The Canadian Substance Abuse Information Network (CSAIN), a loosely knit group of addictions information specialists from across the country, met in Toronto in the spring to plan future initiatives. Despite funding cutbacks and the closure of some substance abuse libraries in Canada in recent years, a surprising number of new CSAIN members attended the meeting, says CCSA's former Director of Information and Reference Services Nina Frey. Participants were given a brief history of the network and encouraged to brainstorm on possible collaborative projects. Top initiatives to emerge were:
- Use of the CSAIN Web site to share and contribute to a new thesaurus developed by CCSA's National Clearinghouse on Substance Abuse,
- Mapping of the addictions infrastructure in each province to provide a national snapshot of all facets of addictions interventions, and
- Creation of a substance abuse acronym database as a means of "taming" an otherwise extremely changeable set of titles/names.
Work on these projects is now under way and volunteers are welcome. Please contact Karen Palmer (kpalmer@ccsa.ca) for further information.