# Poll-Medical Information



## imfree (Jun 24, 2012)

"What would you do, if approached to give a blood sample for a genetic or medical information gathering program that "promises to gather information to improve medical care, overall "?

pro: Million Veteran Program



con: DNA Experiments on Vets

Daaaayum, I cudda' had a poll on that one!!!:doh: 

MODS:

Combining with my first "Medical Information" thread or deleting the poll-less thread would be fine with me.


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## moore2me (Jun 26, 2012)

Edgar,

*I wouldn't mind donating blood or tissue or some biopsy samples under the following conditions . . .* 

a. *If they find something really bad, they tell me* (such as cancer, Alzheimers, etc,),

b. *They do not divulge any of my personal results to a third party such as my insurance company, my employer, or the newspapers, etc*., (For example if an insurance co. finds I carry a cancer gene, they could raise my rates or cancel my policy. I can also forsee that some employers might fire employees who have certain diseases or syndromes possibly in their future.)

c. *Any cells taken from me in biopsy or otherwise remain my property and cannot be sold commercially or grown and future generations used as by private labs or private companies.* (This has actually happened to some cancer patients when their cancer cells were patented (or trademarked?) and became property of someone else.) 

d. *The samples must be taken, used and written up in a humane, scientific manner and to help mankind. They cannot be used for the purpose of war, to punish or execute people or animals, and cannot be used by a company that participates in weapons, war, or kiiling man or beasts*.

e*. They cannot hurt me or charge me to participate. They must truthfully tell me what I am volunteering for.* Blacks were actually injected with syphillis and told they were given another drug.

So, by now most of you have guessed they will probably pass on this old girl. Another reason my essential essence will probably not be used is I have so much wrong with me, the statisticians will likely toss the sample out anyway. People running experiments don't like stuff that could mess with their results or screw up their conclusions.

Example - I have balance problems. I fall down sometimes and go boom. An easy conclusion would be fat girl lose weight, no fall down as much. An element that would mess up that conclusion would be having multiple sclerosis (MS).


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## Webmaster (Jun 29, 2012)

I wouldn't. And not because I don't see value in research, but because I have virtually zero faith in any medical or research institution, and generally assume they will find a way to screw things up. So I don't want that needle in my arm.


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## imfree (Jun 29, 2012)

Given the knowledge that our military and government have been known to "research" one thing and use the information for other purposes and also knowing the VA's Keystone Cops approach to security (c'mon, stolen laptops???), there's no way in hell I would participate in that "Million Veteran Program"!


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## EMH1701 (Jun 29, 2012)

It depends on what it's for, but generally no. It would have to be a really good cause. 

I have given blood to give blood. However, every time I donated blood, they had issues getting enough from me. So I don't do that much anymore. 

I have also given samples to the hospital to be tested for bone marrow donation when my uncle had leukemia last year (he unfortunately got graft vs. host while recovering and didn't survive that).


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## ConnieLynn (Jun 29, 2012)

Nope. So far I've been lucky to not be diagnosed with a single health issue that can affect my insurability. I wouldn't trust that the results would kept anonymous or that they would be used for the defined purpose. I'm cynical like that


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