On 12th October, an ordinance from the University of Warsaw Library concerning the establishment of the Medical Library came into force. The first branch of the University of Warsaw Library will provide the employees and students of the UW’s Faculty of Medicine with access to library materials and resources necessary to support scientific research and the teaching process.

The Medical Library is located in the Library of the UW’s Faculty of Physics at Pasteur 5 in Warsaw. It is part of the Library and Information System of the University of Warsaw.

It started its operations with the inauguration of the 2023/2024 academic year and is open from Monday to Friday from 9 am to 6 pm. The collections of the new library are gathered for the benefit of employees and students of the UW’s Faculty of Medicine, but they can also be used – with the right to borrow collections – by other members of the University of Warsaw community, as well as members of the UW Alumni Club, professors from the UW and other universities, as well as holders of deposit accounts. The Medical Library can also be used on site by other persons holding a valid BUW library card.

Medical book collection

At present, the Medical Library’s book collection consists primarily of literature for first-year medical students, and a collection of textbooks for the second year has been started. It will be expanded as the Faculty of Medicine grows. The resources of the new library are already visible in the UW Library Catalogue. All recommended medical textbooks are also available in the collection of the University of Warsaw Library (BUW).

“Organising a new library from scratch in the UW Library and Information System was a real challenge for the BUW. We worked closely with the Faculty of Medicine to best understand the needs of its students and employees, as well as with the Faculty of Physics on organisational issues. Throughout the summer holidays, BUW employees intensively collected and developed the book collection for the Medical Library, so that it could be ready to receive its first users at the beginning of the academic year. We are monitoring the activities of our first branch on an ongoing basis and we warmly encourage the Medical Faculty’s community to share their feedback on the new library with us,” Anna Wołodko, general director of the BUW, says.