Anonymous Doctor

Maybe I shouldn't be blogging when I've had 3 hours of sleep in the past 36 hours, coming off a 29-hour shift where we got a new patient at 2AM that kept me from getting any sleep overnight and then I could barely sleep during the day because my body is all messed about what time it is....

So while I couldn't sleep I watched this ridiculous medical show on TNT called Hawthorne that someone told me to record for some reason. Anyway, not to spoil anything, but do they even have a medical consultant on this show? Is someone even bothering to see if what's going on makes any sense?

People get run over by a car in front of the hospital, and the nurse manager yells at the people about to go help-- "no-- call 911!" What? So the ambulance can bring them 10 feet to the door? What is she talking about? What's the ambulance going to do? Go help the people! Although after watching the rest of it, they should have called 911, and they should have brought them to a different hospital, where things actually make sense.

One of the people hurt is a surgeon at the hospital. They diagnose him by looking at his arm, and decide he might have nerve damage because they can apparently perform medical tests with their mind. A few hours pass. "It's been a crazy day. Tell the night shift to come in early," the nurse manager tells someone-- as if that makes any sense, and as if there's some special way to get an entire hospital staff to magically show up to work when they're supposed to be off. That's a minor point, I know, but it bothered me, as someone who has worked nights, and would not appreciate someone calling me and telling to come in early because the day was busy. Ha.

So then the doctor with the magic injured arm is told he needs surgery, and they're going to do it as soon as possible. In the middle of the night. Yeah, because non-emergency arm surgery is done in the middle of the night, surgeons work 24 hours a day, the ER is always available, and why wait until normal working hours, right?

And then it gets insane. The head nurse, who seems to be in a relationship with the injured doctor, tells him that she lives right nearby, they should go to her place and then he can come back when they're ready for him in surgery.

Uh, WHAT? First of all, arm surgery isn't happening in the middle of the night. But even if it was-- patients can't just leave the hospital and come back for their surgery. They're not going to, I don't know, prep him for the procedure?

So they get to her house, and she's like, "can I get you something to eat or drink?"

Excuse me? Does she work in a hospital? Has she been around patients ABOUT TO HAVE SURGERY? Patients who are about to have surgery don't eat or drink. That's not, "oh, it's okay because he's a doctor." No, you're having surgery, you don't get food. Period. I actually stopped and re-watched this scene three times, because it was so absurdly ridiculous.

And then, having magically regained the use of his arm, he proceeds to have sex with the head nurse on her floor.

And I think then he had surgery but by that point I was asleep.