Last Dance, Last Chance

her during one of her earlier hospitalizations. Snyderman found the results so bizarre that he wondered if Debbie might be suffering from some kind of poisoning. He spoke to Anthony on August 9 and asked that he bring Debbie in for more blood tests. But he didn’t even hint at poisoning. He said only that he wanted to test for a condition known as porphyria.
    When Dr. Snyderman told Anthony that he felt Debbie should really be in the hospital at once, Anthony said that he would have to consult with Drs. Samie and Koleini and see what they thought. That struck Snyderman as a patent lie; he had already consulted with them, and they had agreed with him that she needed to be in the hospital as soon as possible.
    Finally, Anthony agreed to bring Debbie in to be admitted. Debbie’s in-patient records began somewhat routinely, written, as all medical records are, without emotion.
    “The patient is a 42-year-old white married female with history of recurrent episodes of major depression and pancreatitis two weeks ago. She was admitted to the hospital because of increasing ataxia on standing, distal sensory loss, and sluggishness of the ankle and knee reflexes. Two weeks ago, the patient had an episode of pancreatitis and about four days prior to admission the patient started to have the gradual onset of tingling, numbness and clumsiness of her hands and lower extremities. The patient was seen by Dr. Samie as an outpatient prior to admission and had an MRI of the brain done which was normal.”
    For the layperson, this meant that Debbie’s history of crippling stomach pain now had new symptoms that didn’t seem to tie into inflammation of the pancreas. The new symptoms had come on quite suddenly. She couldn’t feel her hands and feet, and the tingling sensations had progressed to numbness and inability to pick up anything with her hands without dropping it or tipping it over. She did have the history of many surgeries to her neck, which could have caused numbness in her arms and hands, but her other symptoms couldn’t be explained by cervical disk problems.
    Once admitted to Buffalo Mercy, she could be given a whole array of tests to try to find out what was wrong with her.
    What was wrong with Debbie Pignataro? Was it possible that Dr. Snyderman was right? Was it possible Debbie was being poisoned?

16
    I t was the hottest time of the year in Buffalo, and the towering snow drifts of winter seemed years away. Rose Gardner’s flowers wilted and began to dry up as the neighbors watched the Pignataro house, saw Anthony come and go, and wondered aloud about how Debbie was doing. They had heard that she could not have visitors. Rose lit candles and said prayers for Debbie, even though she believed it would take a miracle for Debbie to survive. She was convinced that she would probably never see her again. There had been such a pallor of death about her the last time Rose saw her.
    In the vineyards, the grapes hung heavy on their vines, and the apple and pear trees began to ripen. Wild berry pickers moved deep into the brush. Soon, the familiar roadside stands would be stocked with enough produce to make it worthwhile to leave downtown Buffalo and drive to outlying areas. Chuck Craven played golf, and the tourists flocked to both the American and the Canadian sides of Niagara Falls.
    The best part of summer meant nothing to Debbie Pignataro as she lay on snowy white sheets in a darkened room. Her world was limited now to four hospital walls. Doctors struggled to diagnose her condition, ignoring Anthony, who assured them that there was really nothing wrong with his wife beyond a somewhat complicated case of gallstones.
    They considered all possibilities. She had no history of diabetes; she had no history of alcohol abuse. Her temperature was 98.3, but her pulse raced at 120 beats a minute. Her blood pressure was 110/60 (ideal for an athlete in good condition).
    As they listened to her heart and took her pulse, they asked questions, and she seemed alert. They didn’t know that she would soon have no memory of what they had asked her. When she spoke, her words were clearly understandable. She had no head wounds; her ears, nose, and throat were fine. Her jugular vein didn’t stick out, and the carotid arteries on either side of her neck had no ominous sounds when they placed their stethoscopes there. Her heart rhythm was normal; her lungs sounded normal.
    They kept searching. The membranes in her eyes were a little pale. She