Infomed

History

Infomed started in 1992 as a project to interconnect the information centers and the medical libraries in Cuba, and it is today a network with national reach. The project has received awards and international recognition, in particular the Stockholm Challenge Award in 2002.

It is a network of people and institutions that share the purpose of facilitating access to information and knowledge to improve the health of the Cuban people and other people of the World, by intensive and creative use of the information and communication technologies.

The first international steps of this network were participating in a project of the Pan-American Health Organization and the National Library of Medicine of the USA to access MEDLINE with the help of e-mail through the project BITNIS. The network started as an initiative of the Medical Sciences Information National Center, that was founded in 1965 to take care of the information needs of doctors and other health workers.

A characteristic of the project has been the use of the information and communication technologies with a social vision and with the developments of local capabilities. It was the first national network in utilizing the Linux operating system in all its servers for the development of national content and adequate services to its health system. Since 1994 it has placed the complete texts of the Cuban medical magazines in internet and encouraged the development of specialized sites in the most diverse subjects of the medical sciences and public health.

It provides the users with access to scientific and technical information assistance, administration, education and research in health, turning them in active producers of information and knowledge. It offers content and services with the goal of offering to the user information to satisfy their needs.

Sources of information

Among Infomed's most important information sources is the collection of the complete text of the main Cuban Medical Journals. An important group of them form the collection Scielo Cuba that is part of the Virtual Library of Health. The Virtual Library of Health also has an important collection of books of medical sciences and health published by Cuban authors.