Another Tax(ing) Day

So, have you got those taxes in?

We managed to jump that hurdle this year with nary a whimper from our usual Tax Day Hardware Curse. This year we got them printed without:

• the laser printer going to printer heaven whilst printing out page one of our finished federal return (2003);
• the power supply croaking on the computer just as the print button was clicked (2004);
• the new laser’s printer drum imploding on page one (2005);
• or the new color inkjet printer going belly up when the ‘on’ button was pressed (also in 2005).

The reasons why we don’t tiptoe past The Hardware Curse by electronically filing our taxes is a tale regarding The Great Taxation Software Curse that I’ll save for another time…

I’m not rejoicing, yet, in the glory of getting that 1040 out the door. I’m expecting something will go awry as our forms wing their way across the continent. So, if you see the headline “USPS Truck Hijacked By Swarm of Mutant Paper-Devouring Killer Bees,” you can rest assured: our tax returns were on that truck.

The Gift of Life

Today marks four weeks since my sister, Dorothy, was killed in a car accident. In those four weeks, two patients who’d been waiting for corneas can now see. A set of families who needed bone transplants for their son/daughter/mother/father now have them. And more. Much more.

Oddly, so oddly — and thankfully — good can come from bad.

They call it the “Gift of Life,” and truly, it is.

Aftermath

So, says you, how am I doing?

Been better, thank you. I haven’t written anything because — given the events of the last three weeks — my thoughts and focus have been elsewhere.

The vast and wonderful majority of friends, acquaintances and even strangers have been incredibly kind, supportive and understanding while our family has muddled through the shock and horror of my sister’s death.

But.

I have a bone to pick.

For a tiny minority, my family’s double tragedies — my sister’s death in a car accident this month and my father’s death a few years ago in an unrelated yet equally horrific car accident — have been an opportunity to make crass, rude, and astoundingly inappropriate remarks.

Am I mistaken in finding this outrageous?

I think not. But – to be fair – I’ll give you, Oh Best Beloved, a sampler, a select handful of these comments. And then you decide.

1. “Wasn’t your dad 83? Old farts shouldn’t be on the road anyways – no wonder he got killed.”

   Why, thank you, you who never even met my father, for characterizing an intelligent, astute, sharp, physically active and just dead parent as an ‘old fart’ – and then blaming him for dying in a car accident.

2. Your sister must have been a bad driver.

   Here’s an exercise for you to try so we can compare your driving skills to hers: develop a blood clot that whaps through your heart while driving into a curve on a two-lane country highway at 55 mph, with an oncoming semi a mere few feet from your vehicle. Bonus points if you can manage, like she did, to only sideswipe the truck instead of hitting it head-on.

3. I saw your parents’ accident on TV! Did you get to see it? You should get a tape!

   No, I did not see it, as I ripped the TV’s plug out of the wall socket when it came on as ‘breaking news.’ I don’t think I, or anyone else, should have graphic coverage of tragedies shoved into our faces as ‘news-ertainment’ – and yes, I felt that way long before this happened to us.

4. Wow, it cost that much for the emergency helicopter that flew your mom to the trauma center after your parents’ accident? Thanks a lot – now I know why my insurance rates keep going up! And wasn’t she old, anyways?

   Personally, I thought the price charged was a bargain when compared to the cost of my mother, too, losing her life. You are welcome to seek out and purchase an insurance policy that doesn’t include coverage for trauma care, if you’d like to lower your rates. Me – I’ll campaign for heath care reform based on the factors that are really driving costs. Oh – and when did age become a proxy for determining the worth of a human life?

So – Oh Best Beloved – there’s your sampler.

What do you think: Outrageous? Or acceptable?

I know where I stand.

Today’s Special Is:

Sudoku Recipe (serves 2)

Ingredients:

1 Sudoku puzzle (electronic)
1 kitchen table
2 chairs
1 mathematician (Sudoku illiterate)
1 statistician (Sudoku illiterate)
1 laptop
1 internet connection

Put laptop on medium-sized kitchen table, and connect to Internet. Bring up one Sudoku puzzle (rated 5* or “most difficult”). Seat mathematician and statistician in front of laptop. Link to Wikipedia article on Sudoku. Challenge mathematician and statistician (who obviously live in a cave as they’ve never heard of Sudoku) to read Wiki article about Sudoku, then solve puzzle together.

Whoa! Who would have thunk you could actually have fun with numbers?

And I Will Sent Hornets Before Thee

I have a quirk — a troublesome habit, one might say — that frequently drives me to question the methodology used to derive results that appear in various reports.

Especially when such results are outlandish, given the rest of the data.

This quirk doesn’t always make everyone else happy.

Today, at the request of a friend, I reviewed a set of blood tests that showed that blood drawn from him has “zero” parts of a particular constituent that makes up human blood.

Say what?

Indeed, Oh Best Beloved, that’s what that printout said.

Now, it is possible, just possible, that the test results are accurate.

Highly unlikely – but possible. If, for example, the blood had come from an individual who had been sitting inside the center of a nuclear reactor, why, then, the result documented so nicely on the laboratory’s test findings is exactly what this particular blood test should show.

Since my friend isn’t glowing in the dark, and has perfectly normal results for all the other indicators that would have been blown out of the water by radiation poisoning, it seems a trifle unlikely that massive (or long-term lower dose) radioactive exposure explains this little oddity in his blood work.

So. Shouldn’t one then wonder if perhaps, just perhaps, that blood test might have a teeny tiny little error in it?

Apparently, according to “Debbie” at the laboratory, one should not. One must call “doctor” because “doctor” will explain what the lab results “mean.”

Fine and well. Except that’s not what I had asked Debbie about. I had asked Debbie which specific methodology was used to obtain the results in her lab tests. As an aside, Debbie already knew that an MD hadn’t ordered these tests. These were done at a “direct access testing” laboratory, and ordered directly by the individual who had the blood drawn. This is a perfectly legal process and available to anyone who wishes to pay for it here in the USA.

And… I specifically didn’t want any interpretation of the results, as they aren’t my blood tests. I had no interest in asking questions about someone else’s medical information. Just in case, I’d covered that by having my friend call first to give the lab permission to talk to me specifically about his results, if necessary. Debbie was actually calling me – based on that request to her lab from my friend. I hadn’t called her.

“I’m not asking for an interpretation of the results,” says I. “I’m asking, as I’ve already explained, if this test was run using a machine scan or via human inspection. The results look like you ran it via machine, and the machine hiccuped and gave a false zero.”

“You have to ask “doctor” what the lab results mean.”

“I don’t know anyone named “doctor,” says I, with a tad of annoyance. “And, let me repeat once again, I am not asking what the lab tests mean. I am specifically asking what methodology your lab used to run this blood work for this specific count because, quite frankly, the results looks like lab error. And if it isn’t lab error, then we’ve got some extremely odd results that may indicate an individual with a serious health problem. So if you can’t answer my question, please find someone who can and get them on the line.”

“You’ll have to ask ‘doctor.’”

“‘Doctor’ won’t have an answer, Debbie, because the question is, ‘what methodology did your lab use to obtain these results? Mechanical or manual diff?’ It’s not reported on the form, so any MD that looks at this information won’t have that answer.”

“You’ll have to ask ‘doctor.’”

Have I ever mentioned, Oh Best Beloved, that my paper on the statistical problems and errors inherent in laboratory tests has been and is used to teach students at universities, and medical personnel, about the limits of such diagnostic tests? Have I ever mentioned that the information about which methodology is used in a test can make a critical difference in interpreting the accuracy of the results? Have I mentioned that this information isn’t the least bit secret and laboratories know this and provide information as to testing methodology quite freely to anyone who asks for it, just for this reason?

And have I mentioned, Oh Best Beloved, that I find stonewalling a trifle annoying? Annoying in a way akin to the annoyance that hornets feel when a stick is poked into their nest?

I believe, I truly do, that Debbie now understands that.

Just call me “hornet.”

The blood work results were indeed obtained by the machine based methodology, and are therefore likely in error.

I would be remiss if I didn’t express my deepest thanks to Debbie’s replacement, “Crystal,” who not only knew the answer to the question I had asked, but also was pleasant and professional to boot.

A piece of unsolicited advice for all the “Debbies” out there: be careful where you poke your stick.

You might just encounter a hornet.