This year’s Medical Library Association’s (MLA) conference was held in Pittsburgh from April 29 – May 2 and gathered 720 in-person and 175 virtual attendees. Although this was the 127th meeting of the MLA, it was the first time convening in the oh so appropriate city of Pittsburgh where virologist Jonas Salk developed one of the first successful polio vaccines at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine just up the Allegheny River from the David Lawrence Conference Center. The MLA serves medical, health science, and corporate librarians who are primarily involved in evidence synthesis research and evidence-based practice instruction. With a particular focus on recent executive orders threatening the execution of crucial research and the dissemination of past research results both supported by librarians and ultimately impacting health outcomes, this year’s content seemed more poignant than in the last four years of my attendance.

Favorite Sessions

As one of those health science librarians with goals related to evidence-based instruction and support, the sessions I attended revolved around evidence synthesis service planning and project management. Here are just a few:

• Innovation Instruction: Teaching a Systematic Review Lesson through Candy Sorting
• Standards for Working with Research Librarians on Systematic Reviews (SWiRL-SR)
• Anything you can do, AI can do better… or can it? Comparing ChatGPT’s Search Strategy Outputs with Cochrane Review Searches

Additionally, I couldn’t leave out my health literacy instruction and research goals with these few more sessions:

• Exploring Health Insurance Literacy Research: Personal vs. Organizational
• Bridging the Gap Between Submissions: Impact of Librarian Feedback on First-Year Medical Student Research Assignments
• Making Thinking Visible: Using Thinking Routines to Promote Critical Thinking Skills in Health Science Students

Lastly, I have to include an honorable mention of Jen Ostrosky with JoVE for hosting the lunch and learn The Power of Partnerships: Achieving Great Reach, Relevance and Resilience. Here Jen along with a panel of health science librarians and administrators compared partnerships with collaborations and detailed experiences and best practices when working with vendors, faculty, and the community. This was a sales-pitch free event that provided a great reprieve from content heavy sessions.

Colleen’s Contributions

I presented a lightning talk which included some preliminary data from my High School Health Literacy Pilot Project and a poster introducing a new ZSR library course: LIB290 Advanced Library Research in Medical Literature scheduled for Fall 2025.

Also, as a 2022 MLA Research Training Institute (RTI) graduate and 2024 Peer Coach, I attended this year’s RTI poster session and finally met some of my working group team members in person. During the session, the first 27 awardees of the Research Training Institute Fellows (RTIF) were announced – and I made the list! Recipients of this distinction have completed the RTI program, completed their RTI project, and published their research within five years of that completion.

Looking forward to MLA 2026 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin!