People often assume doctors either love or hate medical dramas.
They start talking about a medical show they adore and assume I’ve watched every episode.
The truth is, I’m more selective in what I watch. Medical shows are like crime and legal series. They’re always in demand because audiences never tire of the emotional stakes and intense emotions in each episode. Only not all medical shows are equal.
There are ones I’ll happily return to and others I can’t get through a single episode without mentally rewriting the script. As a screenwriter as well this means I watch with a different lens which possibly makes me more critical. For me, it isn’t about certainty, or perfection. In medicine, they don’t exist. A procedure can be technically correct, but healing is individual and never certain. Each body, and individual, is different.
Doctors don’t expect television to mirror real life but there is a line – somewhere between drama and complete disbelief – and once it’s crossed, it’s hard to come back from.
I’m looking at you House. Every case doesn’t need a Sherlock Holmes approach with an out-of-left-field diagnosis followed by a high-risk intervention, only to pivot to something more rare moments later. In the world I know, Dr House would be an ethical and medicolegal nightmare. And that’s before we even get to his substance abuse. Even so, lots of people loved the show. Just not me.
Common things occur commonly and can be equally dramatic in their consequences. There are a few shows that get it right. Or at least, right enough.
For many doctors, ER still sets the benchmark. I remember watching the first few episodes and being emotionally drawn in, as if watching a documentary.
Almost reliving moments that were played out on screen. Every case and situation was relatable. Since it debuted in 1994, the show has set the benchmark for medical dramas. And it still works today. Some of my most powerful memories of television are actually from ER.
It captured the pace, the unpredictability, and the organised chaos of emergency medicine.
Patients didn’t arrive neatly packaged with obvious diagnoses. Things evolved. Sometimes slowly. Sometimes catastrophically, and the rest of the hospital didn’t stop for just one patient for all the staff to focus on.
It also showed something else – the toll. Long shifts, emotional fatigue, large financial debts from years of study, physical and verbal abuse by patients and relatives. The quiet accumulation of difficult cases; grief and loss.
It didn’t glamorise medicine. It showed what it costs. In the early stage of my medical career, it was reassuring that someone had lifted the veil on what patients rarely saw.
More recently, The Pitt (HBO) has struck a similar chord. In some ways, it’s akin to ER on speed – but it still delivers a powerful emotional punch.
The medicine is riveting, writing is brilliant and the fast-paced action is expertly choreographed. The prosthetics and procedures are incredibly life-like. It’s clear they take authenticity very seriously and even have a medical training bootcamp for the actors and crew. Filmed in almost continuous scenes, you can’t look away or afford to get distracted by your phone. Is it perfect? No. But is it television at its best – entertaining, informative and completely engaging. Yes.
Even though my daughter challenges me to ‘pick the diagnosis’ before the doctors on the show can, The Pitt has given my own children a greater and more realistic insight into what we lived through as medical students, young doctors, then as more senior doctors. Technology and diagnostic tests may be different overtime, but patients, presentations and emotional loads remain similar.
And then there’s Scrubs. On the surface, Scrubs is the least realistic of all the medical shows. But it’s a comedy with a lot of heart. In many ways, it captures something the others don’t.
The absurdity, the strange, surreal moments that happen in hospitals. Internal monologues, self-doubt and insecurities, internal panic – all hide behind a (mostly) composed exterior. It’s as if the writers could read our minds. Scrubs perfectly highlights early medical experiences and the unrelenting desperation to do the right thing by every patient.
Medicine can be deeply serious. But it can also be unexpectedly funny. Scrubs mines humour in dark moments while maintaining patient respect through its endearing and quirky characters. It understands the need to laugh to make sense of nonsensical things. First debuting in 2001, it caused laughs and occasional tears for viewers. This year’s reboot still manages to showcase the struggles and absurdity of medicine, only with a generation of students and interns who’ve grown up with screens and social media. This time the original cast are now mentors who still want to do right by everyone, and the absurdity is still going strong.
And thankfully, shows that engage and make us feel are the ones that stay with us – long after the episode ends.
Medical shows that become more soap opera whose focus becomes the revolving door of relationships involving medical staff. Neglecting patient care for sex in a cupboard isn’t all that professional to me. Shows in which one doctor in a major teaching hospital is a master of every possible branch of surgery from paediatric appendicitis to adult organ transplantation and everything in between.
Thankfully, there are still medical shows that strike the right balance – engaging, without losing sight of reality. And stay with us long after the episode ends.
ER is currently available to stream in Australia on ABC iview, as well as Netflix and Max (formerly HBO Max).
The Pitt is available on Max (formerly HBO Max), typically accessed in Australia via Foxtel or Binge.
Scrubs can be streamed in Australia on Disney+, where both the original series and newer reboot are available.
IMPORTANT LEGAL INFO This article is of a general nature and FYI only, because it doesn’t take into account your personal health requirements or existing medical conditions. That means it’s not personalised health advice and shouldn’t be relied upon as if it is. Before making a health-related decision, you should work out if the info is appropriate for your situation and get professional medical advice.