As any emergency physician knows, it is normal to ride through the hallways of the hospital doing CPR atop the chest of a dying patient while shouting out orders to nurses at the top of their lungs—at least on television. And, while miracles occur in emergency departments (EDs) every day (such as a specialist coming in to see a patient), they are not always sufficiently dramatic for prime time. Like it or not, the American public learns more about emergency medicine from the television than from their personal experiences. ER has just finished 10 seasons; Trauma: Life in the ER has finished 7. Since it’s only a matter of time before these shows fade from the airways, a replacement will soon be necessary. In this era of reality television, something that will grab the public attention and let them feel the true grit of today’s ED is needed.
The following are reality television proposals for the next generation of emergency medicine viewers:
EM is ‘real’ medicine, and this is ‘really’ funny. Go have a read!
