Tag: Lothian Health Services Archive

News

Archive-based funded PhD, University of Edinburgh

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The University of Edinburgh School of Divinity invite applications for a funded (home / EU fees and living allowance) PhD studentship based on the archive of German-Jewish neurologist Dr Ernst Levin (1887 – 1975), held by Lothian Health Services Archive (LHSA), Centre for Research Collections (CRC), University of Edinburgh. The PhD would be based between the School of Divinity and the CRC.

This is an exciting opportunity for a fluent German-speaker with archival research skills to delve into an uncatalogued archive of personal and medical papers reflecting an individual’s intersection with a turbulent decade in Europe’s political and cultural history. As well as tracing a significant medical career, Levin’s archive outlines time in the military as an Assistant Surgeon in the First World War, his close personal relationships and his family’s friendships with prominent individuals in German culture, including those inside the ‘New Objectivity’ art movement. After the Nazi rise to power in 1933, Levin’s archive shows a family uprooted, gradually building new lives and careers in Scotland.

The application deadline is 31 March 2018. For more details (including how to apply), please see:

http://bit.ly/2D88Ec0

Archives

Upcoming History of Medicine events at the Festival of Creative Learning at The University of Edinburgh

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The Lothian Health Services Archive (LHSA) are holding two workshops as part of The Festival of Creative Learning at The University of Edinburgh (20th – 24th February).

On 20th and 22nd February, Samar Ziadat will be running workshops on ‘Making History’. Exploring the collections through a crafty zine-making sessions, we’ll be taking a closer look at the achievements of some notable but lesser-known women in our collections.

Sign up here:
Monday 20th February: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/making-history-a-feminist-cr…
Wednesday 22nd February: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/making-history-a-feminist-cr…

Also occurring during the festival, on 23rd and 24th February, Surgeons Hall will be hosting a history of medicine Wikipedia editathon. We’ll be working with librarians, archivists, academic colleagues and the University’s Wikimedian-in-Residence to improve the quality of articles about the history of medicine on Wikipedia.

Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/history-of-medicine-wikipedi…

You don’t need to be a dab hand at zine-making or a Wikipeida expert to get involved with either of these – the Festival of Creative Learning is all about trying something new. You can find out more about the full programme on the Festival website: http://www.festivalofcreativelearning.ed.ac.uk

News

Upcoming event: ‘Cracking the case note conundrum’ – Lothian Health Services Archive, Edinburgh, Wednesday 19th October 2016

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LHSA holds over one million patient case notes covering a wide variety of medical specialties. These folder-based case notes contain a range of documents relating to patient care, and can be a rich primary archival source for an array of historical, scientific and medical disciplines. Cataloguing such records, however, can be a difficult undertaking.

As part of the Centre for Research Collections’ exhibition Enhance, Access and Understand: The University of Edinburgh and the Wellcome Trust, archivist Louise Williams will explore how LHSA has overcome the challenges involved in cataloguing neurosurgical and tuberculosis case notes to realise the unique research potential of these two significant collections. This talk will take place on Wednesday 19 October from 12.30pm to 1pm, at the Centre for Research Collections, University of Edinburgh.

This event is free but places are limited – please visit the event page to sign up.

Meetings

Hosting HARG

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By Ruth Honeybone, Manager of the Lothian Health Archives

LHSA has been a member of the Health Archives and Records Group (HARG) for a long while, and today is the second time in five years that we’ve hosted their AGM. HARG is a group of archivists and records managers with responsibility for health records across the UK that come together a couple of times a year (usually once in London and once somewhere else!) to discuss shared issues and brief each other on changes in legislation and how they will impact on the records in our care. The membership is a bit wider than that though – anyone with an interest in health records and the history of medicine is welcome to join.

We were pleased to invite the group to the Centre for Research Collections for their ‘somewhere else’ meeting this year, and spent a really interesting and informative day with fellow professionals. Much of the discussion was around HARG’s brand new website: how we would like the site to look and what information we want to include to benefit those using it as much as possible (https://healtharchives.co.uk/). But it was also a chance to catch-up on others’ news and developments as well as share our own.

The afternoon concentrated on the Scottish perspective, and the group of us who look after NHS records in Scotland were able to introduce some of our work to ensure compliance with the Public Records (Scotland) Act and a conference we hope to run next year focusing on how NHS archives have been used in artwork and installations in Scottish hospitals to help patients and staff. Our Project Cataloguing Archivist, Aline, also talked about our case note cataloguing projects and there was time for those attending to take a behind the scenes tour and to have a look at our two current exhibitions, both of which draw heavily on the history of health and medicine (see our blog from 19 August for more info if you’d like to see them).

What kind of hosts would we be if we hadn’t made time for some lunch…?

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[This post originally appeared on the Lothian Health Services Archive blog, on 23 September 2016, http://lhsa.blogspot.co.uk/2016/09/hosting-harg.html]