Debbie Mirek Debra " Debbie " Lynn Mirek , " née " Packard , was a writer who had a single , albeit an influential one , official co - author credit as " Debbie Mirek " for the reference book , . While Mirek officially has this one official " Star Trek " credit only , her contributions to the franchise actually expanded beyond the one credit . Already befriended with Denise Tathwell , Mirek came into contact with the franchise through Tathwell , when the latter became engaged to Michael Okuda . It was in this period that , " " ( . . . ) Roddenberry asked Mike to write up a chronology to keep the facts straight between and . I think at the time , he thought it would be about 7 - 10 pages of dates . Well , Mike ( and Denise and ME ) is a pathological overachiever . He felt to do the treatment justice , we would have to watch each episode and take notes . . . we ended up with about 10 pages of notes for EACH episode and the chronology was born . " " Though Mirek was mentioned as proof reader and editor in the long list of acknowledgments in the itself , she was not officially credited for it . Nevertheless , her contributions as researcher to this work were explicitly mentioned in her mini - biography in the first edition of the one year later released " Encyclopedia " ( p . 397 ) . Immediately upon completion of the work on the " Chronology " , the Okudas hit upon the idea of doing the " Encyclopedia " and , " " Michael asked if I wanted to do it ( ranked as the second most stupid question he ever asked me ; ) and I said yes . " " However , several reasons – the particulars Mirek was loathe to get into , only admitting the experience to be " less pleasant " and elaborating that , " " We had some personal issues we couldn ' t resolve . It got ugly , so I decided to come back and live in the real world . " " , thereby declining to be part of the subsequent editions – resulted in her author profile being deleted and her credit presented in lower - case fonts for the subsequent editions . Nevertheless , while she was involved with the Okudas for the two reference works during the early 1990s , she frequently got to visit the production of and became acquainted with the other ers as well , admitting tongue - in - cheek that , " " ( . . . ) they are very nice people . Most of them are really normal , too ! ; ) . " " When becoming aware of her background as a certified nurse , Mirek was often consulted on specific medical issues , " de facto " serving as an unofficial science consultant , as she recalled , " " I used to get calls about medical questions for scripts and had one very memorable conversation with Ron Moore about childbirth " [ note : for ] " . " " Mirek went even as far as loaning out the production actual items from the hospital she was working at , though that was not an altogether successful endeavor as far as she was concerned , " " Also had another , not quite so pleasant conversation with the TNG props master about medical props they were borrowing from the hospital where I worked . He was a snot . " " By the time the fourth edition of the " Encyclopedia " was released in 2016 , it was obviously massively revised , but Mirek was still acknowledged for her contributions to the first edition by the Okuda couple , they having added in the acknowledgments in Volume One , " " Her absence from this edition is keenly felt . " " Career outside " Star Trek " . Originally a trained nurse by profession , Debbie Mirek has worked in that capacity in a hospital in Orange County , CA , and it was there where she met and befriended Denise Tathwell ( with whom she shared her middle name ) . When Tathwell , upon meeting Mike Okuda a year later , moved to Los Angeles , Mirek stayed in close contact with her , ultimately leading up to her participation on the " Chronology " and " Encyclopedia " . While she has been credited as a writer in her mini - biography in the first edition of the " Encyclopedia " , that work has to date remained her sole recorded writing credit . Mirek , mother of two daughters and one son , is currently making her home with her husband Thomas in Orlando , Florida .