Nancy Shute

When your child has an earache or a bad cold, it's hard to think that there's not much you can offer beyond Tylenol and sympathy. But most of those infections are mostly caused by viruses that don't respond to antibiotics, a study finds.

Just 27 percent of acute respiratory tract ...

Just 82 children have confirmed cases of enterovirus-D68, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but hospitals around the country say they are treating hundreds more children who have been sickened by the rare virus.

"We have some of these cases now in our ICU," says Dr. ...

There's a lot of argument over how teenage marijuana use might affect people through life, but distressingly little data to help figure it out. That leaves parents, policymakers and young people pretty much in the dark when it comes to making decisions about use and legalization.

Three long-running studies of ...

Measles is often lumped in with flu and chickenpox as mild childhood illnesses. But people who got measles during outbreaks in the United Kingdom say they were pretty darned sick, missing two weeks of school or work on average.

A bout of the measles lasted 14 days on average, according ...

A rarely seen virus is sending children to the hospital with severe respiratory infections, and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning doctors and parents to be on the alert.

"Hospitalizations are higher than would be expected at this time of year," Dr. Anne Schuchat, head of ...

Sure, exercising can make you stronger, happier and healthier. But it can also make you stink. And that polyester workout wear isn't helping.

Anyone with a drawerful of T-shirts knows that the synthetic ones can get sour after just a brief jog, while old-school cotton T-shirts remain relatively stink-free all ...

These days you're pretty much guaranteed a smoke-free experience in stores, restaurants and on the job. But those laws usually don't reach inside the home. Though more than three-quarters of homes are now smoke-free, millions of children and other relatives of smokers are still exposed to secondhand smoke, a study ...

If your eyes feel like a sand dune and your vision improves when you blink, you've probably got dry eye syndrome. This used to be considered a women's thing, caused by hormonal changes at menopause, but thanks to our fondness for staring at screens it's becoming an equal opportunity ailment.

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More women are choosing to have bilateral mastectomies when they are diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer, even though there's little evidence that removing both breasts improves their survival compared with more conservative treatments.

The biggest study yet on the question has found no survival benefit with bilateral mastectomy compared with ...

People who abuse alcohol sometimes try to fake the hand tremors caused by withdrawal to get a prescription for sedatives.

But the Valium used to treat withdrawal is often abused and can be dangerous. "If you give large doses of Valium to people who are intoxicated, bad things happen," says ...

Losing your sense of smell may not sound like a big deal, but it can increase your risk of injury, researchers say. Without the sniffer serving as early warning system, it can be hard to know if the pan is burning on the stove or the chicken has gone bad.

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When Megan Thoemmes first found a tiny critter living in the pores of her nose, she was disgusted.

"The first time I found one on my face I didn't sleep for four nights," says Thoemmes, a graduate student at North Carolina State University.

But she's made peace with her ...

Tobacco control advocates disagree on whether e-cigarettes are a useful tool to get smokers off tobacco, or just a sleeker form of one of the world's deadliest addiction.

A lot of that discord comes from the fact that there's just not enough science to know the risks and benefits of ...

Many parents have pushed for a later start to the school day for teenagers, with limited success. But parents just got a boost from the nation's pediatricians, who say that making middle and high schoolers start classes before 8:30 a.m. threatens children's' health, safety and academic performance.

"We want to ...

A fungus called Cryptococcus gattii can cause life-threatening infections, especially in people with compromised immune systems. One-third of AIDS-related deaths are thought to be caused by the fungus.

But though people in Southern California have been getting sick from C. gatti for years, nobody knew how.

Eucalyptus trees were a ...

An eye exam may be the ticket to a longer life, researchers say, because good vision is essential for being able to shop, manage money and live independently. And maintaining independence in turn leads to a longer life.

Researchers have known for years that people who have vision problems as ...

The hunt is on to identify the man in the James Foley execution video who speaks with a British accent. An estimated 2,000 Europeans have left home to join the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.

Dating isn't easy, and it's even less so when you've got Asperger's, an autism spectrum disorder that can make it hard to read social cues.

Jesse Saperstein knows that all too well. In his new book, "Getting a Life with Asperger's: Lessons Learned on the Bumpy Road to Adulthood," ...

Much of the American West is suffering from extreme drought this year. California is running out of water and wildfires have raged through Washington, Oregon and Idaho. But there is a bright spot out West — or, rather, a green spot. In New Mexico, unusually heavy late-summer rains have transformed ...

Sure, money can't buy you love, but it's hard to imagine that winning rewards won't make us happy.

It does, researchers say, but only if our immediate expectations aren't bigger than the size of the payoff. Disappointment squelches happiness.

"Your happiness increases only if you do better than you expected," ...