RIYADH, 28 November — A new website for physicians in the Kingdom has been developed to enable them to obtain free consultations online for incurable diseases and receive data on new medical research.

The launch of the website, MyYahoo for Physicians, was announced at a symposium on "Internet as a tool for progress in medicine" organized by Merck Sharp & Dohme (MSD) here.

More than 700 physicians from various provinces in the Kingdom attended the symposium.

In his presentation, Dr. Hesham Abu Awda, professor of clinical pharmacy at King Saud University, Riyadh, provided an overview of the best way of gaining access to medical sites on the Internet.

He explained how it was possible to keep abreast of the medical advances and also contact other physicians specializing in the same area all around the world "in order to consult them about incurable diseases and exchange views about patients."

Pointing out that Arab doctors should surf the Internet to keep themselves updated in their respective fields, Dr. Abu Awda said there were more than 36 billion websites, or six sites for each person in the world.

"The number of these sites doubles approximately every 50 days. For instance, two of every five physicians in the United Kingdom have their own Internet websites and more than 55 percent of them are using e-mail for their clinical and administrative works so as to contact their colleagues and consult them about their patients. Thirteen percent of them use it to approach their patients online."

Dr. Abu Awda outlined the services offered for physicians on the Internet, including subscription facilities for newsgroups dedicated to medical specialties.

He also referred to a well-known medical site on the Internet, "Doctor’s Guide", adding that "MyYahoo for Physicians" was a major initiative by MSD for serving the medical community in the Kingdom.

Speaking on behalf of MSD, Mazen Al-Taruti, Internet Services manager, said physicians could benefit from the "Doctor’s Guide" by visiting their website, http://msd.mea.my.yahoo.net.

"A novel feature of this site is how easy it is to use. Moreover, it contains a number of links that shift the user to other sites that can be customized by the user in line with his/her interests."

A multinational, research-driven pharmaceutical products and services company, MSD discovers, manufactures and markets a broad range of innovative pharmaceutical products to improve health care and contain overall health care costs.