Equally important, especially if you can't get personal contact with the birth mother for some reason, is to try to find out what medical situations run in the family...even some that may seem relatively harmless. There are over 5000 medical conditions that they now recognize run in families...some of them, if untreated, can kill...and others can do plenty of damage if they sneak up on you because you're not aware that it is a possibility in the family. Karen