Hi Louis,

What I think all of this is really coming down to is the medical versus the
nonmedical (functional?) viewpoint to disabilities.  Handiham is apparently
more centered around the medical aspects, while people like myself are more
interested in the real-life, functional limitations, mostly artificial ones,
placed on us by our disabilities.  I'm with you.  I want Handiham to focus
just a bit more on nonmedical.  I've heard the medical questions and long
paperwork are optional.  If so, then to some degree, perhaps we're barking
up the wrong perverbial tree.  If not, I'm going to complete them, but using
incorrect and invalid information that does not at all represent my
reality...  That's exactly what many people do when they register for
various web-based services, etc.



----- Original Message -----
From: "Louis Kim Kline" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, June 26, 2004 6:59 PM
Subject: Re: New Handi-Ham Paperwork


> Hi to all.
>
> I am aware of the HIPAA laws, and as has already been stated several
times,
> Handi-Hams has no latitude on the HIPAA paperwork.  It's the law.
>
> My point is that I am not asking for Rehabilitation Services, and it seems
> to me that for those of us who are mostly able bodied, there should be
some
> way of getting materials in an accessible format to prepare for a Federal
> exam.  I am saying that it is time that some type of materials were put in
> a format that someone with a 4-track cassette player, or a Book Port, or a
> Victor Reader could read without having to disclose a lot of personal
> information.  I realize that organizations like ARRL would not want to put
> their materials out in electronic format because hams being the stingy
> so-and-sos that many are would copy them all over creation.  However, I do
> think there has to be some middle ground.  Way back in the late 1980's, I
> started to fill out a Handi-Hams application, long before HIPAA, and
> started to see questions that I felt were none of their business, and
> decided to go it alone.  That should be my right to make that
> determination.  I understand what their position is and what their purpose
> is, and I really don't have a problem with it.
>
> But, I am a member of the ARRL.  I pay a reduced membership dues because I
> am blind and cannot read QST, so I don't have them mail me one.  They
> didn't have to ask for a physical, or anything long and drawn out.  All I
> would ask is that the materials that I need should exist some where where
I
> don't have to become the client of some Rehabilitation agency to get the
> same materials that sighted amateur radio operators just buy.  And, I
think
> it's time that a bunch of us hit up the publishers of these materials to
> find a way to produce these materials for sale that is in a format that is
> accessible to blind users.
>
> That's my position on this situation.
>
> I'm not calling Handi-Ham's motives into question, or trying to bash
> them--they are simply not my cup of tea.
>
> 73, de Lou K2LKK
>
>
>
> Louis Kim Kline
> A.R.S. K2LKK
> Home e-mail:  [log in to unmask]
> Work e-mail:  [log in to unmask]
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