The regular morning meeting of the research database project has just convened, and the task this day is to revisit a question that has nagged the group for months: Whom to include in a study of bad drug reactions and their prevalence, when there will be millions of patients to consider, some with gaps in their Kaiser membership.
On the one hand, if the gap is too long, it would be impossible to know what happened to the patient during this time. On the other, if researchers are too picky, they risk missing rare but important side effects.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Tuesday, January 06, 2009 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 1 inches; 45 words Type of Material: Correction
Dr. Morris Collen: An article in Saturday's Section A about 95-year-old doctor Morris Collen said that when he earned his medical degree in 1939, penicillin had yet to be discovered. Penicillin was discovered in 1928, but no one was successfully treated with it until 1942.
With the benefit of 60 years of Kaiser history stored in his balding, freckled head, Collen comes down on the side of inclusion.
He prevails.
"When I come here, I drop off 40 years; I feel like a 50-year-old," he says after the spirited meeting. "I call this my survivor therapy."
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Collen has just arrived back at Sunrise Assisted Living, his home for the last two years and a place he regards with deep affection. The complex has two separate buildings: his and one for residents with Alzheimer's disease.
"If I live long enough," he adds with a wry laugh, "I'll graduate."
Here's the bistro, where he gets his four or five cups of coffee a day. And the dining room, set up like a restaurant, where he and his pal, Pete the dentist, have meals and "watch the girls go by."
Collen crosses the lobby and heads for the stairs. His fellow "fogies" have gathered for some live music, and the area is wall-to-wall walkers and wheelchairs. His sole complaint: Activities tend to be "spectator sports," a little tame for a guy with a car.
Collen considers the oval second floor his "racetrack." He has paced it out at about a block and tries to do 10 laps each day. He has stopped walking outdoors -- too much rain, too much sun.
"Here," he says, "I just put my slippers on, and for me, it's just perfect."
Equally perfect is Unit 228, all jam-packed 362 square feet of it. There are two dressers, two desks, two filing cabinets, the bed he and Bobbie shared, a sofa, a coffee table, a bookcase, a television, boxes of files for his current book project.
And his computer. For Collen, the machine is equal parts tool, entertainment system and lifeline.
He is tapping out "The History of Medical Informatics: The Clinical Support Systems" on it. He uses it to watch movies, scroll through hundreds of family photos, listen to Vladimir Horowitz playing classical piano.
