The Access Services staff is comprised of seven paraprofessional team members and is primarily responsible for providing user services such as circulation, group study room reservations, patron registration, and ready reference service at the library’s main service desk, the HUB and other designated service points, which include the ground floor helpdesk.  This staff also maintains the library’s print collections of books, journals, and other media, which comprises several floors of the library.  For more information regarding services provided at Lister Hill Library please call 205-975-HUB1.

The Cataloging staff is responsible for creating and updating records in the catalog for print and electronic resources for LHL, Reynolds Historical Library, LHL @ University Hospital, and Sparkman Library at Huntsville. The Unit also manages Course Reserves. Cataloging handles processing and preservation of materials for LHL and manages the Leisure Reading collection. Donations for the Leisure Reading collection are always welcome. Call 934-2461 for more information.

Community Services staff are focused on library connections to and services for the larger community outside of UAB. As part of that goal, we partner with a number of local, regional and national organizations to improve access to reliable, current health information and services for Alabama residents. Some primary examples include:

• Health InfoNet of Alabama – An award-winning consumer health information service of the state’s medical and public libraries. Formed initially as a partnership between Lister Hill Library and the Jefferson County public libraries in 1999 (now statewide), this program features training workshops for public library staff and consumers, backup reference service for consumer health questions by the medical libraries in the partnership, and a database of Alabama health services on the Health InfoNet web site (www.healthinfonet.org).
• Healthy Spirit – A partnership between Health InfoNet and Congregations for Public Health, Inc., to address health disparities by improving access to and understanding of health information through local church health ministries.

For more information, contact Kay Hogan Smith at 934-2208 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

The department’s main purpose is to acquire the latest life sciences and biomedical content and organize it in an easy to use health information collection using the latest technologies to facilitate scholarly research.    The units within Content Management specialize in managing materials through the Library’s online catalog, electronic resource management system, and establishing links directly from the citation databases to scholarly publications.  Given the immediate impact and convenience of the electronic format, the department procures scholarly, peer-reviewed, materials that are accessible online.  Working collegially with other Library units, the department contributes content by scanning unique documents housed in the Reynolds Historical Library and UAB Archives, and makes this collection available on the University’s institutional repository.  The units participate in consortia arrangements with other institutions of higher education to broaden collection access.  The department is proactive in conserving the rich and varied print collections housed in Lister Hill Library and making sure these materials remain available for future generations.

• Librarian-Mediated Database Searching

• Library users may also request a librarian-mediated computer search on their topic. Trained librarians will conduct a database search on any one of the several hundred databases available for online searching. A web request form is also available. Call (205) 934-2230 for more information.

• Educational Services

• Lister Hill Library offers a number of different classes and services in retrieving and managing health information. These include library tours, orientations, information retrieval seminars for particular subject specialties and databases, Internet classes, and consultations on special information needs. Seminars or hands-on workshops may be requested and customized for specific groups. Call (205) 934-2230 or come by the HUB for more information.