Biblioteca Nacional de Ciencias de la Salud (National Library of Health Sciences) (BNCS)
HISTORY
The present day Biblioteca Nacional de Ciencias de la Salud (National Library of Health Sciences) dates back to 1994, when, coinciding with the 70th Anniversary of the Escuela Nacional de Sanidad (National School of Public Health), it was constituted as the Centralized Document Processing Unit for all departments of the Instituto de Salud Carlos III.
It was officially declared a National Centre on 2 August 1996 (Royal Decree 1893/1996), reporting organically and functionally to the Institute's Escuela Nacional de Sanidad. With effect from from 28 July 2000 (Royal Decree 809/2000), it reported to the Sub-DirectorateGeneral of Teaching Planning and Coordination, whose powers include the coordination of the Escuela Nacional de Sanidad and the Biblioteca Nacional de Ciencias de la Salud, which is responsible for the management and coordination of all the Institute's libraries.
The Sub-Directorate General for Cooperative Research Centres and Networks took over the management of the Biblioteca Nacional de Ciencias de la Salud from May 2005 (Royal Decree 590/2005) . Currently the Director of the Library is Elena Primo Peña.
FUNCTIONS
Servir de apoyo a las actividades científico-técnicas e investigadoras de los distintos Centros del Instituto de Salud Carlos III, del Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades y de la comunidad científica del Sistema Nacional de Salud. To maintain and update shared network systems that allow access to the resources of the libraries belonging to the National Health System. To maintain up-to-date databases of scientific documentation produced in Spain to facilitate access to the research work carried out by our scientific community and its dissemination. To conduct activities designed to establish programmes for cooperation with other institutions, in order to establish mechanisms that improve systems for the exchange of scientific data between Spanish libraries of health sciences and other national and international networks. To exercise surveillance of medical terminology, in collaboration with international organisations in the field of public health, in order to coordinate the use of new scientific terms. Cuantas acciones y estudios en materia de su competencia sean precisos como apoyo al Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades y a las Comunidades Autónomas. Support for and participation in its own teaching programmes and those of the different departments and units in the Escuela Nacional de Sanidad (ENS).
COLLECTIONS
It has a collection of 3,700 journals, 300 of which have current subscriptions in electronic format (5 of which are in paper format as well). The collection contains over 35,000 books, of which about 3,000 are publications from the historical section, all published before 1950 and including some unique originals, among which the complete collection of documents recording the constitution of the WHO is of special interest.
HEAD QUARTERS
Currently there are two sites:
Sede de Chamartín, que se encuentra en el edificio de la Escuela Nacional de Sanidad, que presta soporte bibliográfico a las actividades científicas y de investigación desarrolladas en las Centros de este Campus a la vez que ofrece apoyo de documentación a alumnos y profesores de la Escuela Nacional de Sanidad. This site also houses specialised funding dealing with cancer, donated in July of 2008 by the Fundación Científica Asociación Española Contra el Cáncer (Spanish Association Against Cancer Scientific Foundation). As of June 2013 this includes the funds specialised in Occupational Health from the National School of Occupational Medicine.Sede de Majadahonda, que presta apoyo científico en el campo de la Sanidad Ambiental, Bioinformática, Microbiología, Virología e Inmunología, entre otros.
PRODUCTS
Virtual Library on Health in Spain (BVS España): it manages and maintains the Virtual Health Library in Spain, integrated into one of the main International Networks for access to information on health sciences and the divulgation of scientific knowledge on the Internet. Its objective is to bring national and international information sources together in a single location, guaranteeing their reliability and the quality of their contents. SciELO Spain: it manages and maintains the SciELO Spain platform that includes Spanish health science magazines in full text and free access, thus promoting the divulgation of quality Spanish publications on helth sciences. This platform currently includes 51 Spanish magazines. Spanish Bibliographic Index of Health Sciences (IBECS): database that includes indexed literature of Spanish publications on medicine (including public health, health epidemiology and administration), pharmacy, veterinary medicine, dentistry, psychology and nursing. The publications included are selected on the basis of quality criteria previously established by a Technical Committee. Currently indexing 209 magazine titles. LIS España, healthy places: search engine specialised in health sites available on the Internet selected using quality criteria. It provides a description of the content of the sites and internet links to them. The quality criteria used for the evaluation and selection of the sites undeniably add value, since only impartial, reliable resources whose origin is known are included. This tool provides more accurate results for searches concerning health than other existing internet portals, making it easier for users to locate and retrieve information. LIS Spain has two health sites versions Healthy spaces for professionals and Healthy spaces for citizens. IBSST: Since 2002, the BNCS has worked with the International Occupational Safety and Health Information Centre/International Labour Organization (CIS-ILO), continuing the cooperation which began over 30 years ago and acting as the national centre for the CIS in Spain. Las líneas de colaboración establecidas se basan en la traducción al español de la base de datos CISDOC y su volcado en la base de datos "Índice Bibliográfico de Salud y Seguridad en el Trabajo" accesible a través de la BVS España. This Index currently contains the records included in CISDOC from 2001 to 2010.
COLABORACIONES
La BNCS se constituye desde 1999 como Centro coordinador de la The Virtual Health Library in Spain, BVS in collaboration with the Latin-American Centre and the Caribbean Centre of Health Sciences (BIREMEformerly the Regional Medicine Library) of the Pan-American Health Organisation - World Health Organisation (OPS/WHO).
The BNCS has been appointed Strategic Centre for Pan-American Health Organization - World Health Organization (PAHO-WHO) publications, thus becoming a key centre for the institution's official publications in Spain.
It is a CIS centre in Spain International Occupation Safety and Health Information Centre of the ILO (International Labour Organization).
Since 2003, the BNCS (National Library of Health Science) is the agency governing the translation into Spanish of new terms that the NLM (National Library of Medicine) identifies, maintains and reviews those terms currently contained in the DeCS (Health Sciences Descriptors), the thesaurus managed by BIREME, that feeds the UMLS (Unified Medical Language System), an international dictionary that gathers medical terms and concepts from more than 50 biomedical vocabularies and classifications.