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1. Planning Process

At the September 2004 meeting, the Board of Regents decided to develop a Long Range Plan for 2006-2016. A Subcommittee on Planning was appointed, and is co-chaired by the Honorable Newt Gingrich and Dr. William Stead; members include Dr. Holly Buchanan, Dr. Wallace Conerly, Dr. Thomas Detre and Dr. Kenneth Walker.

For over six months the NLM planning panels membersworked diligently to develop the key recommendations for the next 10 years.

In April 2005, a Strategic Visions Working Group comprised of outstanding leaders from all sectors of NLM’s diverse constituencies[65] met to provide the broadest view of NLM’s mission, current situation, and its potential future contributions to the health and well-being of America in the 21st Century. A vision statement identified new scientific, medical, technical, social and economic developments that may impact national and global needs for research, clinical and patient data and information. It formed the basis for the creation of four long range planning panels that met twice each during the months of November-December 2005, and February-March 2006, named and chaired as follows:

• Resources and Infrastructure: Dr. Edward Shortliffe and Ms. Gail Yokote
   
• Health Information for Underserved and Diverse Populations: Dr. Louis Sullivan and Ms. Eugenie Prime
   
• Support for Clinical and Public Health Systems: Dr. Reed Gardner
   
• Support for Genomic Science: Dr. Daphne Preuss
   

Nearly 100 panelists worked to identify the forward-looking strategies and infrastructure that will enable NLM to maintain its role as a premier national library and positive force for change in the US and abroad in the 21st Century. The panel-ists considered, among many relevant issues and trends, exciting changes in genomic and computer science, scientific publication models, and transformational changes in health care delivery, electronic health records, and quality and safety made possible by new information technology. The promise of new research correlating genotype, phenotype and environmental data figured prominently in their deliberations, as did the challenges posed by a critical lack of space needed to house NLM’s programs and collections; the existence of health disparities among the underserved; a lack of trust in societal institutions, including government; and the mitigation of threats to the public health from disasters and epidemics.