Grey's Anatomy: Entertaining but Irresponsible

[okarol]

FROM FOXNEWS.COM - EDITORIAL

Grey's Anatomy: Entertaining but Irresponsible

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

by Peter Brown

The ABC medical drama Grey's Anatomy has become television's top show by transferring the "all for one, one for all" mentality of the now-departed mega-hit Friends to a hospital setting.

The problem is that in real life, friends don't usually look the other way when crimes are committed and rules are broken -- nor should they.

And, the show's message that it is perfectly normal, and to some degree acceptable, for people in the position to decide who lives and who dies to give preference to their personal emotions over the law and medical ethics is profoundly disturbing.

Of course it is only TV. But given the medium's power and the topic's seriousness, I for one am offended by a major story line of the hit show, which by the way, is terrifically entertaining.

One of the show's main characters, Dr. Isobel Stevens, a lingerie model turned medical intern, breaks the law and medical canon to manipulate the way heart transplants are allocated to save her fiance, Denny.

The show's failing is that it gives the inaccurate impression that the transplant process is capricious, can be easily manipulated, and if so, what's the harm, since it's to help a friend.

I am not a doctor, but I was fortunate enough in 2002 to receive a liver transplant. I became acquainted with the arduous process by which organs are allocated.

Organ transplants are the ultimate zero-sum game. For every patient saved, someone else is not. There are many more people needing hearts, livers, lungs and kidneys than there are available organs. Thousands of Americans die each year waiting for a transplant.

Everyone connected with the transplant process -- doctors, nurses, donor families, or recipients and their families -- understands this.

The United Network For Organ Sharing supervises U.S. transplants. It has set criteria for evaluating patients' needs, primarily based on a recipients' closeness to death, overall health and ability to thrive afterwards. It decides who gets a transplant and who doesn't.

In Grey's Anatomy, the Dr. Stevens makes her fiance sicker in order to move him up the list when a heart becomes available. Several fellow interns, instead of stopping her, aid in her efforts.

The patient dies after the transplant and the other interns don't report what happened. Later, they refuse to finger the culprit in some kind of celebration of friendship. If coming attractions are to be believed, the hospital lets Dr. Stevens back on staff.

Arthur Caplan, the Emmanuel and Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania, says what would then happen in the real world is this:

--Dr. Stevens would probably face murder or manslaughter charges, since she began a process that resulted in the patient's death. She would face criminal charges for falsifying medical records. She would be dismissed from the intern program and almost certainly never get a medical license.

--The hospital, aware it could lose its accreditation to do transplants and have to pay a huge damage settlement (not just to this patient's family, but to the family of the one who didn't get the heart due to the fraud), would report what happened to the state medical board, UNOS and the police.

--The other interns could also face criminal charges. Their medical futures would be in doubt since they could be considered accessories to the crime.

In the show, no one calls the cops or the state medical authorities. Nothing happens to the other interns.

Now, television is, of course, entertainment. It is invested in hooking viewers on Dr. Stevens' character. But it is also a business, hence their reluctance to write a popular character off the show.

You got the feeling when the tough resident doctor who supervises the interns began lobbying the big boss to take Dr. Stevens back that she is going to somehow return to the hospital and all her friends.

That is a shame. Television doesn't have to replicate real life. But when a drama, not an obvious farce like the NBC comedy Scrubs, suggests crime can be without consequences, it is as dangerous to the public good as when it glorifies sex and violence.

original: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,224582,00.html
...........

[Epoman]

Yeah that's pretty messed up, a lot of TV shows really distort the truth. For example the other night I was watching "Nip Tuck" on FX networks and one of the characters needed a kidney because hers was "stolen"  and they showed her on dialysis one time then the next thing you know she has a donor and they are doing the transplant and the "plastic surgeons" were assisting in the procedure. They covered the whole process in under an hour of TV. I know it's just a TV show but that episode REALLY glamourized the whole process, making it seem like a walk in the park. 

[Stacy Without An E]

You're exactly right Epoman, I was flipping around and stopped when I realized Nip/Tuck was on.  When they showed her in the clinic she worked in receiving Dialysis, I thought it was pretty cool because they used the same Dialysis machine my clinic does, the newer ones with the computer touch screens.

By the end of the episode, not only does she receive a kidney from frickin' Rosie O'Donnell (how'd you like to have her hanging around because she donated...I'd rather stay on Dialysis) but they didn't honestly portray what a Dialysis patient goes through.  She was lying there relaxing like she was at a health spa.

It's time I finish my Dialysis script and teach the world what we're suffering through damnit.

Wait.  Is "damnit" a curse word??

[angieskidney]

By the end of the episode, not only does she receive a kidney from frickin' Rosie O'Donnell (how'd you like to have her hanging around because she donated...I'd rather stay on Dialysis) but they didn't honestly portray what a Dialysis patient goes through.  She was lying there relaxing like she was at a health spa.

It's time I finish my Dialysis script and teach the world what we're suffering through damnit.

Wait.  Is "damnit" a curse word??

Ya exactly!!! A guy once said to me, "Oh come on! Why are you too tired to play a game online with me? All you do in dialysis is sit in a chair and watch TV!! Now stop with the excuses and play this game with me!"

Grrr ... it frustrates me! There is more things people have said that shows thier ignorance but those are for another thread  

[Black]

FROM FOXNEWS.COM - EDITORIAL

Grey's Anatomy: Entertaining but Irresponsible

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

by Peter Brown

... One of the show's main characters, Dr. Isobel Stevens, a lingerie model turned medical intern, breaks the law and medical canon to manipulate the way heart transplants are allocated to save her fiance, Denny.

The show's failing is that it gives the inaccurate impression that the transplant process is capricious, can be easily manipulated, and if so, what's the harm, since it's to help a friend.

I am not a doctor, but I was fortunate enough in 2002 to receive a liver transplant. I became acquainted with the arduous process by which organs are allocated.

Organ transplants are the ultimate zero-sum game. For every patient saved, someone else is not. There are many more people needing hearts, livers, lungs and kidneys than there are available organs. Thousands of Americans die each year waiting for a transplant.

Everyone connected with the transplant process -- doctors, nurses, donor families, or recipients and their families -- understands this.

The United Network For Organ Sharing supervises U.S. transplants. It has set criteria for evaluating patients' needs, primarily based on a recipients' closeness to death, overall health and ability to thrive afterwards. It decides who gets a transplant and who doesn't.

In Grey's Anatomy, the Dr. Stevens makes her fiance sicker in order to move him up the list when a heart becomes available. Several fellow interns, instead of stopping her, aid in her efforts.

The patient dies after the transplant and the other interns don't report what happened. Later, they refuse to finger the culprit in some kind of celebration of friendship. If coming attractions are to be believed, the hospital lets Dr. Stevens back on staff.

Arthur Caplan, the Emmanuel and Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania, says what would then happen in the real world is this:

--Dr. Stevens would probably face murder or manslaughter charges, since she began a process that resulted in the patient's death. She would face criminal charges for falsifying medical records. She would be dismissed from the intern program and almost certainly never get a medical license.

--The hospital, aware it could lose its accreditation to do transplants and have to pay a huge damage settlement (not just to this patient's family, but to the family of the one who didn't get the heart due to the fraud), would report what happened to the state medical board, UNOS and the police.

--The other interns could also face criminal charges. Their medical futures would be in doubt since they could be considered accessories to the crime....
original: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,224582,00.html
...........

The Fox story does have merit but I hope everyone knows TV shows are fiction.  However, the Pollyanna who wrote the piece needs to do more research.

""UNOS routinely fails to detect problems"
 
   
Transplant monitor lax in oversight
U.S. organ network routinely fails to detect problems.

By Charles Ornstein and Tracy Weber
Los Angeles Times Staff Writers

October 22, 2006

The little-known organization that oversees the nation's organ transplant system often fails to detect or decisively fix problems at derelict hospitals — even when patients are dying at excessive rates, a Times investigation has found. ...
 [snip]
Breaking the rules

A few years ago, Temple University Medical Center found a way to speed up its patients' waits for heart transplants.

It reported some patients to be sicker than they were, according to records and interviews, allowing them to jump ahead of patients at other hospitals on a UNOS waiting list.

The hospital did this repeatedly — over four years.

Patients at other hospitals, some of whom were unfairly bumped down the list, had no way of knowing what happened. In fact, the story has never been publicly disclosed.

UNOS knew what was going on, though. In 1999, records show, a UNOS inspection found that the hospital was unable to prove that at least 13 of its patients were sick enough to be classified as "Status 1A," meaning they were on the verge of death and entitled to priority. Temple officials said it was a mistake — it had misinterpreted the rules, according to a confidential UNOS summary of the Temple case.

UNOS closed the matter.

In the months that followed, however, UNOS reviewers determined that Temple had inflated the conditions of 12 more patients. During a January 2001 meeting with UNOS officials, Temple proposed a compromise: It would have its Status 1A listings reviewed in advance by a UNOS panel. In return, the oversight group agreed to hold off on discipline for a year.

In 2002, Temple broke the rules again, misclassifying a patient as near death. After UNOS reviewers rejected the assessment, the hospital proceeded with the transplant anyway.

The hospital's cross-town competitor was incensed.

"If there's a sense that one place isn't playing by the rules, and you play by the rules, then your poor patients aren't going to get a fair shake," Dr. Michael Acker, head of cardiac transplantation at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, said in a recent interview.

In a July 2002 inspection, UNOS found 64 more cases in which the patients' urgent conditions "could not be confirmed with the facts" in their medical records, the UNOS summary said.

That October, UNOS again compromised with Temple, agreeing not to revoke the hospital's "good standing" if Temple promised to change its ways.

The following month, its board of directors placed Temple on confidential probation. Temple completed its probation in January 2006.

"Our transplant program today has been infused with new leadership and improved processes that continue to meet or exceed all recognized industry standards," Temple said in a written statement to The Times.

UNOS' timid response to Temple is not an isolated example. ...[snip]"

I have the entire article from the LA Times.  If anyone is interested in reading all of it, I'll post it in another thread.

[okarol]

Hi - Here's the thread regarding that LA TIMES article http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?topic=1644.0.

I for one feel that the fraternity of doctor's is like a secret society, they won't expose
mistakes or other related facts and they are always covering for each other. If you try
to get your own medical records it's nearly impossible without a court order. The article
about UNOS exhibits some of thie good ol' boy courtesy given to transplant centers who
were given second, third and fourth chances to clean up their act. There is no way that
anyone can say with certainty that the system cannot be manipulated to benefit a patient
if the doctor has an agenda. The chances of getting caught and prosecuted are unlikely
because UNOS's role is not as a policing agency. Grey's Anatomy is probably closer to the
truth than the what that Bioethics Professor claims would happen.

[Black]

Hi - Here's the thread regarding that LA TIMES article http://ihatedialysis.com/forum/index.php?topic=1644.0.

I for one feel that the fraternity of doctor's is like a secret society, they won't expose
mistakes or other related facts and they are always covering for each other. If you try
to get your own medical records it's nearly impossible without a court order. The article
about UNOS exhibits some of the good ol' boy courtesy given to transplant centers who
were given second, third and fourth chances to clean up their act. There is no way that
anyone can say with certainty that the system cannot be manipulated to benefit a patient
if the doctor has an agenda. The chances of getting caught and prosecuted are unlikely
because UNOS's role is not as a policing agency. Grey's Anatomy is probably closer to the
truth than the what that Bioethics Professor claims would happen.

Thanks for the link, Karol, and yes, I agree on the "secret society".  (That was one of the things I liked about the character, Jack, on the show "Lost".  He reported his own father for malpractice. LOL, more TV)  And, yes, GA was unfortunately probably closer to the truth than the professor.

UNOS may not directly be a policing agency BUT they are the agency in charge and they are responsible for oversight.  It's difficult to closely monitor every patient but the pattern of manipulation, neglect and abuse which was ignored for years is inexcusable.  IMO, the good ol' boy network of "you cover my ass and I'll cover yours" came into play there as well.  Anyone who does not believe that sort of thing happens hasn't been involved with the medical community much.

[jdat]

By the end of the episode, not only does she receive a kidney from frickin' Rosie O'Donnell (how'd you like to have her hanging around because she donated...I'd rather stay on Dialysis) but they didn't honestly portray what a Dialysis patient goes through.  She was lying there relaxing like she was at a health spa.

It's time I finish my Dialysis script and teach the world what we're suffering through damnit.

Wait.  Is "damnit" a curse word??

Ya exactly!!! A guy once said to me, "Oh come on! Why are you too tired to play a game online with me? All you do in dialysis is sit in a chair and watch TV!! Now stop with the excuses and play this game with me!"

Grrr ... it frustrates me! There is more things people have said that shows thier ignorance but those are for another thread  

She did say she didn't want to be on dialysis 6 hours a day! 
Nip/Tuck is so overboard I sometimes find it painful to watch it is so grotesk...