Trout Library Blog

Over the last month, the Trout Library website at Harcum College underwent a redesign. Like many library websites, it had grown over time with new content and updates added to meet changing needs. While the site contained valuable information, the organization and structure no longer aligned with how users were interacting with it. Although functional, the website benefited from a refreshed approach—one that would make tasks easier and create a more user-friendly experience.

The website is built on LibGuides, a platform widely used by academic libraries. While LibGuides has some design constraints, it offers enough flexibility to make necessary improvements. The goal was not a complete overhaul but rather to implement practical adjustments that would enhance navigation and better highlight key resources. The layout was streamlined by organizing content into clear sections: Library Services, Ask a Librarian, and Request Forms. Emphasis was placed on the resources most used by students and faculty such as the research databases, library guides, and request forms.

Updates to the website were also made to improve its mobile responsiveness and overall usability. While there is always room for further improvement, these changes aimed to create a more user-friendly experience. Feedback from library staff, students, and faculty played an important role in guiding the redesign of the website. Their input influenced decisions about layout, navigation, and which resources to highlight—making sure the updated website reflects the needs of the Harcum community.

The library website will continue to evolve with ongoing updates based on user feedback. This recent redesign represents a step toward making the library’s online presence more user-friendly, accessible, and aligned with how students and faculty engage with library resources.

The updated website can be viewed here: https://harcum.libguides.com/troutlibrary 

EBSCOhost has just released a browser extension that makes it easier than ever to connect to full-text materials.  EBSCOhost Passport browser extension shows you when the material is available in full text when you are searching on virtually any web page where DOIs are present. This means when you are searching on PubMed or Google Scholar, you'll see an icon that will allow you to click through to the full text if it is available via the Charles H. Trout Library. 

The browser extension is currently only available for Chrome but more browser extensions are coming soon. To install the browser extension, visit the Chrome web store listing. Click Add to Chrome. Search for Harcum College when prompted to select your institution. If prompted for a password, see our one-minute video on how to access passwords.  

Once the extension is installed, just search PubMed, Google Scholar, or the web as you normally would. When an article is available in our EBSCOhost databases, you'll see an icon alerting you that the material is available. Simply click on the icon and the full text will open in a new tab. 

When searching in PubMed and Google Scholar there will be an additional more results icon near the search box that will show additional results available in EBSCOhost 

To learn more about EBSCOhost Passport and how to install it, click here.

Happy searching! If you need assistance with your research, please reach out to us!

With the last month of the semester approaching, many of you are likely working on major papers and projects. I thought that this would be a good time to review what plagiarism entails and the importance of citing your sources properly.

Plagiarism is using the words, thoughts, or ideas of someone else without giving credit. It can take many forms and can be intentional or accidental. Below are some guidelines to follow:

• Quoting an author's exact words often strengthens your argument. When you do so, you must provide a citation for the source of those words immediately after the quotation.
• Sometimes you will paraphrase an author's words using your own words and phrasing. You must still provide a citation when you paraphrase in order to avoid plagiarism. So as not to plagiarize accidentally, you should compare your paraphrased writing with the author's exact words to make sure you have not copied phrases or sentences from the author​ without stating that you have done so.
• The original source must be cited even if the borrowed information is used for different purposes from those intended in the original source. If you organize your ideas in the same way in which an author organized his or her ideas, cite the source of the organizational scheme.
• Information drawn from personal communications, speeches, conversations, interviews and other spoken words must be documented with a citation.
• If multiple students write a paper as a collaborative group project, one of the authors cannot submit or reuse the paper for another assignment. Any information borrowed from a paper that you write collaboratively should include citations for the information taken from the original paper.
• Information that is commonly known by the public or the intended readers of a paper does not need to be cited. The general rule is that if you can find the information in at least five separate sources, a citation is not necessary. However, if you are not sure whether an idea is common knowledge, use caution and cite the source.

Five different citation styles are used at Harcum: APA (American Psychological Association), MLA (Modern Language Association), ASA (American Sociological Association), AMA (American Medical Association), and NLM (National Library of Medicine). APA is generally used in the social sciences with ASA being specific to sociology. MLA would be used in English courses and some of the humanities. MLA and NLM are used in the health sciences.

Typically a brief in-text citation is included at the end of a directly quoted or paraphrased comment in a paper, and a full citation is then listed in the References or Works Cited page at the end of the paper. Each citation format is different in terms of the placement of information as well as the rules regarding the use of italics, punctuation, capitalization, and whether to use a hanging indent. Ask your instructor or consult your syllabus to determine which style to use for your paper.

The Library has print manuals for each style on reserve behind the front desk. You may also consult our Cite Sources guide for tips and examples. Purdue OWL is another good resource to use for citation help. In addition, we created modules as a non-credit course in Canvas called Information Literacy & Library Resources. These are quick PowerPoint presentations and ungraded quizzes that are available for you in order to review and test your understanding and knowledge of each citation format used at Harcum. The PowerPoints are also available in the Information Literacy library guide, which you may access under the Getting Started menu on the Library's homepage.

If you have any questions about citations or any other research matter, please reach out to us. You may visit us in person during the posted Library hours, send an email to library@harcum.edu, use our chat service when it is available, or call us at 610-526-6085.

This week we are going to profile a library database that would be especially useful to students in the Dental programs at Harcum: Lexicomp for Dentistry. This database will provide you with drug information that you may need for your studies and your career. In it you will find tools to help answer prescribing, diagnosis and treatment questions, with dental-specific pharmacology on prescription drugs, over-the-counter medications, and natural products. Although this version of Lexicomp contains material that is focused on the needs of people in the dental profession, students in other Allied Health programs should be able to find useful information in this database as well.

To access Lexicomp for Dentistry, click on the Databases icon under Quick Links on the Library’s homepage. This will bring you to an alphabetical list of all of our databases. Scroll down to Lexicomp and select it. Since Lexicomp is a subscription database, you will need to enter a username and password if you are off campus. To find this information, log into Harcum Hatch and you will see a purple icon for Library Database Passwords on the righthand side of the bottom row. Click on this icon and choose the username and password for Lexicomp.

To do a drug search in Lexicomp, simply enter the name of the drug into the search box, click on the blue search button, and then click on the link under Dental Lexi-Drugs in the upper left-hand corner of the resulting screen. You will be brought to a screen that contains a Dental Lexi-Drugs monograph record, the main record in the database. The following are some features of a Dental Lexi-Drugs monograph record:

• Brand names
• Generic availability
• Pharmacologic category
• Use, including off-label if applicable
• Allergy considerations
• Adverse reactions
• Effects on dental treatment and on bleeding
• Dosing for various categories of patients
• Pregnancy and breastfeeding considerations

The following is an image of the top portion of the Dental Lexi-Drugs record for Penicillin G Procaine (You would scroll down to view the rest of the record):

As you can see in the blue bar and hyperlinks across the top of the record, Lexicomp contains a number of other useful features. Some include:

• Drug alerts and interactions
• Drug I.D. (Enter characteristics of an unknown drug to help identify it.)
• Drug images
• Adult and pediatric patient education (Answers common questions patients may ask)
• Various types of calculators, including those for dosage and unit conversion
• Toxicology of substances

More detailed instruction on the contents and use of Lexicomp for Dentistry can be found in our video database tutorial. Choose Database Tutorials under Quick Links on the Library’s homepage and then select Lexicomp.

Remember that if you have questions about this resource or any other, please don’t hesitate to ask us. You may visit the Library during the hours posted on the Library's homepage, email us at library@harcum.edu, or call us at 610-526-6085.

Google Scholar is a popular search engine for scholarly sources. It can be frustrating though when you cannot immediately view the full text of an article. You can add more full-text results to Google Scholar by connecting Google Scholar to Harcum College Trout Library resources to access material available from our databases. Follow the steps below to configure Google Scholar. 

Go to Google Scholar on your device. Click on the menu icon on the top left of the screen and select Settings. 

In the Settings menu, select Library Links. Use the search box to search for Harcum College. 

Put a checkmark in the box in front of Harcum College/Trout Library - Available from Library, then click Save. It is important to note here that this setting uses your browser's cookies to remember your new library links. If you clear your browser cookies, you will have to set this up again. 

Go back to the Google Scholar search page and try a search. Your search results will now show you when the full text of an article is available through the Harcum College Trout Library. Notice in the screen capture below that you will see links with the words Available from Library. These links will take you to the full text of the article when it is available from the Trout Library. Click directly on the Available from Library links to be directed to the full text. 

An additional note: You will still need to input the passwords to the databases when prompted. Those passwords are located in your Harcum Hatch. Look for the Library Database Passwords icon (see below) in Harcum Hatch. 

Happy searching! If you need assistance with your research, please reach out to us!