#6 - Hospital auditor: The Rodriguez family stipulated

[ntusss]

Hi PowerScore Staff,

I'm stuck between (A) and (D), and I hoped that you can shed some light on this.

I'm concerned about (D) because I don't think the clinic administrator implied that the clinic is adhering strictly to the conditions the R family placed on using money. Isn't the word "strictly" too strong? I thought that the administrator only argued that the new tech will help lessen patients' suffering, but does that mean that it will help minimize patients' suffering?

Regarding (A), I guess the problem is that the hospital auditor did not specifically talk about "early treatment of neurological disorders", and thus we wouldn't know his/her opinion on (A). Is that right?

Thanks in advance.

[nusheenaparvizi]

Hey ntusss, I too was struggling with this question but I think (and administrators could correct me if my reasoning is wrong), but the problem with A is the second half that states " lessens the suffering associated with those disorders rather than completely eliminating such suffering." Both the hospital auditor and the clinic administrator are concerned about minimizing suffering, not with completely eliminating suffering as they both mention. Noticing that, I immediately eliminated A, because it is not a point at issue among both people- they are both agreeing and on the same page when it comes to minimizing suffering, not eliminating suffering completely.

[Adam Tyson]

Thanks for the question, ntusss, and thank you for the assist, nusheenaparvizi! You are correct that the problem with A is at the end of the answer choice. The issue is not the difference between minimizing and eliminating suffering, but between minimizing it and NOT minimizing it. A good prephrase here would have been "whether funding diagnostic technologies complies with the stipulations placed on the use of funds."

ntuss, I too was concerned with "strictly" in this case. Clearly the auditor would say "no, definitely not," but do we have sufficient evidence that the administrator would say "yes, they are strictly following the stipulations," or just "they are doing so when it comes to this portion of the funds"? I kept it as my first contender because it was very close to my prephrase, although imperfect, and I hoped that E would be better, but it wasn't. That meant I had to pick answer D because it was the best of the bunch. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, as they say!

One more note, on the use of the word "minimize." That means they have to attempt to lessen suffering as much as they can, but it doesn't mean they have to completely succeed at eliminating suffering. If the funds are reducing suffering, that should be enough to meet the criterion of minimizing it. And if early diagnosis leads to "far less" suffering, that sounds like just what the Rodriguez family wanted.