Medical officer for Olympics events

Kwan is the U.S.'s leading gold-medal contender in figure skating. Spaulding is a UB professor of medicine and one of four U.S. physicians helping the Japanese conduct drug testing at Nagano. She is lead medical officer for figure skating, women's hockey, short-track skating, some long-track skating events and the newest Olympic ice sport, curling.

This is Spaulding's second Olympic experience. She was lead medical officer in Atlanta in 1996 for two hugely popular competitions: the aquatic events-swimming, diving, water polo, synchronized swimming-and track and field. The job is a gift from the gods for the avid sports fan and mother of two daughters who are competitive athletes. "It's one of the greatest experiences I've ever had in my life," she said.

Adventure began in 1990

Nagano is far removed from the local competition in 1990, where Spaulding's adventure began. She volunteered to do the drug testing for her daughter's swim meet and found the experience fascinating. She received her training and certification in time to handle testing for swimming and track and field for the World University Games in Buffalo in 1993. When the call went out for volunteer medical officers for Atlanta, Spaulding wrote to everyone she knew offering her services, and her efforts paid off.

There she met Carl Lewis ("Very nice"); Jackie Joyner ("Really terrific") and Michael Johnson ("Pretty cold"). She chatted with 15-year-old swimming phenomenon Brook Bennett, and got to know the women's swim team and the U.S. fencing team.

Spaulding spends most days as chief of oncology at the Buffalo VA Medical Center, but her avocation takes her to competitions all over the East. In recent months, she supervised drug testing at the World Cup Free Style Skiing team competition in Sugar Loaf, Maine, and the Olympic short-track skating trials in Lake Placid. Her venues also have included the 1997 Boston Marathon, the 1997 U.S. Track and Field Championships in Indianapolis and the World Cup water polo competition and the Olympic track and field trials held in Atlanta prior to the Olympics.

Exhausting work for medical staff

Those Summer Games were unquestionably the pinnacle. Spaulding recounts 16-hour days, subsisting on turkey sandwiches and an occasional Big Mac, and loving it. "After the first week, we were all exhausted," she says. "I don't think I've worked that hard since I was an intern."

Spaulding's job as lead medical officer is to make sure all test samples are collected and packaged without tampering, and that each athlete certifies in writing that the process was conducted properly.

The ingenuity of users, combined with the development of ever-more-advanced performance-enhancing drugs, has transformed what should be a simple matter of collecting a urine sample into a closely monitored, painstaking procedure.

"No matter what you do with innovative drug testing, they are one step ahead of you," Spaulding says. She tells of athletes using catheters to fill the bladder with "clean" urine, strapping a container of urine to the body, or hiding a urine bag in the vaginal cavity. Athletes selected for testing now are observed constantly from start to finish to prevent such transgressions.

The new drug of choice is erythropoietin, a hormone that stimulates the bone marrow to produce red blood cells, Spaulding says. An increase in red blood cells boosts the amount of oxygen available to muscles to perform work, which increases endurance. The arrival of erythropoietin adds a new step to the drug-testing process: some competitors now will be asked to provide a blood sample, as well as a urine specimen. Urine is analyzed for evidence of steroids, human growth factor and diuretics, which can mask the presence of performance-enhancing drugs, as well as flush evidence of illegal drugs from the system, Spaulding says. Tests also look for stimulants, narcotics and beta blockers, sometimes taken by marksmen to slow the heartbeat and gain an extra moment of dead calm in which to take aim and shoot.

Drug testing is conducted on all medal winners and world-record setters, as well as randomly selected athletes, Spaulding says.

Testing insures reliable result

While drug testing was instituted to protect athletes from dangerous substances as much as to maintain a level playing field, the process is designed to insure a reliable result that will withstand legal challenges.

Athletes selected for testing are escorted off the field of competition, notified of their selection and must sign a form certifying the time of notification. They then have one hour to appear for testing. If they don't, a positive result is automatically registered, Spaulding says.

Most competitors appear as requested, however, and their main task is to produce a urine sample while being observed (not Spaulding's job), a predicament that can give even a champion pause.

Once samples are procured, athletes select a testing kit, certify its pristine condition, divide the sample between two bottles, label and seal the bottles, place them in the packing kit, seal the kit and testify in writing that all procedures were followed properly.

One sample is tested, the other is frozen. If sample A is positive, sample B also is tested. If both results are positive, appropriate sanctions are imposed. Labs have been set up in Nagano for testing, which must be completed within 24 hours.

Nagano will be different from Atlanta, aside from the fact it is on another continent. Japan has no history of volunteerism, so, unlike Atlanta, Spaulding will be paid, in addition to receiving room and board.

But she won't be outfitted in spiffy Olympic gear. It's not that the Japanese are tight-fisted: Their women's clothes are too small, even for a petite American. That shouldn't be a problem in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, with its hearty Australians, and Spaulding hopes to be there.