Apologies for cross-posting. Of possible interest to the list. Please feel
free to contact me for more information.
Grace Baynes
BioMed Central
PRESS RELEASE: March 2004
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NHS England purchases online medical image database from BioMed Central
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BioMed Central announced today that it has signed a subscription agreement
with The National Health Service (NHS) England for the online encyclopedia
of medical images, images.MD. NHS England's subscription, commencing in
April 2004, provides access to the entire content of images.MD for all 1.2
million NHS staff.
The decision to subscribe to the innovative medical images product was in
direct response to requests from medical researchers, the NHS said.
According to Scott Gibbens, Project Manager of the NHS Core Content Group,
"Our decision to subscribe to images.MD for the whole of NHS England was
driven by high demand from users. This product is great value for money, and
meets our need for a comprehensive, high-quality images database for
teaching and diagnosis. As a company BioMed Central continues to provide new
invaluable and innovative resources along with excellent service."
NHS England's decision to purchase images.MD further cements the
relationship between the Health Service and BioMed Central. BioMed Central
is fast becoming a key service provider to the NHS. As well as providing a
valuable publishing service to NHS researchers, whereby under the NHS 2003
membership agreement all NHS staff can publish an unlimited number of
research articles in BioMed Central journals without incurring the usual
article processing charge, BioMed Central provides indispensable content
including the 100+ Open Access journals it publishes and a range of
secondary, value-added products like images.MD. The Open Access journals
are free to access for anyone with an internet connection.
The NHS signed up for BioMed Central membership for the whole of England in
April 2003 - becoming the first of a growing number of national
organisations to take up membership. Scott Gibbens said at the time,
"This deal is really exciting for us as it gives us an opportunity to be
leaders in free access electronic publishing"
BioMed Central membership has been hugely successful, with a substantial
number of articles submitted and published by authors employed by the NHS
since April last year. NHS England and BioMed Central have worked closely
together to build awareness and acceptance of Open Access journals amongst
UK medics. Building on this productive relationship, BioMed Central is now
providing NHS England with one of its premier subscription products.
images.MD compiles over 50,000 high-quality images spanning all of internal
medicine, all derived from Current Medicine's renowned series of illustrated
atlases. Each image is accompanied by detailed and informative text written
by over 2,000 contributing experts. According to Head of Marketing, Natasha
Robshaw;
"Images.MD is a fantastic product and we predict huge sales as awareness in
the market grows. NHS England's decision to subscribe is very exciting for
us - with BioMed Central membership they have shown themselves to be leaders
in the adoption of electronic publishing models and healthcare products. We
are pleased that we are able to continue to innovate and provide must-have
products and services to our key customers. We hope that other major
medical institutions will now follow the NHS's lead and subscribe to
images.MD."
END
About images.MD
images.MD is the first encyclopedia of medical images available on the Web.
This indispensible resource is published by Current Medicine, a company that
is world-renowned for its collection of over 90 atlases, spanning the entire
spectrum of medicine.
images.MD includes images and text edited by the world's finest physicians
in over 90 subject specialties. Our collections are fully searchable online
and contain high quality images available for downloading and
personalization.
Subscribers to images.MD are able to create their own image library, giving
them the ability to personalize their collections, add or delete text,
rename the image, or add personal notes. Customized slidesets can be created
as PowerPointŪ presentations that can be emailed in less than an hour or put
on a CD-ROM and mailed to the subscriber.
About the NHS
Founded in 1948, the National Health Service is now the largest health
organisation in Europe. As well as providing free healthcare for the British
public, the NHS also has a commitment to invest in developing future
treatments and expanding medical knowledge.
About BioMed Central
BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com), an independent online
publishing house committed to providing Open Access to peer-reviewed
biological and medical research. This commitment is based on the view that
immediate free access to research and the ability to freely archive and
reuse published information is essential to the rapid and efficient
communication of science. BioMed Central currently publishes over 100
journals across biology and medicine. In addition to Open Access original
research, BioMed Central also provides valued-added services including
journals containing reviews, commentaries and other non-original-research
content and databases such as images.MD and literature awareness services
such as Faculty of 1000.
About NHS England's BioMed Central Membership:
BioMed Central's business model is based on charging authors to publish, and
then making the content free to readers. Under the agreement,
article-processing charges are waived - for any of the 1.2 million NHS staff
- for publication in one of BioMed Central's 90 peer-reviewed journals. Upon
acceptance, the article becomes freely available online to readers
worldwide. Many NHS researchers have already published in BioMed Central
journals.
Further Information:
For more information about the NHS Core Content Group, please contact Scott
Gibbens Project Manager, National E-licensing Project [log in to unmask]
Tel 0115 968 4445
For further information about BioMed Central or the NHS contract please
contact Grace Baynes ([log in to unmask] or +44 20 7631 2988) or visit
our website http://www.biomedcentral.com/)
To read further press releases from BioMed Central visit:
http://www.biomedcentral.com/pressinfo/
Grace Baynes
Marketing Communications Manager
BioMed Central
Middlesex House
34-42 Cleveland Street
London W1T 4LB
T: +44 (0)20 7631 9988
F: +44 (0)20 7631 9926
http://www.biomedcentral.com/
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