From the New York Times:

A report in the Journal of the American Medical Association says cancer survivors in the United States and Europe were 37 percent more likely to be unemployed than their peers who had not had cancer. The situation is particularly critical in the United States where survivors often rely on employers for health insurance.

The study’s chief author, Angela G.E.M. de Boer, speculated that disability played a leading role in survivors being unable to return to work. She urged employers to offer accommodations to cancer survivors, including flexible work hours and additional breaks.

From the AP/Chicago Tribune:

An appeals court in Wisconsin has ruled that the wife and daughter of a man who committed suicide can inherit his estate even if they assisted him in killing himself.

Edward Schunk of Stanley, Wis., had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and died of a self-inflicted shotgun wound. His wife and daughter allegedly drove him home from the hospital and gave him a loaded shotgun.

Under Wisconsin law, a person who “intentionally kills” another cannot inherit; the court found that the law does not extend to those who assist in suicide. Boston College Law Professor Ray Madoff, an expert in inheritance law, said she has never heard of a similar ruling in the nation.

From the CBS Early Show:

Garrett Schram of Boise, Idaho, (left) is the first student in the country to attend school from a hospital room by using a new business video conferencing device. (See video here.)

Called Roundtable, the device with tiny cameras pointed in every direction makes it possible for Garrett to participate in classes at Sawtooth Middle School even though he’s being treated for bone cancer at St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital.

The Microsoft technology provides a real-time audio-video connection between the hospital and his classroom, allowing Garrett to keep up with lessons and stay connected with his community, teachers and peers.

Microsoft says it is donating thirty of the devices to hospitals this year.

(CBS graphic)

From ABC News and the [Eugene, Oregon] Register-Guard:

A 64-year-old Oregon woman was notified by her insurer that it would not pay for the $4,000-a-month drug that her doctor had prescribed for her lung cancer. The Oregon Health Plan instead agreed to pay for assisted suicide drugs, at a cost of about $50.

“It was horrible,” Barbara Wagner (above) told ABCNews.com. “I got a letter in the mail that basically said if you want to take the pills, we will help you get that from the doctor and we will stand there and watch you die. But we won’t give you the medication to live.”

Critics of Oregon’s decade-old Death With Dignity Law — the only one of its kind in the nation — have been up in arms over the indignity of her unsigned rejection letter. Even those who support Oregon’s liberal law were upset.

Wagner’s doctor had prescribed the drug Tarceva to slow the cancer’s growth, predicting that it would give her another four to six months of life. The insurance plan declined to fund the drug because it does not meet the “five-year, 5-percent rule” — providing a five percent survival rate after five years.

(Photo from the Eugene, Oregon, Register-Guard)

From the Baltimore Sun:

Public health experts say the nation needs to set up national health registries, similar to those now in place for cancer, to track trends and focus research on a long list of conditions. Among them are Alzheimer’s disease, autism, multiple sclerosis, asthma and heart disease.

Registries for birth defects are in place in only 15 states, according to the CDC. Cancer registries contain information on the age, race, gender, county of residence, diagnosis, treatment and outcome for patients across the country.

Scientists say the cancer registries have been valuable in learning the causes and trends of cancer, and in developing prevention and treatment strategies. “We also can have those benefits for other diseases,” said Thomas A. Burke, an epidemiologist and professor in the Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health. “It takes political will, and it does take funding, but there’s an awful lot of interest there.”

From the Topeka [KS] Capital-Journal:

A federal appeals court has taken laws prohibiting discrimination against people with disabilities into territory we don’t think those who drafted the laws ever anticipated they would venture.

We’re sure we never imagined the Rehabilitation Act, passed by Congress in 1973 and a forerunner to the Americans with Disabilities Act, would be invoked to cover a “sexual disability.” We’re still mystified at how a such a disability is anything an employer or potential employer should be made aware of and hope further court action in the case offers some enlightenment.

Earlier post here.