Academic Health Sciences Libraries' Outreach and Engagement with Native American Communities: A Scoping Review

Objectives: A lack of equity in access to health information and low health literacy contribute to overall poor health outcomes for underserved populations. Among those underserved populations, Native Americans face significant health disparities. In order to bridge those gaps, there is an increased need for academic health sciences libraries to reach underserved communities to help provide health information and to improve health literacy. In this project, we seek to identify trends and themes in how academic health sciences libraries have supported community engagement and outreach with Native American communities. We seek to learn about and share culturally relevant effective practices.

Methods: We will conduct a scoping review using Arksey and O’Malley’s methodological framework and guidance from Joanna Briggs’ Manual for Scoping Reviews. Our search strategy will include exploration of 8 databases (ERIC, Education Research Complete, Academic Search Complete, LISA, LISTA, E-LIS, MEDLINE, Native Health Database); searching of unpublished literature, select journals, and conference abstracts; and information gathering from conversations with librarians and community partners. Librarians and partners will be sought through messages to the AAHSL listserv, the New Mexico Library Association listserv, the Border Regional Library Association listserv, the SCC MLA listserv, and MEDLIB-L. Organizational output, especially from Native American-focused organizations and programs, will be included. The searching will be conducted iteratively. Initial searches will be conducted with planned keywords and hedges. Search hedges from University of Alberta will be adapted to include appropriate terminology for indigenous Native American populations included in this review. Citations will be managed with Zotero. Data will be screened in duplicate using Covidence. Key themes will be qualitatively identified, geographic location will be mapped, and data on efficacy, evaluation criteria and sustainability will be extracted when present.

Results: The research is not yet completed; full results will be presented at MLA.

Conclusions: The research is not yet completed; full results will be presented at MLA.