We've all heard it: nurses can't watch medical shows without getting annoyed about how inaccurate they are. Lately, I'm finding that the most ridiculous medical mistakes happen on police procedural dramas (Law and Order, Criminal Minds, etc.); at least the medical shows have people with medical backgrounds advising them.
Anybody have some funny tv medical mistakes to share??
Last week I was watching a rerun of Criminal Minds. The victim had been drugged with haldol by her kidnapper. When the police rushed in to save her, the EMS gave her a bolus of narcan and she magically awoke. It was a flipping miracle!! ?
I was watching *Jericho* last night on Netflix. At one point a patient in the town clinic crashes and dies -- the cardiac monitor was going insane because his heart rate was all the way up to 124!
Since we started this thread, I've been more aware of stupid TV medical errors than ever, and this season of Chicago Med hasn't disappointed. My ongoing favorite on CM is how the BP can be reading fine one second, the patient goes into some crisis, and maybe 5 seconds later the nurse/MD/family member says, "Their BP is crashing!" No A-line in sight, btw. Fastest cuff in the west, I suppose...
Buffy the Vampire Slayer when Buffy's mother dies. The paramedics arrive, check her pulse, declare her dead and leave Buffy alone with the body. Drives me nuts!
End of life patient on Nurse Jackie, walking, talking, joking, eating chicken noodle soup, then a few hours later peacefully dying. I wish they would accurately depict the dying process so the public would be better prepared for it.
In Mission Impossible, the 2nd season, the show titled Operation "Heart" shows a person undergoing open heart surgery, and his respirations are 'normal'. He is not on a vent during the surgery!
Also, they show 'fibrillation' by making the NSR rhythm on the screen get smaller in size ...
That certainly is "mission impossible" *snort* [emoji19]
Husband hates to watch anything with me that contains medical scenes....
My favorite? Some movie or TV that had a scene of pt undergoing awake brain surgery, he was talking to surgeon.. In the background you could see and hear the ventilator!
End of life patient on Nurse Jackie, walking, talking, joking, eating chicken noodle soup, then a few hours later peacefully dying. I wish they would accurately depict the dying process so the public would be better prepared for it.
While that isn't what usually happens, sometimes people will have what we call their "last hurrah", where they wake up, eat, visit with friends and family, and then die peacefully.
One of my patients had been lethargic for a few days, but perked up when the last of her relatives arrived. She had a nice visit with everyone, told them she wanted Colonel Sanders for dinner. They got her a two piece, she ate every bite, then a few hours later, fell asleep and never woke up.
I am finally watching Nurse Jackie. The show is ridiculous from start to finish. The ER doctors standing around, socializing, waiting for their next case, the acquisition of a Pixus eliminating the need for a pharmacist, Jackie and her Doctor friend taking leisurely lunches away from the hospital while on duty. In a recent one I watched, Jackie is the one who tells the nursing student in the pink scrub to give Fentanyl to a patient, the girl does it without any scrutiny, we never see her instructor, and overdoses the patient who then stays in the ER in a coma instead of going to the ICU for a lamebrained reason. And there's the ridiculous ER director who has lots of time to walk around cluelessly, saying stupid things.
They make it seem like all nurses have super easy access to narcotics, and time to have sex with pharmacists on every shift. And time to wait on hold with an insurance company to try to get a deaf woman's severed finger reattachment surgery approved, since she needs her fingers to talk.
Specializes in L&D, CCU, ICU, PCU, RICU, PCICU, & LTC..
"My other favourite TV thing is when someone is in the ICU, hooked up to tele and actively dying. Then of course they die, the tele monitor flatlines and no one comes in the room."
There have been times when a patient had been made a DNR and no one went in from our unit to give the family time alone, to grieve, so this is NOT necessarily a mistake. I have even pulled the drapes and closed the door on families to give them privacy at that time while I watched the monitor straight line at the desk.
Dr. Brown stat to the ICU. BP's 140 over 80. We're losing him doctor. He's gone. Gone all right, in about 8 seconds and nobody actually did anything to the patient!
michigansapphire
133 Posts
I was watching *Jericho* last night on Netflix. At one point a patient in the town clinic crashes and dies -- the cardiac monitor was going insane because his heart rate was all the way up to 124!