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So JJ Abrams announced a few days ago that

the new villain Kylo Ren is NOT a Sith.

I kinda don't believe him, because this is the same guy who said Cumberbatch wasn't playing Khan, even after filming on that one had already begun....

But anyways, this got me thinking about how this character would have realized that they have the Force. Which got me thinking about midichlorians. Do only Jedi and Sith know about the midichlorians? Or do they show up on doctor scans? Are there doctors in Star Wars and do they scan for midichlorians (or even know about them)? Would they show up as some kind of weird infection or parasite? Like, "What's wrong with me, doc? I can move objects with my mind!" Doc says, "No idea, but you're covered in microscopic lice!"

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    One might say that Abrams was telling the truth when he said Cumberbatch wasn't playing Khan.
    – Praxis
    Aug 28, 2015 at 2:58
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    There are many different types of practitioners of the Dark Side of the Force, the Sith are only one type. According to his wookie page, Kylo Ren is not a Sith but a member of the Knights of Ren. JJ Abrams is making the distinction between Ren and Darth Krayt/Lumiya, who actually were Sith at the time.
    – Phyneas
    Aug 28, 2015 at 3:25
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    @Praxis: True from a certain point of view, as Obi-Wan would say. Aug 28, 2015 at 9:01
  • In a sense, anyone swinging around a red lightsaber and wielding the dark side of the Force could decide to call themselves "Sith". Close enough. But if Kylo Ren is considered to be "not a Sith" that could mean that he is not part of the official Banite Sith lineage, meaning he was not trained by a Sith from Bane's ( and Palpatine's ) order. Aug 29, 2015 at 14:51
  • Not just doctors. They do blood tests for midichlorians at casinos too, if they suspect a force user is trying to rip them off (that's in the book Darth Plageus).
    – Hack-R
    Jul 17, 2016 at 5:31

2 Answers 2

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Are there medical doctors? Yes, although most medical treatment appears to be performed by droids.

In The Empire Strikes Back you see at least two forms of medical treatment.

  • The Bacta tank that Luke recovered in after getting injured by the wampa ice creature on Hoth
  • The medical droid, 2-1B, which attached Luke's new hand.

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Additionally we saw a medical droid in Revenge of the Sith during the delivery of Luke and Leah.

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There are also doctors and medics as seen in Star Wars : Clone Wars.

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Do they scan for Midichlorians? Yes, at least on Republic worlds.

In the Republic, all newborns are required to get testing.

On all Republic worlds, newborns were subject to mandatory blood-testing to detect the concentration of Midi-chlorians in a sample. If results were returned with a high percentage, the sample was forwarded to the Temple on Coruscant for recording in the Jedi Acquisition Division's database. - wookieepedia

On a non-Republic planet (or outlier) like Tatooine Jedi might manually test people. Such as Qui-Gon testing Anakin in The Phantom Menace.

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  • Qui-Gon only ended up testing Anakin because of unusual circumstances. Generally speaking, people on planets outside the Republic were probably not tested for the most part. Qui-Gon explained that Anakin's count escaped early detection due to his (presumably) not having been born in the Republic. Aug 29, 2015 at 14:55
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There are all manner of doctors and medical researchers in the Star Wars Universe. Midi-chlorians could be detected through a simple blood test and medical researchers associated with the Jedi and the Sith, and even those not associated with the Sith or Jedi, often did research on them.

Knowledge of midi-chlorians waxed and waned depending on the period you are asking about; for instance the Empire made it illegal to investigate midi-chlorians and destroyed so much of the data on them that by the time Luke Skywalker founded the New Jedi Order in 11 ABY he had no idea about them.

In the Republic Era it was mandatory for all children born on Republic worlds to be tested for midi-chlorians. The Jedi Acquisition Division was responsible for coordinating the search and collection of new Force-sensitives, including those not born on Republic worlds. In the Imperial Era there was also testing for midi-chlorians but after the Empire fell in 4 ABY that testing most likely ceased as there is no record of it until sometime before 40 ABY.

As Kylo Ren was born after the Battle of Endor (4 ABY), there is nothing to suggest that he was tested for midi-chlorians, though we do not currently have enough information on him to know for sure.

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