Wikipedia vs peer-reviewed medical literature for information about the 10 most costly medical conditions.

Context: Since its launch in 2001, Wikipedia has become the most popular general reference site on the Internet and a popular source of health care information. To evaluate the accuracy of this resource, the authors compared Wikipedia articles on the most costly medical conditions with standard, evidence-based, peer-reviewed sources.

Methods: The top 10 most costly conditions in terms of public and private expenditure in the United States were identified, and a Wikipedia article corresponding to each topic was chosen.

Social Media, Power, and the Future of VBAC.

The Internet has been called a disruptive technology because it has shifted power and altered the economics of doing business, whether that business is selling books or providing health care. Social media have accelerated the pace of disruption by enabling interactive information sharing and blurring the lines between the "producers" and "consumers" of knowledge, goods, and services. In the wake of the National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Conference on Vaginal Birth After Cesarean (VBAC) and major national recommendations for maternity care reform, activated, engaged consumers face an unprecedented opportunity to drive meaningful changes in VBAC access and safety.

Factors associated with favorable attitudes toward end-of-life planning.

Planning for end-of-life (EOL) care can result in better patient outcomes and lowered health care costs. We hypothesized that knowledge and experiences with EOL care would influence patients' EOL planning (i.e.

The CDK-activating kinase (CAK) Csk1 is required for normal levels of homologous recombination and resistance to DNA damage in fission yeast.

Background: Cyclin-dependent kinases (CDKs) perform essential roles in cell division and gene expression in all eukaryotes. The requirement for an upstream CDK-activating kinase (CAK) is also universally conserved, but the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe appears to be unique in having two CAKs with both overlapping and specialized functions that can be dissected genetically. The Mcs6 complex--orthologous to metazoan Cdk7/cyclin H/Mat1--activates the cell-cycle CDK, Cdk1, but its non-redundant essential function appears to be in regulation of gene expression, as part of transcription factor TFIIH.