The parents of a 14-year-old girl, lifelong patient, want me to help them obtain a lab specimen from their child so that they can do paternity studies. Dad's sperm count was low, so they used a sperm donor, but can't be sure that they didn't get lucky and conceive the child with home-grown spermatozoa. My trouble is, they don't want to tell their daughter about this until after they get the results. They figure if there's no other bio-father, why bother to upset the kid? As I see it, it's a mistake to trick the kid. I figure they might as well deal with the situation up front. This area came up in the recent Pediatric Notes with the editor taking the position of keeping secrets if possible. My instinct is to be as open about this as we've learned to be open about conventional adoption. When kids in this situation learn about the birds and the bees, why don't we tell them there are some alternative ways of making babies? I have an appointment with the family on Thursday to discuss the issue. Max Kahn, MD New York, NY