Classification and Arrangement of Books in the Library of the Surgeon-General's Office

摘要

At the request of the Editors of the Bulletin of the Medical Library Association, the subjoined classification of the bound medical books in the Library of the Surgeon General's office is submitted for publication. This classification, with the changes made necessary by later advances in medicine, was devised by Dr. John S. Billings and Dr. Robert Fletcher on the basis of the scheme of nosology and classification of the Royal College of Physicians of London (derived from the system of Dr. William Farr), and has been in use in this Library since the steel book stacks were installed in the Library Hall of the Army Medical Museum in 1887. It is also substantially the classification which has been used to date (with necessary changes) in the Index Medicus (1879-1917). For libraries which classify not only medical books, but also pamphlets, reprints, or the contents of medical periodicals, we recommend the monthly table of contents of the Index Medicus as a good working scheme of classification. In the subjoined arrangement, the different subjects are placed under grand divisions, e. g., Anatomy, Physiology, Surgery, etc., for the convenience of those who wish to adapt it to the needs of smaller libraries, but, in the guide-book to the alcoves and shelves, which is daily in use by the staff, the arrangement is purely alphabetical, with indices to the proper location in the alcoves.