Man on the Edge: Do You Want to Know When You’ll Die?

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It’s a system that was developed in Australia, called CriSTAL, like a crystal ball.  But it’s also called the “Death Test”.  It uses 29 different sets of criteria, like your medical history, blood pressure and stuff, then calculates how likely you are to die within the next 30 days.

The idea is that it would prevent unnecessary test on terminally ill or elderly patients and allow them to die at home surrounded by family and loved ones.  And at a recent medical conference in the U.S., doctors were chomping at the bit for it.

Of course, doctors already have some idea of how long terminally ill patients will live.  But on a broader scale, it’s a question people have wondered for ages: when will I die?  We’re so fascinated, we’ve developed stuff like the online Death Clock, which uses various life factors to figure out the exact time you’re supposed to die.  But it’s just a gag, all in morbid fun.

So if doctors could somehow combine the two, get precise info and plug it into a calculator for a healthy person, would you want to know exactly when you’ll die?  Our Man on the Edge, Robert Wilder, has a lot of life left to go, but would you want to know?