Remind managers: No health-cost comments.

When an employee suffers a major health problem, those costs can add up--in terms of insurance dollars and lost work time. But make sure your supervisors understand that it's never appropriate for them to voice these concerns to the employee or even to other co-workers. And remind rank-and-file employees to keep comments about co-worker health to themselves.

Recent case: Jullee, a county government employee, developed several health problems over the years. She had a series of strokes, a heart attack, heart valve surgery and she took multiple medications that required her to go to the restroom frequently.

Jullee sometimes took FMLA leave for treatments.

One day, her manager commented about how much her medical treatments must be costing the county. Plus, several of Jullee's co-workers were known to talk about her many medical problems and they teased her about her frequency of bathroom...