LOSS-MAKING medical publisher Eireann Healthcare has puts its newspaper title Medicine Weeklyon the market in an effort to rescue its business.

The company, which went into examinership last week with liabilities of some €1.1 million, gave six staff one month's notice yesterday as efforts begin to sell the title as a going concern.

The newspaper will be published on a week-to-week basis as that effort continues, staff were told yesterday.

Another 23 people work for the business, which has an event management unit, an editing, design and production service, and specialist titles such as Hospital Doctorand Irish Psychiatrist.

Micheal McAteer of Foster McAteer was appointed examiner to Eireann's parent company, MC Publishing, last week.

Company founder Chris Goodey said yesterday that he had "three or four" approaches about the title but declined to name those behind the approaches.

He attributed the newspaper's problems to a significant downturn in advertising by pharmaceutical groups in the past year. An overall advertising and promotion market previously worth €8 million to €9 million per year had declined to some €5.5 million.

"The other parts of the business are profitable and they're not for sale," he said.

"Basically, Medicine Weeklyis the loss-making part of the business. We're attempting to find a buyer for it in a difficult environment. We're putting it up for sale."

Established in August 1997, Medicine Weeklycompetes with the Irish Medical Timesand the Irish Medical News.

The auditor's report with the last filed accounts for MC Publishing, for the 18 months to December 2006, indicates that the directors of the company had been trying to raise additional funding for the business.