Autumn has arrived in the northern hemisphere and with shades of yellow and orange comes a less-welcome visitor: cold and flu season. Made worse this year by the H1N1 (swine flu) pandemic, people around the world are flocking to drugstores and supermarkets to stock up on over-the-counter (OTC) medicine, says market research firm Mintel. Mintel’s [...]

While one might anticipate that poor health takes a financial toll on employees, new findings released today from MetLife’s 7th Annual Employee Benefits Trends Study help define what those financial consequences can be, both short- and long-term. The MetLife study found that working Americans who say they are in fair or poor health are also [...]

When little Mark Blinder was diagnosed with a rare bone cancer, doctors at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital gave his parents three agonizing options: amputate the affected arm at the shoulder, irradiate the tumor and risk a second malignancy, or try a limb-preserving surgery that had never been attempted in a toddler. Nearly a year later, [...]