Syed Mahmood Ali Shah  ( Medical Student, The Aga Khan University, Karachi. )

BMJ is the online edition of the British Medical Journal created in May, 1995. The most important feature of e-BMJ, making it different from otherMedical Journals, is that it is totally free of cost. You need not buy BMJ anymore because you will find full text of all the articles published in BMJ from January, 1997 to date at http://www.bmj.com It is not only in the text format, you can also get the article in the same format as it is printed in the hard copy issue by downloading it in the Adobe Acrobat format.
The web site is very well designed and comrpehcnsivc. If you are lost somewhere, you need not worry as a complete section is dedicated for helping visitors solve their surfing problems. The main page gives you the option to view the current issue or go directly to the archive/search section that has all the issues of BMJ from January, 1997 onwards. Other important links, getting place on the index page, are classified ads, collected resources, customized alerts and a free medline search.
Collected resources (http://www.bjm.com  collections) categorizes the articles published in BMJ under a speciality or topic and you can get details of all relevant articles they have published since Januaiy, 1997. From accident and emergency medicine to the Gulf War Syndrome, all the topics are covered. Anotheroption allows you to explore related links to the topic you have chosen. A separate link (http://www.bmj.com/collections/specials.shtml) will take you to the archive of theme issues of BMJ published so farwith thumbnail view of their front pages. The classified ads section (http://classified.bmj.com!) includes Education (learning opportunities, seminars and conferences) general appointments, GP appointments, hospital appointments and overseas appointment. They have an extremely powerful search engine (http://www.bmj.com/all.shtml) which can be customized in whatever way you like, using year of publication, author’s name, citation, subject or anything you can think of as the key word. Another useful fea ure is the customized alert http://www.bmj.com/cgi/customalert) With this service you can select the topic of your interest and e-BMJ will let you know whenever there is something new about it published in BMJ. You can also post your comments online, which makes an article more interactive. e-BMJ has started an online peer review system which means that you will post your article on the website and every “reader” can “review” it. The articles passing this test of scrutiny will be published in BMJ. While going through an article, you can jump to other related articles, read responses or programme e-BMJ to inform you whenever a related article is published; all this by following the hyperlinks on the top right corner of your active window. e-BMJ might not be the best online journal in terms of outlay and designing, but it is definitely rich in content and then again, it is absolutely free. Hyperlink Update British Medical Association can be reached at http://www.bma.org.ul. Student BMJ can be reached at http://www.studentBMJ.com.