I love the show. It is just guaranteed pleasure for the next half hour. When it ends my body feels the sides effects. I just don’t feel the same without watching the show.
The question, though is how close does the show come to what actually goes on in a hospital? I know the illnesses get toned down to a PG level. I’m wondering if the lessons JD learns could be useful in real life. Though I know the show is dead on for anyone who thinking about joining a tough profession.
It’s my favorite show. But I’m pretty sure *real * hospitals don’t have people breaking into song or have zany sound effects…
I know the one I worked at last year didn’t but I was only in Housekeeping… for all I know, the doctors on 4E had parties all the time when I wasn’t around.
:dubious:
Hey, Aesiron, they could’ve had parties BECAUSE you weren’t around.
THANK YOU. The next show’s in twenty minutes!
Well, yeah… that was what I was implying. Bunch of snooty nurses.
From the 10 or so episodes I’ve seen, I would say it is “hospital flavored.” ER is a lot closer, but real ERs in my experience work at about 10 fold less pace than ER. Scrubs is kind of like an idealized residency program in an idealized hospital. I find the show enjoyable, though.
My biggest medical nitpick with Scrubs is the structure of the residency program – the non-surgery residents seem to treat everyone, from taking ER cases to both pediatric and regular. Consult services don’t seem to be a big deal in the show, at least compared to ER. They could be in a med/peds residency, or they could be in a family medicine type residency (although this doesn’t make sense as they seem tied to the hospital), but it, in my viewing, was never really clarified. The cases, when they go into detail, seem to generally be accurate. They do a really good job with the social situations they work in as the show’s “morals of the story.” The residents seem to be more well rested and perky than I remember, especially the surgery ones. But then comedy shows about surly, sleep-deprived people don’t go very far.
What about “24”?
Scrubs is like the funniest, most story-worthy bits of residency picked out and set aside and retold, only revised so that everyone’s had a full night’s sleep and a shower and a good meal, rather than being exhausted, hungry, surly and unwashed people who’ve worked for the last 28 hours. It’s not very accurate on the details of being a resident, but it does a wonderful job of capturing the spirit of the thing. The first season does an especially good job with the emotional issues young doctors have to learn to deal with. I watched that season with a sense of perfect recognition, because it mirrored Dr.J’s experiences so well.
They are in internal medicine; they’ve said so. (They’re a year ahead of me. 
) I don’t know why they seem to do the occasional pediatrics case.
The biggest inaccuracy, aside from that, is the fact that residents work in rotations; that is, they change jobs from month to month. One month they’re working the general medicine wards, another they’re in the ICU, another they’re in the outpatient clinic or with a specialty service. To me, this is one of the most fundamental and difficult things about being a resident, since you have a new job with new co-workers and new expectations every month. However, it’s hard to work into a narrative structure or a consistent setting, so I can see why they leave this aside.
(ER is even worse about this; their med students seem to do 24 consecutive rotations in the emergency room, unless they need to do a psych rotation so they can be stabbed to death by a psychopath.)
Otherwise, I think Scrubs is the most accurate show about life in the hospital (especially about residency) ever produced. The general absurdity level, the arrested adolescence of the residents, and the close but strained relationships between people who work way too many stressful hours together are all very true to life.
Heck, if I had a nickel for every surgery resident I’ve known who was a very-slightly-less-exaggerated version of The Todd, right down to telling everyone they’re going to the caf to get their donut on, I’d be a wealthy man indeed.
I’d hardly call 24 a comedy.
I dunno. It was pretty funny when Kim got stuck in the bear trap.
I know nothing about medicine, but I think Scrubs is the best thing on television. A good comedy will hold my interest for 22 minutes, but Scrubs regularly has me falling off the couch laughing.
“But…but but, I need your help, and then you teach me a lesson, and…and the music plays!”
Add me to the list of Scrubs-lovers. 
More accurate than St. Elsewhere? I’ve never been a resident (or even a patient…though I have been both an ER and maternity ward volunteer, the latter just a few years ago), but except for the rotations I think St. E did a fine job. Long hours, not everyone making it to the next year, etc. Of course, that show is pretty old now.
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I still love St. Elsewhere. In the very early '90s PBS aired the entire series, in order and commerical-free (either one episode per day or one per week), and with the help of my Mom I taped almost all of them: I think I only missed 1 or 2 episodes. Since then, I’ve watched the entire series several times. I think I know most of the dialogue by now. :eek: :o
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Misnomer, you must’ve loved season one, episode twenty-one, "My Sacrificial Clam", which featured four doctors from St. Elsewhere who all got sick at a medical convention and ended up in the Scrubs hospital. I wasn’t a big fan of the show but I instantly caught and appreciated the extended cameos.
What the hell? I’m sure I responded to this thread 
Anyway, as well as what other people said, the level of respect dead bodies get in a hospital is pretty realistic. Lotta gallows humour, dead baby jokes, etc.
Around relations and people close to the deceased people are very respectful but as soon as it’s just staff bodies are meatbags and not much more.
Oh I did, I did! During the first season, I watched (and enjoyed) Scrubs when I could but it wasn’t one of my “must-see” shows: however, when I saw the teaser for that episode I made a point of watching it.
(I’m just an Elsewhere junkie, I tell ya… :D)
The the first season’s not out on DVD, is it?
Shouldn’t it be, by now?
ZJ
Zach Braff posted in his blog that they want to sell the syndication rights before putting it on dvd. He did seem to indicate that would be in the next yr or so though. Yay!