Yet Another Reason Why Money and Medicine Make Bad Bedfellows

First, here’s a practical (and important) financial article by Liz Pulliam Weston, titled Why Medical Debts Shouldn’t Count. Read it to find out about a vastly under-reported issue that is affecting thousands of lives: the recent, widespread selling of medical debt to collection agencies, often for pennies on the dollar. To add insult to injury, […]

Black Friday (shudder) Health Tips

For those who started the (pre-dawn) day with a list of stores to hit, all I can say is…wow. A Walmart on Black Friday is the purest example of survival of the fittest ever devised. I’ll admit it up front, I’m not woman enough to Black Friday. I don’t believe the obviously false propaganda that […]

You Can Die From A Cold. Eek.

A new one to add to the scary list of emerging infections: The CDC announced today that a new strain of “cold”–AKA adenovirus–has emerged that can kill young, healthy people. Unlike the potential “bird flu” scare, there are already ten documented deaths from this virus in the past year. So what can you do, besides […]

Medical Clearance and Kanye West’s Mom

The one sure fact about the news of Dr. Dondra West’s death, even from a distance, is the tragic loss to the world of a wonderful person. I extend my heartfelt condolences to those who knew and loved her. While the media speculates about the circumstances of her death, I’d rather, instead, focus on a […]

When It’s Not In Your Head

This week’s news saw two extraordinary health tales–both of them reminders to trust yourself and report odd symptoms, even if they seem embarrassingly weird. The first story is the horrifying news that Bindeez toys can convert to the date-rape drug when swallowed. How likely does that seem? Imagine being the mother who has to take […]

What if There’s a Recall…But I Already Ate It?

With one million pounds of ground beef recalled this weekend (adding to this year’s total of “more than 30 million pounds of ground beef — enough to make 120 million quarter-pound burgers“), the issue of what to do about a recall of something you just ate is not a theoretical concern. In […]