History
CONBLS is a consortium of biomedical libraries serving Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Puerto Rico, South Carolina and Tennessee.
The Consortium of Southern Biomedical Libraries, Inc., was incorporated in the State of South Carolina on September 30, 1982 with the stated purpose “to exchange information and share existing resources to mutual advantage, to participate in cooperative programs, to strengthen existing resources and library services through joint application for private and government funds.” Leadership for forming the consortium included the then Director of the Library of MUSC (The Medical University of South Carolina Library). Member libraries included the Resource Libraries (associated with Colleges of Medicine and/or Academic Health Science Centers) of the states that fell into the geographic boundaries of the Southeastern Regional Medical Library Program (SERMLP) of the National Library of Medicine (NLM): Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Mississippi, Tennessee. SERMLP was absorbed into a larger regional program, the Southeastern/Atlantic RML, in 1982.
CONBLS incorporated in order to continue and/or initiate cooperative projects begun within the SERMLP framework and to formalize a liaison with the new RML (now called the Southeastern/Atlantic Region of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine).
Continuing activities include a union list of serials, coordination of reporting serials holdings to NLM’s SERHOLD database, reciprocal interlibrary loan activity, continuing education opportunities, and an annual CONBLS salary survey. There are seventeen member institutions of CONBLS from the six states listed above, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
5/10/94; rev. 2/10/97