Surviving AmericanSurviving
American Medicine
A friend who works as an actor in health dramas is also a patient and a caregiver for an ill parent. We discussed the relevance of TV depictions of medical care and real-life health care issues.
TV programs are presenting issues that people are dealing with every day. Although TV scripts tend to over-dramatize the emotional consequences of problems in medical care (e.g. too little time for doctors and nurses to provide adequate care, insensitivity to patients, too much time spent on the medical record instead of the patient, or incorrect diagnoses), the TV segments do give patients and families an opportunity to think about what their care is like, relative to the dilemmas facing the actors on screen. In giving patients a clue about possible problems and solutions, these shows can be a helpful element in health care.
My tips for you are:
- Watch TV medical shows to identify issues that seem relevant to your care.
- Discuss these topics with your family and write down questions about how the issues in the TV shows are similar to or different from what you have been experiencing.
- Ask your doctor, nurses, or office staff about these issues and how you can get better care and overcome the problems identified in the TV dramas.
- Check Chapter 11 Getting the Right Answers: Key Questions for Your Doctor in my new book Surviving American Medicine for exact wording on many of the questions you can ask.
