The Dane Commission (The Dane Chronicles) (8 page)

Ryan didn’t like shots. And even though
no one used needles anymore, the high velocity air-shot they used, still hurt
like hell.

He grimaced.

She knew him well enough to know what
he was thinking.

“Ah, you big baby just do it and get it
over with.”

Protesting he said, “But didn’t we get
our regular inoculations at the beginning of the year. I should already be
fully protected against everything.”

“Well, you can explain it to the nurses
when they come around. But you better not be carrying any bugs into this house
Mr. Dane.”

She looked serious.

“Ok, ok. If they offer, I’ll get one.”

 
With that he finished getting ready, and drove to work.

When he stepped off the elevator and
onto his floor, he nearly ran right into several nurses pushing white carts to
the front conference room. Grimacing again, he headed to his office to put his
things down and read his mail. He had two messages waiting; the first was from
Ben letting him know that he could go to the labs today to talk with some
researchers. That was good news.

The second message was from
IntelliHealth asking all employees to take time to get vaccinated against the
evil virus that would wipe them all out if they didn’t.

‘Damn, Jean nailed it,’ he thought.

Picking up his coffee cup, he headed up
to the front to get his shot, and then to get some coffee. When he got to the
conference room where the nurses had set up shop, there was already a short
line of people waiting.
With a sigh, he stepped up to the end.

Theresa came and got into line after
him.
“Always something isn’t it. They say we could be carriers. I guess the
trade-off for keeping us healthy, are all the shots.”

“Yeah, I suppose you’re right.”

While they waited, she asked about how
he was doing; did he like it here; was everyone being friendly. He said yes to
it all, and meant it. He really was having a good time. Just as he was running
out of things to say, the line cleared, and it was his turn.

The nurse said, “Please hold your
identification chip over the scanner.”

“I’m sorry, why do I need to have my ID
chip scanned?”

The other nurses stopped what they were
doing and looked towards Ryan.

“My understanding is that the CDC wants
statistics on how much of the population has been vaccinated. If you do not
want to scan your ID chip, that’s fine, but I can not give you the shot unless
you do.”

He never liked being pressured to do
anything.

Normally, he would say ‘Ok then, forget
it.’

But in that instant he remembered how
he had ignored Alex when he was sick yesterday. If he brought something home
and Alex got sick because he didn’t get the shot, it would be bad. Very bad.

He waved his chip, and rolled up his
sleeve.

He imagined that the nurse gave him an
extra little jab while he had his arm there.

Turning back, he forced a smile at
Theresa and headed for the coffee.

 
Later that day, he went to floor 123 to visit with the researchers
Ben had been good enough to arrange. With Ben’s approval, Ryan had temporary
access to floor 123. A week only, but it could be extended if necessary.

When Ryan stepped off the elevator, he
was confused for a moment because the floor plan was completely different. The
elevator opened at the end of a very long, white hallway lined with doors.
There were many doors going down both sides, and he could hear lots of noise
and people talking from inside them.

With no one to greet him, he began
walking down the hall and came upon his first set of doors on the right-hand
side. It was a set of double doors, and both were open revealing a lab suite on
the inside. He could see long lab benches filled to capacity with beakers,
flasks, water baths and lots of unknown equipment stacked all about, often on
top of each other. There were lots of people in white lab coats working and
talking.

Interested now, he wanted to see more.

Moving down the hall he saw several
more labs just like the first. Then he heard a familiar voice, he couldn’t
place it at first. Moving to the source, he poked his head into the next lab
and saw a pair of scientists talking to a large view screen as data scrolled
across its display. He recognized the voice from his interview; they were
talking to SID. He came to another lab where there appeared to be a woman
talking to SID as well. At the next one, he found another conversation going on
with SID and a group of students.

It felt odd to hear the same voice
having multiple conversations at once.

Moving on, he became more impressed.
All together, by the time he reached a cluster of offices, he had counted 32
separate lab suites with more than half interacting with the research assistant
program, SID.

‘This place is really a marvel,’ he
thought.
 

Walking up to the first office he came
to, he stopped and looked inside.
An older gentleman sat with his back to the door at a desk covered with debris.
He was reading something. Judging from the amount of papers, books and
belongings here, this was a senior investigator. Ryan had seen them before.
They always looked as if they might live in their offices. The door was open,
so he knocked on the frame and waited. The man sighed heavily and eventually
turned around, obviously annoyed at the interruption.

Smiling his biggest smile, Ryan said,
“I’m so sorry to bother you, I have an appointment with Dr. Bender. Do you know
where I might find him?”
“Look in his office, number 123B just down from mine. If he’s not there, you
can try his lab back that way on the left.”
Without waiting to see if Ryan understood, the gentleman turned back around and
went back to work.

Ryan moved through the offices until he
came upon 123B, and found another older gentleman, presumably another senior
investigator sitting inside. Ryan knocked on the door, to which the man held up
a finger, indicating Ryan should wait. Patiently, Ryan stood quietly at the
door for several minutes while the fellow inside typed furiously at his keyboard.
Finally, the man saved his work, and turned around. Once again the annoyance
factor seemed pretty high to Ryan, who was now feeling less than welcome.

“Hello, what do you want?”

“I’m Ryan Dane, I work for Ben James,
and I believe I have an appointment with you this afternoon, Dr. Bender.”

The man had the appearance of having
forgotten.
“Oh. Well, what would you like to talk about?”

“May I come in?”
“Yes of course, but I am a bit occupied, so please get to the point,” Dr.
Bender hurriedly said.

“Well, I’m on a project that might
benefit from the advice and/or perspective of IntelliHealth scientists such as
yourself. You see Dr. Bender, it appears that a small number of patients have
been given or nearly given the wrong medical treatment.”

“I don’t understand why you are talking to me about this,” he said slightly
agitated now.

With all the patience he could muster,
Ryan began again.
“Well, you see Dr. Bender; these treatments have been directed by prescribing
research faculty. Please understand, I’m not suggesting that a member of the
research faculty made a mistake about which procedure to follow. What I am
saying is that somehow the treatments were mixed up resulting in the patient
nearly getting an incorrect and potentially dangerous treatment. While the
error was indeed caught, it nonetheless stirred up a lot of attention,
especially in light of the danger to the patient.”

Ryan paused while Dr. Bender considered what he had just said.

“I am still not sure what you want from
me, Mr. Dane.”

“Well Dr. Bender, while we were looking
at the possible mechanisms capable of resulting in such an error, it was
realized that the only group not consulted were the researchers. I was hoping
you might be able to give me some insight into how you prescribe a treatment
for a patient. Maybe it will yield some clue as to how these errors have
occurred,” said Ryan.

“Hmm, now I see what you’re getting at,
let me introduce you to my assistant Dr. Sarin.”
Dr. Bender got up from his desk.
Heading out of the office with Ryan in tow, Dr. Bender said, “I study basic
research and do not prescribe patient treatments per se. Actually though, I
have some faculty in my lab who do prescribe patient treatments.”
After passing several doors down the hall, Dr. Bender turned and walked into a
lab suite.
“I believe the man who can help you better than I could, would be Dr. Jeff
Sarin, my lab director and research assistant. He should be in the lab right
now.”

Dr. Bender led Ryan through a large lab
suite, and began asking for Jeff. With just a few tries, Bender found the man
he was looking for and introduced him to Ryan. Then as quickly as possible, and
with barely a wave, Dr. Bender left the two of them on his way back to his
office.

Dr. Jeff Sarin was Indian, and looked
younger than Ryan. Fortunately he seemed much more personable than his
colleagues on this floor.
 
“I’m very sorry to bother you, Dr. Sarin. I need some help, and it seems Dr.
Bender has given me to you.”

“Please call me Jeff. My real name is
Vignesh, but my students cannot pronounce it.”
Jeff smiled.
“What can I do to help?”

Ryan explained again why he was here.

Jeff thought for a moment, nodding his
head.

“Well, we do have four faculty in our
group that regularly prescribe treatment to patients. I believe some of them
prescribe treatments manually through our computer network, and others use SID
as the conduit for prescription. It really depends on the investigator, and how
they prefer to work. Both options are available to all.”

Ryan said, “May we talk with one of
each; someone who uses the SID program as well as someone who enters the data
manually?”

“Sure Ryan, lets visit Dr. Ellis, one
of our lab’s collaborating research physicians.”

Jeff led Ryan to a workbench where a
gentleman in a lab coat was moving some equipment around on the counter. As
they walked over, Jeff told Ryan that he was one of the researchers who
preferred to enter his work manually using a typical computer network terminal.

After a brief explanation, Ryan was
able to watch the doctor input and assign a treatment. While they watched, Jeff
explained that the doctor never knows anything about the patient beyond the
biological state, symptoms and health. No names and no history beyond what was
necessary to know.

He went on to say that the doctors
working in a given area of research, had access to patient data associated with
that interest regardless of which IntelliHealth Facility they were in.

“I’m not sure I understand, Jeff.”
”Well, what I mean is our researchers see the patients of the IntelliHealth
System grouped by their biological condition, not by their location. If Dr.
Ellis is approved to begin a new treatment on patients with a particular
disorder, he may prescribe a treatment that will be administered to patients
around the world, not just in our local hospital.”

Curious, Ryan said, ”So treatments our local patients receive, are equally
likely to be prescribed from here, as from any IntelliHealth Facility?”
“Yes, that’s correct,” said Dr. Ellis.

Apparently, there were lots of
crossover-collaborative treatments going on.

He was learning a lot of good things
here.

Jeff said goodbye to Dr. Ellis, turned
to Ryan.
”Now let's visit Dr. Gimble. She prefers to prescribe treatments using the SID
program.”
Walking through the lab suite, and into the next, they found Gimble looking
into some sort of microscope and occasionally pausing to write short notes in a
yellow pad.

Jeff explained why they were there, and
what they needed to see. She wasn’t happy about stopping to help them, but she
did agree. They walked over to the nearest view screen, and she began, “SID, I
need some help.”
The screen came to life displaying her current work, files and profile.
Then the SID program spoke.
“Yes of course Dr. Banner,” it said, ”How may I be of assistance?”