Abstract

This study focused on the domestic hospital libraries, the policies and support projects for them, and the current operation status of them. To this end, a list of hospital libraries was established and the operation status was investigated by conducting telephone interviews with 73 libraries collected. As a result, it was found that hospital libraries were established through support projects of other institutions (foundations, enterprises, etc.) rather than by the parent institutions, most of which were barely maintained except for certain actively operated ones. In terms of space, hospital libraries equipped with independent space were mostly operated on a small scale, and bookshelves were deployed in space for other purposes such as lounge and hallway. In terms of operation, a dedicated department or personnel for the library operation hardly existed, and more than half of them did not purchase additional books, simply maintaining the donated books at the time of the establishment. It was also shown that for services and programs, only booklending services are provided, except for a few libraries. Therefore, national policies and support will be needed to revitalize hospital libraries in the future, and the government needs to seek ways to continuously operate them through links with local representative libraries and public libraries.