<p>After reading another short thread about Grey's Anatomy and whether internship can be fun, I'm interested in hearing a further discussion about medicine as seen on TV (like Grey's Anatomy, Dr. 90210, Strong Medicine, House, ER, etc.). I'm not sure how to begin...perhaps I'll propose a few questions:</p>
<p>How similar is the atmosphere between TV ER and real-life ERs?</p>
<p>How is the camaraderie between doctors?</p>
<p>How often do doctors have "Eureka" moments where something a patient says offhandedly or something they saw helps them cure an unknown disease or ailment?</p>
<p>How similar is the presence of sexual tension as portrayed between TV medical employees and real-life ones?</p>
<p>What are some of the most erroneous myths about medicine as seen on TV?</p>
<p>How similar is the atmosphere between TV ER and real-life ERs? The TV show ER was pretty good (the first 2 seasons were excellent). Much more true-to-life is Discovery Health's ER show. BTW, House is a total abomination. Anybody like that would be gone in 60 seconds. </p>
<p>How is the camaraderie between doctors? The camaraderie is like any other: there are folks you detest and folks you really like, though in general you'll prefer to be on-call with the hard-working and talented regardless of your personal relationship. </p>
<p>How often do doctors have "Eureka" moments where something a patient says offhandedly or something they saw helps them cure an unknown disease or ailment? Funny. You might ask a pt a question 12 times and get nothing, but as soon as you are at the bedside and your senior resident or attending/staff asks the question, the pt answers in the affirmative and everyone wonders why you're so dumb you didn't know about it.
Then there was the time on rounds in NYC some years ago. About ten of us were around the bedside working up a non-English speaking Chinese girl with abdominal pain. All of a sudden a 6" worm crawled out of her nose. No kidding. Eureka. But those moments are not too common. </p>
<p>How similar is the presence of sexual tension as portrayed between TV medical employees and real-life ones? Sorry, there is virtually none. There may be some joking around, but more than that just wouldn't be tolerated. </p>
<p>What are some of the most erroneous myths about medicine as seen on TV? The biggest myths are that docs have time to chat and that they have such posh offices.</p>
<p>Hehe. There are docs with posh offices. Private psychiatrists. Thats where their work goes down. The have to make their patients comfortable. No other doc I know has a posh office.</p>
<p>I wanted to let you guys know that if you're really interested in seeing how medicine works, watch the Discovery Health channel. Their shows are absolutely unscripted and genuine.</p>
<p>I love Divcovery Health Channel, I'm watching "trauma: life in the ER" right now. It's starting to make me consider a career in medicine.</p>