Dr. Sheikh Shoaei, the secretary of the Medical Librarianship Session, has been leading a committee dedicated to exploring the applications of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the field of medical librarianship and libraries. This committee held three pre-congress sessions, each delving into unique aspects of AI and its integration into medical libraries.
In the first session, titled “AI and Medical Libraries: The Future of Services and Empowering Users,” participants discussed the fundamental concepts of AI, focusing on techniques such as machine learning and deep learning. The session highlighted the significance of training librarians to effectively leverage these technologies. Topics included the pros and cons of language models like Chat GPT in library functions and the integration of smart tools such as virtual assistants (Siri, Alexa, Google Nest) for supporting routine tasks like resource location, database searches, and gathering user feedback. Additionally, the use of robots for shelf reading, user assistance in search strategies, and fact-checking were explored.
The second pre-congress session, “AI in Scholarly Writing for Medical Librarianship,” examined the advantages of AI in academic research. For authors, AI tools aid in tasks like editing, summarization, literature review, idea generation, and translation. Editors and reviewers benefit from AI’s capabilities in quality assessment, plagiarism detection, and reviewer recommendations. Ethical guidelines for AI usage were also emphasized, referencing international standards set by organizations like ICMJE and COPE.
Finally, the third session, “AI in Medical Librarianship Education,” addressed the philosophy of AI in medical library education, covering topics like curriculum development, educational content creation, and the use of AI for summarization, content creation, and presentation design. Various tools for summarizing, reading articles, and generating multimedia content for medical librarianship were introduced.