarded a prestigious Joan Leishmann Award of Merit in 2023 for her outstanding contributions to library realm.
Session
INTRODUCTION
While fundamental in other disciplines, marketing skills appear unfamiliar to hospital librarians for many reasons. The purpose of this project is to demonstrate that a hospital library does not need massive budgets to promote services. I will show that hospital librarians can painlessly market their services to create partnerships and uphold their values.
DESCRIPTION
When I started at the Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation hospital library in the thick of 2020, I realized I had an unsurmountable task ahead to unveil the invisibility of the library. I will share tips on marketing a hospital library through the journey from nebulous novice marketer to eventually building a modest marketing plan.
DISCUSSION
Working from home during the pandemic hiatus, the library's spotlight had dimmed but there
was actually a plethora of opportunities to take advantage of. I will illustrate how the pandemic ignited the promotion engine where library projects were bouncing off each other; from providing a library space as a vaccination clinic to collaborating with labs, to creating events for the IDEAA program, and to designing an exhibition for the hospital's anniversary.
OUTCOMES
From the library being in a fog in 2020 to now, our library's services profile has soared exponentially. Not only does the library continue to maintain its traditional essential services, but it has also introduced many innovative ones, such as the lending devices from our research labs. It is evident that promoting library services is doable even without formal training, and achieved instead with indispensable passion to seize the day.