As a student at OCOM, you have access to a plethora of resources available through the library to help support you. This page contains links that library staff think will be most helpful for you during your time here. For more information about each service, read the descriptions further down the page or contact a librarian for help!
Library Space & Technology
Requesting & Borrowing
The Primo Catalog is the library’s one-stop shop to accessing books, eBooks, articles, videos, and many other types of resources! The catalog allows students to access the holdings of our PAHL consortium partners, so not only can you check out books from OCOM, but from the National University of Natural Medicine, the University of Western States, and from the Oregon Health & Science University.
When you sign-in with your OCOM Library account credentials you can see what books you have checked out, renew your loans, request digitization of articles or book chapters, save searches and items for later, and see more available materials (some databases only show full-text results when you are signed in).
For more information about using the Primo Catalog, the following Research Help Guides are available:
The Checking Out Materials page answers all the burning questions you ever had about check out limits, when fines get added to your account, and what to do when the OCOM library doesn’t own the book you need.
Head to the bottom of the page to see all the different types of resources you can check out as a student! Forgot your charger? Come on over to the library for a 24 hour check out. Family in town and need a fun outing? The library has a Lan Su Garden Pass available for you!
The library maintains a list of databases that will be helpful for your studies. Databases with the lock symbol are databases that the library purchases for your use while you are a student here. When you are off-campus, you’ll need to login using your library credentials to access these databases.
Library tip: while PubMed is available to search without a library login, using the library’s access link to PubMed will give you easy access to see if you can immediately access the full-text of an article or quickly submit an InterLibrary Loan request for articles we don’t own.
The article Full Text Finder is a useful tool for determining if OCOM library has access to a known article, and if not, quickly submit and InterLibrary Loan request for it. Input the information you know about the article, hit submit, and the tool will either give you links to the full text or a link to submit an ILL.
Library Tip: The Full Text Finder can be a little finicky and while you don’t need to fill out every field to retrieve results, the more information you have about the article, the more likely it will be able to identify what you are looking for!
WorldCat (or World Catalog) is a fantastic resource for locating books that OCOM and our PAHL partner schools don’t own. Thousands of libraries have put information about their holdings into WorldCat. When you use the OCOM specific WorldCat link, you can search these thousands of libraries and request books or scans to be sent to you from all around the world!
InterLibrary Loan (or ILL) is a service that lets you request journal articles and books not available in the library collection. There is no charge to OCOM students for this service, but it is limited to items that support your educational and scholarly needs.
The Journal Publication Finder is a great tool for checking if you have access to a journal through OCOM library, as well as its peer reviewed status. You can search for specific journal titles or use the subject search to see what journals are available on specific topics. Some journals in the OCOM collection are only available online, some only in print, and some are a mix.
The library offers printing and scanning services for our students. Students are welcome to come into the library and use the computers, or connect their laptops, to print out assignments, articles, whatever you need for class! The copy machine is also available for student work and is equipped with a scanner that can send digital files to OCOM email addresses for free.
Don’t have time to come in to print or scan? The library will scan pages from physical items in our collection. Students can request this service through the Primo Catalog. Login to your Primo account, find the item you need scanned, and request a digitization. You may request up to two chapters to be scanned per day. If you need documents printed, you can use the library’s print from home service and come pick them up when you’re next on campus!
Get Research Help
Having trouble logging into your library account? The library account help page will help get you logged into Primo, access databases, print, and read online journals!
The library has created multiple research help guides about finding academic research. The Teach Yourself webpage has curated multiple guides together and different topics that will be relevant to current students.
The library has created multiple research help guides about citing and writing. The Teach Yourself webpage has curated multiple guides together and different topics that will be relevant to current students.
AMA Format is the citation format used for medical research and you to look over references in other papers and follow their references to find similar research! Citations need to be formatted correctly and the Citing in AMA Format guide has examples for different resource formats and how to write in-text citations.
The library subject guides bring together resources from the OCOM library’s physical collection, online collections, and around the web on specific topics related to traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture, resources for the NCCAOM boards, and subject related to specific types of healthcare.
The Copyright at OCOM guide helps you navigate what you can and cannot do with copyrighted materials during your time as a student here.
Library Space & Technology
Learn more about the library facilities including our food and drink policy, noise policy, group study room policy, and available technology for students.
The group study room is available for students to reserve. Walk-ins are welcome, but if someone has a reservation, they get priority. Booking an appointment is available on the library facilities page. The group study room is set up with life size models including one of acupuncture points, a skeleton, and a dry erasure mannequin. The room comes equipped with a computer with Zoom installed for students that would like to attend class from the library.
The OCOM library is committed to being accessible to all our students. We are dedicated to ensuring all OCOM students have equitable access to the facilities, services, and materials that are required for their academic needs. If you require ADA accommodations, please contact the Student Services for more information on services that could assist in your studies at OCOM.
The library has an adaptive computer station, an adaptive laptop bundle, iPads, ergonomic supports, and copying and scanning support from library staff.
