12 Major Healthcare Organizations Offer Leading Clinical Content to Doctors Online With MD Consult.

ST. LOUIS--(BW HealthWire)--Nov. 4, 1998--Extending the availability of comprehensive clinical information to physicians, medical professionals, and students through the MD Consult Internet service, MD Consult announced today that it has signed agreements with 12 leading hospitals and healthcare organizations throughout the U.S. Created through a joint venture of leading medical publishers, MD Consult features the most comprehensive collection of brand-name clinical reference and current awareness information available on the Web. The physician-oriented service also is available to individuals via its Web site at http://www.mdconsult.com.

The 12 hospitals and medical centers join more than 50 healthcare organizations who have provided the MD Consult clinical information service to their medical staff, now serving more than 15,000 physicians and clinical professionals. MD Consult users gain access to a unique blend of the medical publishing industry's leading clinical knowledge resources, including medical reference books, medical journals, drug information, patient education handouts, clinical practice guidelines, personalized updates and continuing medical education credit.

The 12 hospitals and healthcare organizations include:

-- Flagler Hospital, St. Augustine, Fla; -- The Houston Academy of Medicine, Houston; -- King/Drew Health Sciences Library, Los Angeles; -- Langley Air Force Base, Va.; -- Oakwood Hospital, Dearborn, Mich.; -- O'Bleness Hospital, Athens, Ohio; -- Peace Health, Bellevue, Wash.; -- Pfizer Inc., Groton, Conn.; -- Pourdre Valley Hospital, Ft. Collins, Colo.; -- ProMedica Health System, Toledo, Ohio; -- Swedish Medical Center, Seattle; -- University of Washington, Seattle.

"The fact that so many healthcare organizations have adopted MD Consult in such a short time highlights how the service uniquely meets the needs of physicians," said Stephanie Manning, vice president and publisher of MD Consult, L.L.C. "Physicians immediately recognize and trust the content resources of MD Consult. Just as importantly, we've blended these resources online to create a very practical tool that meets the day-to-day needs of physicians and staff who must diagnose, treat and manage patients, train others, and continue with their own professional development."

More on MD Consult

MD Consult simplifies the way physicians find and use clinical information to help them answer clinical questions and keep them up-to-date efficiently. The service includes unlimited access to:

-- 37 leading medical reference books; -- The full-text articles of 47 premier medical journals; -- Prescription information for more than 30,000 medications; -- More than 500 peer-reviewed clinical practice guidelines; -- Customizable patient education handouts covering more than 6,000

topics; -- Personalized daily summaries of important articles and

announcements in clinical medicine; -- A physician's review of medicine in the lay press; -- More than 300 modules of category 1 CME credit.

A free trial of MD Consult is available to physicians at http://www.mdconsult.com. Individual subscriptions currently are available for $199 annually or $19.95 per month. Physicians or organizations interested in MD Consult may call toll-free 1-800-207-4977 or email to [e-mail].

Based in St. Louis, MD Consult, L.L.C. is a joint venture of three of the world's leading English language medical publishers: Philadelphia-based W.B. Saunders, a division of Harcourt Brace & Company, Orlando, Fla.; Philadelphia-based Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a division of Wolters Kluwer U.S., Chicago; St. Louis-based Mosby, Inc., also a division of Harcourt Brace & Company.

MD Consult, 11701 Borman Drive, Suite 300, St. Louis, MO, 63146, 1-800-207-4977. http://www.mdconsult.com