A Health Library for Holyoke, MA

NOTE: This section of the website documents the early years (2000...2001...2002...) of our project.
We invite you to visit our new homepage at www.holyokehealth.info

Vision
Models
Needs
Locations
Scope
Funding
Web
About us

 

The vision

We envision a comfortable, easily accessible, community space where Holyoke residents could drop-in and find helpful information about health issues and medical problems of concern to them. The information should be in an accessible language (Spanish, English, or other) and style (layman's terms rather than medical jargon; appropriate reading levels). Information resources would include a physical collection (books, pamphlets, videos), Internet resources (links to selected health-related websites), and trained staff helpful in connecting people to the information they seek.

Learning from Models of health libraries elsewhere

The vision described above is possible; such health libraries for consumers already exist in a variety of other locations:

Assessing Holyoke's needs

What aspects, if any, of these external models would be appropriate for Holyoke? What special needs do we have in Holyoke? What health information services already exist here?
  • City of Holyoke website (www.holyoke.org) includes list of local health services
  • Holyoke, Massachusetts (Commonwealth of Massachusetts community profile)
  • Massachusetts Community Health Information Profile (MassCHIP)

    Envisioning possible locations in Holyoke

    Since late February 2000, when the idea for a Holyoke Health Library was raised by Sandy Ward in a phone conversation with the Mayor, many people have been consulted and a wide range of related ideas generated. The question of LOCATION is often mentioned. Options mentioned so far include the following:
    1. former Epstein's Furniture building, Dwight & Maple Streets (as part of Holyoke Health Center's Phase II expansion plans)
    2. storefront on High Street next to City Hall, formerly Salvation Army Thrift Store
    3. Holyoke Hospital (perhaps in connection with their Medical Library or their patient education program, or both).
    4. Holyoke Public Library (no space currently, but perhaps as a future branch? or expansion?)
    5. mobile options, outreach to housing units, elderly, youth groups
    6. Holyoke Mall, Ingleside
    7. virtual only: a website accessible from many locales
    8. Nuestras Raices, 329 Main St, corner of Cabot (200 sq.ft. room for future Agricultural Library could include health information and become a pilot site for our Health Library project).
    9. South Street Plaza
    10. Open Square, 383 Dwight St. (in conjunction with massage therapist and other alternative health practicioners)
    11. Mercy Women’s Health Center (formerly Providence PreNatal), 317 Maple Street (in conjuction with teen pregnancy and parenting program)
    12. El Mercado, 314 Main St (under construction) - Nueva Esperanza.
    13. Nueva Esperanza building at Cabot and Main.

    Multiple locations are possible, and might be desirable. We can envision a future network of Holyoke health information services, virtual and real, serving people in many locales. The Stanford Health Library, for instance, started in 1989 as one small storefront at a mall and now has branches. The Planetree Health library in San Jose, CA, has four branches now (one added in 2001).

    Defining the scope of specific projects

  • Pilot project: Nuestras Raices has offered space (location H above) for a small library.
  • Holyoke Health Center: we imagine a consumer health library included in Phase 2 of the HHC's renovation plan (location A above); we will need to define space requirements, equipment and furniture requirements, collection content, network connections, staffing, annual operating costs, etc. and make a proposal to HHC.
  • Mercy Women’s Health Center, Maple Street: possible branch location. In 2002 Mercy secured a small grant that includes purchasing some health library materials and teaching Internet workshops to pregnant and parenting teens.

    Funding and Sponsorship options; Agencies and Organizations

    Here are some agencies and organizations that might be helpful in supporting the health library concept for Holyoke:

    Web-based resources

    See our new website launched October 2002: www.holyokehealth.info

    It includes a section of websites in Spanish and a long list of multilingual sites.

    About Us

    Who are we? A group of volunteers, including Sandy Ward (Holyoke resident and Science Librarian at Mount Holyoke College), Maria Pagan (Director of Holyoke Public Library), Chris Lapon (Holyoke Health Center), Kathleen McDonough (Holyoke Community College librarian), Judy Atkin (Mercy Women's Health Center), and others. We have incorporated as Holyoke Consumer Health Library, Inc., a non-profit organization. Want to join us? Or add your comments and suggestions? Please email sward @ mtholyoke.edu. We invite you to join us.

    Progress Reports

    This webpage is maintained by Sandy Ward.
    Last updated: April 23, 2004
    [March 2007: Many links were modified or removed as this page was moved from the mhc site to our current website (into directory marked “oldsite”) for historical purposes.]