evaluating the knowledge of physicians about and their usage of iranian national medical digital library in isfahan university of medical sciences, iran

introduction: increasing volume of information in various sciences, such as medicine, has led to the use of various strategies to effectively provide students, researchers, and teachers with medical and paramedical information. the iranian ministry of health and medical education has developed an online digital library, called iranian national medical digital library (inmdl), which provides access to databases of medical fields. however, it is believed that most researchers in isfahan university of medical sciences still tend to use printed resources due to their insufficient familiarity with electronic databases. the aim of this study was to describe the knowledge of physicians about and their use of inmdl in teaching hospitals in isfahan, iran. methods: this applied descriptive survey was carried out on physicians from 9 educational hospitals in isfahan. the number of participants was determined based on the morgan's sample size table. from the 500 physicians working in 9 hospitals, 217 individuals were randomly determined. data collection tool was a questionnaire whose validity was confirmed by professionals. the reliability of the questionnaire was verified after a pilot study (α = 0.87). finally, 127 questionnaires were completed and data was analyzed in spss 18 . results: most physicians had little knowledge about the e-journals and book databases available on inmdl. moreover, the majority of physicians made very little use of inmdl. among the existing resources, most use was made of e-journals while databases and e-books stood next. education level was significantly correlated with the knowledge of physicians and their use of inmdl. 81 percent of physicians had little awareness to inmdl's e-books and 85.2 percent of physicians had very little use of inmdl's e-books. a strong correlation was also detected between the knowledge of physicians about inmdl and their use of it. among the electronic journal databases and e-book databases, science direct and md consult were most frequently used. conclusion: medical librarians need to have an active role in informing and educating physicians about methods of searching for information in inmdl resources. in addition, as lack of time is a problem for physicians, educating them to use alert and rss services is necessary. moreover, face to face training can be possible by appropriate medical librarians.