Layla Salem Albraiki has completed a medical librarian fellowship under the auspices of the Harvard Medical School Dubai Center (HMSDC) Institute for Postgraduate Education and Research and the Maktoum Harvard Medical Library.

The fellowship brought Layla, a UAE national, to Boston, where she was exposed to a number of local libraries, including Harvard Medical School’s Countway Library and the patient and family education libraries at HMS affiliates. Her goal was to learn more about the processes and resources that support successful libraries. She was impressed by the quality of the hospital libraries, noting that she saw firsthand how patients and their families were “health consumers eager to learn more about the medical conditions affecting their lives.”

She added, “In the UAE, patients also want to know more about their conditions, but they seem to depend only on the doctors and the nurses, and few realize that a medical librarian can also play a great role in health education.”

Layla said that the development of the Maktoum Harvard Medical Library in HMSDC will fill a critical need in the UAE and help patients to better educate themselves. “Internet and web resources are one option, but there is no guarantee that the information available on these sites is valid and reliable. A librarian may be the best person in this situation to contact.”

Construction on the Maktoum Harvard Medical Library began earlier this year, and it is expected to be completed in 2007. In the meantime HMSDC is working to educate medical librarians who will be needed to staff the new library.

“It is a great step taken by the Dubai Government and Harvard Medical School Dubai Center to open this library in Dubai and give this wonderful opportunity to UAE nationals to be an active participant to run such a fabulous place,” she said. “I hope to be a part of Harvard Medical School Dubai Center in the future and serve my country.”

Layla earned a bachelor’s degree in health information management from Sharjah Women’s College, part of the Higher Colleges of Technology. To learn more about fellowships offered by HMSDC, including studies in medical library science, please visit the Fellowships section of the HMSDC website.

July 2006