Ridiculous medical mistakes on TV

Nurses Humor

Published

You are reading page 25 of Ridiculous medical mistakes on TV

Specializes in Cardio-Pulmonary; Med-Surg; Private Duty.

I was watching an episode of Criminal Minds the other day, and the crazy serial killer was injecting himself with steroids. They showed him pulling up the 'roids with a Monoject plastic Smart Tip vial access "needle" on a syringe, and then they show him jabbing himself in the thigh immediately after, without stopping to switch out the med prep cannula for an actual injection needle.

:wideyed:

wannabecnl

341 Posts

Specializes in PACU, presurgical testing.

Not a mistake as much as just a silly choice for the writers: two weeks in a row on Code Black this season, the patient went into Torsades de Pointes (already a rarity) AND the resident failed to recognize it. Really? I learned that before I finished nursing school!

Specializes in Cardio-Pulmonary; Med-Surg; Private Duty.

Another Criminal Minds episode, the one where Derek Morgan was kidnapped and tortured. As he's being loaded into the ambulance after his rescue, he "codes".... the monitor shows the squiggly line, and they shock him with the paddles, and the monitor shows the flat line -- only problem is, there is NOTHING on his chest -- no electrodes and wires, no paddles, NOTHING to provide the monitor with the line it's supposed to be showing.

Then afterward, he wakes up in the non-ICU hospital room after three days of unconsciousness, and he has oxygen on via nasal cannula, but the tubing doesn't come down in front of his neck... it just hooks over his ears and then disappears into the pillow.

GAH! Nursing has ruined me for television!!!!

Specializes in Cardio-Pulmonary; Med-Surg; Private Duty.

A few more Criminal Minds episodes later, and now Morgan's wife was the victim.... in the hospital, nasal cannula in the nose and behind the head instead of in front of the neck.

What the eff, people? Have your medical consultants ever actually worked in the medical field????

Specializes in Hospital medicine; NP precepting; staff education.

I once had a patient who worked in television production or something and I expressed my frustration at the myriad of mistakes and I asked the same question related to whether their consultants were aware of such glaring mistakes. He said that getting it right doesn't always get the drama they want.

I think I said something to the effect that realism can be plenty dramatic. And that I would have fewer apoplectic responses to entertainment.

Orca, ADN, ASN, RN

2,066 Posts

Specializes in Hospice, corrections, psychiatry, rehab, LTC.
I always loved Dixie's cap, mini dress and high heels. Who says a nurse can't be fashionable?

My late mother (ICU RN) always commented on Nurse Gloria "Ripples" Brancusi on Trapper John, MD wearing high heeled white pumps on the floor. "She must not do much", my mother said.

allnurses Guide

JBudd, MSN

3,836 Posts

Specializes in Trauma, Teaching.

One of the CSI spinoffs, I was watching reruns.... victim intubated, paralyzed by the crazy bad man; rescued, is blinking yes/no at the officer. Rolls her eyes up and seizes, diagnoses with a stroke. Still intubated in the next day's scene, and the doc says "GCS is 3, in otherwords, she's braindead". Hello? Aren't all intubated, paralyzed pts a 3???

Orca, ADN, ASN, RN

2,066 Posts

Specializes in Hospice, corrections, psychiatry, rehab, LTC.
My personal pet peeve is Liz Webber Lansing Webber Spencer Webber on General Hospital. One day she's an artist and the next day she decides to be a nurse. Within months, she's "the best nurse at General Hospital." Must be -- she's in the ER, the OR, the ICU, L & D -- no matter why a patient is admitted to the hospital, she's his nurse.

Your reference to soap operas jogged my memory about a few observations (aside from every patient having either amnesia or a brain tumor). There is an apparently huge hospital, but you only see one or two doctors who are taking care of everyone, regardless of what they are in for. They are easy to spot, because white lab coat=doctor. They are invariably male. They are always wearing some cheap piece of crap stethoscope around their neck that looks like it came from a flea market BP kit. Geez, buy a few Littmanns for the props department, OK?

sevensonnets

975 Posts

Don't you love it when the ER docs do brain surgery and heart transplants?

Orca, ADN, ASN, RN

2,066 Posts

Specializes in Hospice, corrections, psychiatry, rehab, LTC.

I don't know if this would really qualify as a medical mistake, but soap operas are notorious for ridiculous medical situations. On an episode of As the World Turns (which I can't believe is still on; my grandmother used to watch it in the 1960s), a woman had sex with a man who wasn't her husband because she drank some cough syrup that made her hallucinate that it was him.

I still haven't found that cough syrup.

nitenite

97 Posts

You never see agonal breathing when someone is dying of an injury or heart attack.

People dying of terminal illnesses are always conscious and lucid up to the moment they die.

Closed mouths on coma patients.

You never see people in a minimally conscious state.

Defibrillating through clothing is the one that makes me rage hard, though.

I know this is an older thread, but I had to comment on one episode of SOA that made me laugh (there were lots of medical mistakes in that series ever since Tara became the MCs Dr and performed all her stuff on the club's pool table). But the one that got me the best was when Jax gave Wendy a "speedball" shot of heroin and speed into her left deltoid and she instantly crashed! Ummm, no! I've worked in drug and alcohol rehab and that's called a "miss", basically when a drug addict misses the vein and muscle pumps the drug. It takes a ALOT longer for the effect to hit the person. So, there is NO WAY Wendy would have felt the "speedball" in a matter of 2 or 3 seconds the way it showed on the show... And that's just ONE example of the mistakes in the show (which I LOVED the show by the way). If I were to go and describe all the mistakes of Tara performing procedures on the pool table and the drama at the hospital itself, that would add another 10 pages to this thread!

+ Add a Comment