She did give an example of a stand she took on a line in a script meant to imply sexual contact between two characters, a line that violated the precise terminology she holds dear about medicine. "I wrote them an e-mail and I said you can't have bacterial vaginosis in your mouth. First of all, it doesn't grow there. But more importantly, it wouldn't be called bacterial vaginosis if it were in your mouth."
"So they were like, 'That's very nice, but this is way funnier.' And you know, it was. What can I say? I fought the battle for linguistic purity and I lost to prurient humour and it was funny."
She says the House writers are so sophisticated now, with the show in its fourth season, they rarely unwittingly make errors. "There are some shows that probably adhere more closely to the way things are, but I think that's because their focus is on a different thing. House is really about figuring stuff out," she asserted. "It's true that House takes liberties with the truth – you know, bacterial vaginosis – but I think it's usually in an effort to do a show about thinking."
Dr. Scott Morrison, a physician in Illinois, writes reviews of House that focus more on the accuracy of the medicine than angst over the damaged doctor's dark soul or who flirted with whom – though he doesn't ignore those important areas, either. Far from an indignant list of nitpicks, his Polite Dissent reviews are written with obvious affection for the series. Perhaps surprisingly, he remains impressed with House's accuracy.
"House is probably the most accurate of the current crop of medical television shows, and definitely well above average for the genre," he said in an e-mail interview, in which he shared Sanders' opinion that entertainment does and should trump accuracy. "It’s simply not possible for them to be 100% accurate and remain a finely tuned drama. When I point out errors, especially the smaller ones, it is not so much to detract from House as it is to let my readers know what they should expect in real life."
In real life, as Morrison points out, "tests results often take days to come back and the results are rarely as clear cut as House or other television shows make them out to be."
In real life, as Sanders points out, oncologists don't perform surgery. Plus, she said, "I have never touched the controls of an MRI. In fact, if I did, I would certainly be called before the CEO of Yale-New Haven Hospital: 'I understand you were touching our $6 billion MRI?'"
Article comments
1 - Namaste
Thanks for the interviews, DK. It's good to get the point of view of the people who are medical professionals out there -- and who have nitpicked with the best -- and to know that they appreciate the difference between reality and entertainment as well. I do agree that it's sometimes a wide gulf, but I always say that if I want reality, I'll watch Discovery Health (and even reality is heavily edited).
2 - Diane Kristine
Hi Namaste, good to "see" you. I agree, and it's funny that we seem to expect more from a medical drama than a cop show or show set in an office, for example. There's not a lot of accuracy about any workplace you see on TV.
3 - Mary K. Williams
This was very, very good Diana. Glad you're keeping track of the good Dr. still.
4 - Phillip Winn
If work environments were realistically portrayed on television, what would be the point of watching? We could just go to work!
Real-life hospitals are fascinating at first, then dreadfully boring most of the time. A TV show has to remain interesting 17 hours a year for as many years as it can. I've watched 79 episodes of House and I'm still interested. I can't imagine still being fascinated after 55 hours of observing a real hospital.
5 - Karen Smith
Thank you Diane for a well written, very insightful look at the BEST show on television. Great job!