About Eira

Eira – Effective Information Retrieval and Acquisition – is a consortium of all 21 healthcare regions in Sweden, dedicated to ensuring that all healthcare professionals have access to a common, high-quality knowledge base, regardless of where in Sweden they work.  Eira consortium negotiates license agreements for electronic information resources. The content is agreed upon in cooperation with hospital libraries in Sweden and is mainly based on demand, usage statistics and price. Compliance to Eira requirements on license terms and conditions is also a deciding factor. There are yearly negotiations with publishers, resulting in both one-year and multi-year agreements. 

Eira Core, Eira Plus and Eira Add-on

Content negotiated by Eira is divided into three categories: Eira Core, Eira Plus and Eira Add-on. Eira Core is the common, high quality knowledge base available in all regions. An Eira Core agreement means all 21 regions subscribe. Eira Plus are optional, additional agreements, subscribed to by interested regions. For both Eira Core and Eira Plus, ordering, licensing and invoicing is administered through Eira office, Inera. Eira Add-ons are additional offers negotiated by Eira. For Eira Add-on offers ordering, licensing and invoicing is handled by vendor and each interested region directly. 

For Eira Core the license costs are distributed among the 21 regions, based on number of residents. The decision process on which content is included in Eira Core involves stakeholders from all 21 regions. The final decision on Eira Core content for the following year is made October 1st each year. 

The Eira Office

Since 2010 Eira Office is part of Inera AB, a company focused on digital infrastructure in municipalities and regions, owned by the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR). The Eira Office in Stockholm manages negotiations with vendors/suppliers, administrates payments of license costs, analyzes usage statistics and keeps in regular contact with publishers and members. Eira Office provides a networking platform for the hospital libraries of Sweden and arranges meetings and training within the so called Eira Network. 

The Eira Network

The nationwide network of hospital librarians in Sweden is an important intermediary between the users - the healthcare employees - and the Eira Office at Inera. The hospital libraries in Sweden are the ones primarily responsible for disseminating information and providing training in the use of the electronic resources to end-users. Each region has librarians assigned to the so called Eira Contact Group, which meet regularly and discuss e-resources matters. There is also an Eira Steering Group with representatives from different sized regions. The final decision on what content is included in the common, high-quality knowledge base made available in all regions, Eira Core, is made by the Eira Steering Group and a network of Hospital Library Managers. 

Authorized users and access to content

Usage rights and limitations on use

In Eira licenses "Authorized users" are defined as follows:   

"All health care personnel, employees in the regions and Swedish health care personnel working on behalf of and funded by the region. Persons who are permitted to access the Licensee’s information services from computer terminals within the physical premises of the Licensee ("Walk-In Users") are also deemed to be Authorized Users, for the time they are within the physical premises of the Licensee." 

Eira licenses in general allow: 

• Authorized users to use content in accordance with copyright and other applicable laws for personal non-commercial purposes  

• Authorized users to access, browse, view and search content as well as print, download and store a reasonable number of items and provide copies of individual items to other Authorized users and to third party colleagues for scholarly and research uses  

• Eira libraries may on occasion supply single copies of articles to a non-commercial library located in Sweden by post, facsimile or email (provided the electronic file is deleted immediately after printing), to fulfil requests for Interlibrary Loan ("ILL"), provided such use is in accordance with applicable copyright law. Libraries are not allowed to forward emails with digital content to the end user, articles must be distributed to the end user as a print copy 

Contact

E-mail: eira@inera.se