Promoting e-Health Resources: Lessons Learned

The increase in the number of online health resources and in particular medical digital libraries has made a wealth of information available to health professionals. Previous research has mainly concentrated on the usability and development of the resource but often, the continued promotion of the site and how to increase the levels of usage over an extended period are overlooked. In this paper we present a number of factors that have influenced the levels of usage on the National electronic Library of Infection (NeLI) family of websites. These include active promotional techniques such as attendance at conferences and eNewsletters but also passive factors such as referrals from other sites. The impact of these factors on usage levels of the sites are detailed and discussed further.