American
Broadcasting Company |
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| “MDs”
is one of a fresh crop of medical-related TV shows
scheduled for the fall programming lineup. The new
ABC series, set in a fictional San Francisco hospital,
features Jane Lynch as Nurse “Doctor”
Poole. |
Seen a doctor lately? If not, then you must not be
watching much television. Doctors, nurses and other
health care professionals are all over the tube these
days.
Whether it’s a dramatic series like “ER”
or a reality-based program like “ICU: Arkansas
Children’s Hospital,” TV producers continue
to seek viewers via the real-life drama that takes place
in hospitals every day.
At least four series—“ER,” “Scrubs,”
“Presidio Med” and “MDs”—are
scheduled for the fall lineup, and three documentary-style
TV programs—“Children’s Hospital,”
“Houston Medical” and “ICU: Arkansas
Children’s Hospital”—appeared this
summer.
Added to the mix are programs such as “General
Hospital” on ABC, “Trauma: Life in the E.R.”
on The Learning Channel and “M*A*S*H” reruns
on what seems like every other channel.
So, why all the medical-related TV shows?
Robert Thompson, professor of media and popular culture
at Syracuse University, said that medicine—along
with private detectives, law enforcement and law—is
one of four TV “franchises” that consistently
generate enough stories to keep a TV series going.
“For a series, you need these situations or settings
in which there is a constant source of dramatic tension
and major dramatic tension at that,” said Thompson,
director of the university’s Center for the Study
of Popular Television.
“The hospital shows are a matter of life or death—even
more than the cop shows—that viewers can identify
with,” Thompson said.
Richard Hanley, communications professor at Quinnipiac
University in Hamden, Conn., said another reason for
the popularity of medical-related TV shows is that most
people continue to assign a certain amount of mysticism
to the medical profession. As Shakespeare did with royalty,
portraying doctors with some sort of humanity and—in
certain instances—clay feet, resonates with the
audience, he said.
Undergirding the traditional dramatic structure in
these TV shows, Hanley said, is something that is fundamental
to the psychology of advertising: Sex and death sell.
“Medical shows seem to inject a rather thick dosage
of sexual tension among the hospital staff—note
the liaisons among “ER” staffers—and
this tension is heightened by its juxtaposition with
death or the threat of death,” he said.
And the area of sexual tension, like it or not, is
often where nurses come in.
In the early days of television, Thompson said, nurses
existed to provide a romantic interest for doctors on
programs such as “Ben Casey” and “Dr.
Kildare.” The CBS program “Trapper John,
M.D.” (1979-86) included a nurse named Gloria
Brancusi, one of the first TV nurses to be portrayed
as a professional rather than a love interest.
Another positive portrayal of nurses came in the CBS
program “Nurse” (1981-82) starring Michael
Learned, better known as the mother on “The Waltons,”
another CBS program.
The NBC program “St. Elsewhere” also portrayed
nurses as medical professionals who played a crucial
role in patient care, Thompson said, and “ER”
has continued in that vein and has introduced the “male
nurse” to the American public.
One of the most popular portrayals of nurses came on
the ABC program “China Beach,” which followed
the lives of several characters working in an Army surgical
hospital close to the frontlines. Dana Delany portrayed
nurse Lt. Colleen McMurphy, whom Delany described in
a NURSEWEEK article last year as a female Clint Eastwood.
Delany won two Emmy Awards for her portrayal and the
response from health care professionals led to her involvement
with the American Red Cross, the Texas Hospital Association
and the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Project.”
And the worst portrayal of nurses? Thompson names the
ABC series “Nightingales” (1989), which
continued the traditions of the “jiggle era”
of television best exemplified by “Charlie’s
Angels.” This Aaron Spelling production included
lengthy scenes of attractive nurses changing clothes
in the nurses’ locker room.
“I think the reason it took so long [to begin
portraying nurses as professionals] is that the first
shows focused on medicine, and doctors are cast at the
center of that,” Thompson said.
The same holds true for the reality-based TV shows.
“Houston Medical” and others often focus
on the interaction between doctors and patients even
though nurses provide the majority of patient care.
“Nurses, I think, have been treated in television
and reality shows in much the way they are treated in
the real word,” Thompson said, “and that
is as an extraordinarily underappreciated and overworked
profession.”
Thompson said reality-based medical shows always draw
a smaller audience because they’re harder to watch.
The dramatic series, like “ER,” intersperse
tense moments with lighter subplots, whereas the reality-based
programs often don’t have that option.
Chuck Bangert, executive producer of New Screen Concepts,
which produced “Houston Medical,” said the
earlier episodes were more serious than the later ones.
“We learned to cut our stride and balance them
out, especially in the fourth, fifth and sixth shows,”
he said. “You can’t be that heavy all the
time.”
“Houston Medical,” which ABC ran in the
slot usually occupied by “NYPD Blue,” received
a respectable 5.5 share, which means that about 5.5
million people viewed each episode. Bangert said ABC
has asked New Screen Concepts to continue filming at
Memorial Hermann, although it has not committed to airing
more shows.
The popularity of the program in Houston has led a
city councilman to start a campaign to save the show,
complete with its own Web site [www.savehoustonmedical.com].
Thompson said those viewers who enjoy reality-based
medical programs often are among the most devoted fans.
Susan Allen, RN, a shift manager in the preop testing
center at Doctor’s Medical Center in Modesto,
Calif., was among those who complained when she learned
that “Houston Medical” wouldn’t appear
on the fall TV schedule.
Although she has watched “ER” for years,
Allen said she prefers the reality-based programs to
the dramatic series. She said she enjoys seeing how
other hospitals handle patient care and whether they
experience the same sorts of problems as her facility.
Beth Sartori, director of corporate communications
for Memorial Hermann Healthcare System, said the feedback
on “Houston Medical” from staff and the
public has been overwhelmingly positive.
The hospital’s Webmaster has received e-mails
on a daily basis since the show premiered and a larger-than-usual
number of people used the e-greetings to send get-well
wishes to patients profiled on the show.
“Many of the viewers were health care professionals
and, based on the e-mails we received, they liked the
reality and the fact that it depicted their lives without
the Hollywood slant,” Sartori said.
Tom Bonner, senior vice president for administration
at Arkansas Children’s Hospital, said the desire
to recruit nurses and other health care professionals
was among the reasons hospital administrators decided
to allow cameras into the nation’s sixth-largest
children’s hospital.
“We want nurses to come to our hospital and to
Arkansas to live and work,” he said. “Any
positive publicity we can get that shows what this hospital
does is going to help us in this area.”
Christie Berner, MSN, RN, senior vice president for
patient care services at Arkansas Children’s Hospital,
said the four-week series has generated a number of
calls to the hospital’s employment line.
She said in the case of “ICU: Arkansas Children’s
Hospital,” the portrayal of nurses has been extensive
and favorable.
“I have been very pleased about how the nurses
have been a key part of all the episodes,” she
said. “I can’t think of one family situation
they followed where they haven’t also included
an interaction or an interview with a nurse.”
Two “break-out stars,” as Bonner described
them, were both nurses.
Berner said she especially enjoyed watching Jean Ann
Phillips, RN, manager of the hospital’s heart
operating room, who, in one scene, calls a colleague
early in the morning to discuss a heart surgery on an
infant in which they had just participated.
“She’s very dedicated and extremely competent
and when you heard her talk you could see she was very
thorough and very careful about her job and took her
responsibilities very seriously,” Berner said.
“I thought she was showing the competence a nurse
can have.”
Contact
Scott Williams at scottwilliams21@msn.com.
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