The pharmaceutical giant Merck, which began making information for doctors available in print volumes in 1899, has made all of its content for physicians and consumers freely accessible online.

Although backlist editions of the Merck titles will still be sold, all new content will be posted at www.merckmanuals.com, a site which will feature two options on the landing page: one with advanced content designed for healthcare professionals (doctors, pharmacists, and nurses), and another with content presented in layman's terms for consumers (patients, caregivers, and parents).

The site will contain no advertising and is, instead, being supported by Merck as a public service. The decision to do away with new print editions and make all its information available to both doctors and patients has been in the works at the company for a long time. "We are continually updating our content and publishing it online as soon as it is ready, so we make no distinction among editions. Our sole distinction is audience,” said editor-in-chief Robert Porter.

The 19th edition (and last) of The Merck Manual for doctors was published in 2011. The version for patients, The Merck Manual of Medical Information Home Edition, was first published in 1997 and routinely hit various bestsellers lists, selling more than 2 million copies. In its third edition, which was published in 2009, the book was renamed The Merck Manual Home Health Handbook.

Multimedia features on the new site include daily medical news feeds, expert commentary, infographics, animations, video clips, health calculators and trackers, quizzes, a drug interaction checker, a pill identifier, and a guide to pronunciation of medical terms