UpToDate Up To Date

Earlier this year, medical students from Wyoming to Alaska were up in arms about the University of Washington's canceling a heavily-used electronic medical reference called UpToDate. I was in the minority of voices saying, "Good Riddance." Not because I didn't use or like the resource, but because the company exerts a profit-motivated monopoly on medical guidelines. UpToDate wanted to charge gazillions of dollars to provide articles that the authors write for free!

I had gotten used to the slightly less organized and less thorough eMedicine articles when my university's library portal indicated,

UpToDate - Good News!

Renewal for the coming year pending. We expect confirmation the first week of June ...

The so-called confirmation hasn't come yet, but it looks like the threat of cancellation and the uproar from UW docs and students combined to renew the subscription. Whatever. I'll still use UpToDate, but I have another arsenal of tools at my disposal now, too.