Just wanted to say that I found out earlier that Michael Norell, who was Capt. Hank Stanley in the 1972-77 NBC hit medical/action series Emergency!, has passed on at 85 (it happened May 12).
I’ve just recently found Emergency! A friend of mine loves the show, so it was kinda on my radar. After I switched from cable to OTA stuff, I noticed it was available. I’m enjoying it.
I guess it’s expected when one starts watching a new old TV show that the actors may die. 
It was one of my favorite shows as a kid. Watching it now it seems painfully slow like other shows from the era. They were pretty realistic about actual procedures. Much more accurate than shows today.
Which is precisely why I enjoyed it on DVD (I’ve been seeing videos on YouTube on how paramedics are to call in radio reports, and the demonstrations are pretty much how Emergency! portrayed the characters doing things).
One of the greatest shows from my childhood! I watched it when it was on MeTV or Antennae TV. I still though it was great. I got two of my grandkids hooked on it!
My feelings, exactly. I’ve watched several episodes recently, and while I still enjoy it, it is just so slowly paced.
I particularly enjoyed the interactions between the characters, and Norell as the station’s stalwart captain was part of that. RIP, sir.
I caught one episode recently where they were performing CPR on a heart attack victim. They did everything (mostly) correctly and went about their job in a calm professional manner. It looked so realistic it seemed fake on TV. No one was yelling or panicking. “We are losing him!” “Not on my watch!!” That would never fly on tv today.
Nor was there a distracting alarm like Med has at Gaffney Chicago-- at Rampart, when major events went down, the staff just went right to work; the only alarms were for the fire and rescue people, summoning them to wherever they needed to be.
Exactly so; the drama was in the situations, and the rescues, and while the patients (or their families) might be emotional or panicky, the paramedics, firemen, and hospital staff were always focused and professional while on duty.
The scenes in the firehouse, or when the Rampart staff and the paramedics weren’t actively working with patients, were times when the characters showed their emotional sides more.
I remember them always starting IVs TKO. I had relatives who worked in hospitals, so I knew that didn’t mean Technical Knock Out.
“Start an IV D5W TKO with Ringers Lactate!” 
(The strange things that are lodged in my head from TV shows of my youth.)
My mother, decades ago, went to the ER for some reason. One of the ER staff put her on an IV with Ringers Lactate, and my mom thought to herself, “I remember that, from the show my son used to watch.”
Today, upon looking it up, I learned:
- TKO means “to keep open” – a very slow IV drip rate that is just enough fluid to keep the IV open and not clotted
- D5W: dextrose 5% in water, used as an IV medium
- Ringers Lactate: an IV solution containing sodium and other electrolytes, used particularly for trauma patients