Recently I attended a workshop by Dick Eastman on Cloud Computing provided by my local genealogy society. \u00a0Dick spoke briefly, a lunch break was given and then the workshop resumed. \u00a0Although his information was interesting, it was the side conversations I overheard during lunch that piqued my interest.<\/p>\n
I need to offer a disclaimer first – one of my children is employed by a large laboratory in the U.S. and part of the job responsibility is to trouble shoot and then correct problems that individual labs are encountering. \u00a0 The troubleshooting my child does is regarding equipment and not results. \u00a0To my knowledge, none of that organization’s business is in DNA analysis. \u00a0Even so, this proud momma often hears from family and friends who got results back that there must have been some mistake – how could whatever level that was being measured be so high, etc. \u00a0It was with this background that I brought to eavesdropping on the conversation at the next table…<\/p>\n
A woman was explaining that she had recently had her DNA results returned and she wasn’t matching with anyone in her family. \u00a0She is unmarried and has no children so none of them tested. \u00a0Her parents are deceased and she had no siblings. \u00a0By matching, she was referring to cousins. \u00a0A man at the table conjectured the lab had made a mistake and mixed up the samples. \u00a0Another attendee reported that his results matched with his children, siblings and first cousins but not with relatives from 3 generations back. \u00a0He, too, originally thought the lab had erred. \u00a0Then a match occurred with a surname which he was not familiar. \u00a0He thought he had somehow missed that line in his research so he went back over his records and low and behold, discovered that the matching surname lived in the same boarding house as his 2x’s great grandmother. \u00a0Hmm. \u00a0And yes, great grandma was married to who he had assumed was his great grandfather at the time. \u00a0There went all of his research on that great grandpa’s line!<\/p>\n
Could a lab make a mistake? \u00a0Absolutely! \u00a0The likelihood, though, is not as great with the processes and procedures that are in place as is the entanglement of human relationships.<\/p>\n
The following day I was reading a list serv to which I belong and an individual had posted how she had inadvertently given a female DNA test kit to a male relative. \u00a0The lab caught it and asked for clarification.<\/p>\n
My advice if your returned results give you unexpected findings – get the test redone at another site. \u00a0Prices are dropping for the holidays so the cost is negligible. \u00a0There are “rumors” that Ancestry will run a special beginning November 25th for $69.00 to beat the FTDNA price of $79.00. \u00a0I don’t have that in writing so check around on the 25th to see what happens.<\/p>\n
When the test results are returned, if they’re similar, well, you know you need to explore other lines to determine who’s the daddy. \u00a0If they are not the same, I’d contact the lab and share your findings. \u00a0You’d probably get your money refunded if the lab made the error and an offer for another test as a thank you for letting them know there is a quality control problem. \u00a0Personally, I’m betting on the relationships and not the lab as the culprit.<\/p>\n
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