# Study says young docs learned wrong procedure from TV medical dramas
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [April 2, 2009, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736 "2009-04-02T17:36:25Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/21 "2009-04-02T21:06:43Z")
So, how true is “visualize the cords”? “I see them!”
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### Author:  [@threemae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threemae)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/22 "2009-04-02T21:44:47Z")
Well, that’s socialized medicine for you!
[dodges hurled shoe]
I kid, I kid, you Dopers…
I actually bothered to pull the referenced “study” and it isn’t even a paper. It’s merely a letter to the editor in _Resuscitation_ that says that 50% of surveyed Canadian trainees weren’t doing the procedure properly. Unfortunately, they do nothing to describe their recruitment or selection criteria, and just because second year medical students that have no idea what they’re doing identify _ER_ as the second most likely source of where they get any idea about how to do an intubation doesn’t mean that the person doing _you’re_ intubation when you stroll into some Canadian ER has never properly learned to perform the procedure nor that trainees won’t get plenty of practice with manikins prior to their first experience with a real intubation.
So, the, “letter to the editor,” doesn’t give us a tenth of the required information to accurately assess how dire the gap in training is.
So, **Bricker** , to make a rough analogy, if you wrangled up a group of 15 second year law students and said, “help our esteemed colleague **Rand Rover** here prepare a tax return for a publicly traded company. You’re deadline is in two hours.” Would you be upset if, when polled as to where their expertise to carry out this practical assignment was derived from, they responded:
1. Hell if I know
2. _The Practice_
Not that anyone actually makes television shows which deal extensively with the topic of filing corporate tax returns.
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### Author:  [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/23 "2009-04-02T22:01:01Z")
> [@threemae](#):
>
> So, **Bricker** , to make a rough analogy, if you wrangled up a group of 15 second year law students and said, “help our esteemed colleague **Rand Rover** here prepare a tax return for a publicly traded company. You’re deadline is in two hours.” Would you be upset if, when polled as to where their expertise to carry out this practical assignment was derived from, they responded:
>
> 1. Hell if I know
> 2. _The Practice_
No.
But I’d be upset at a firm that permitted second year law students to prepare a tax return for a publicly traded company without careful oversight and supervision.
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### Author:  [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/24 "2009-04-02T22:12:55Z")
> [@Typo\_Knig](#):
>
> The \*\*pendant \*\*in me wants to point out that [Scalia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalia) is a Associate Justice of the SCOTUS, not Chief Justice of the United States. But since Scalia really said that a TV show is a model for the law, I find it difficult to continue my \*\*pendantry \*\*and refer to him as “Mr. Justice”. If some bonehead falsely accuses me of being a terrorist, I shan’t expect much justice from Scalia. Even if I can use Gilligan’s Island as precedent. :rolleyes:
Bolding mine.
[Snerk] You have a hanging ornament in you that wants to point something out? Or is your name really that accurate?
The pedant in me made me do it…
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### Author:  [@incidental](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/incidental)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/25 "2009-04-02T22:13:04Z")
> [@Bricker](#):
>
> No.
>
> But I’d be upset at a firm that permitted second year law students to prepare a tax return for a publicly traded company without careful oversight and supervision.
Well, I’ve never run into a hospital that allows medstudents to run free among patients. Practicing medicine without a license is kind of frowned upon, what with that whole “malpractice lawsuit” business. Every intubation I’ve even done has had at least two-three actual doctors hovering anxiously over my shoulder, lest I lose the airway.
In my experience, even resident physicians are very closely supervised in these situations. You don’t fuck with the airway.
And for the record - I have never, ever seen ER. Or any other medical show.
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/26 "2009-04-02T22:19:20Z")
> [@incidental](#):
>
> You don’t fuck with the airway.
Unless you are Deep Throat…
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### Author:  [@Fritz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fritz)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/27 "2009-04-02T22:37:05Z")
> [@Mach Tuck](#):
>
> About all that porn I’ve been watching…
This made me giggle like a fool…
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### Author:  [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/28 "2009-04-02T22:37:05Z")
It seems surprising to me that the med students would think this, because based on both my professional experience, and comments from those in other professions, **TV gets everything wrong!**
Back when I worked with mainframe computers, any TV (or movie) scene involving computers was wrong, often laughably so. Now that PC’s are common and used by most screenwriters, they aren’t so completely wrong, but still often way beyond reality.
Friends who were lawyers always told me “Perry Mason” was way off from a real courtroom. And actual police tell me that cop shows aren’t very much like the real job. And a friend who runs a real police crime lab says the people there make jokes about the inaccuracies on the TV crime lab shows.
So I would think that med students would react the same way – watching the TV medical shows and laughing at the mistakes they made. Maybe this will come later, after these med students get further along in their studies.
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### Author:  [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/29 "2009-04-02T22:44:43Z")
> [@threemae](#):
>
> So, **Bricker** , to make a rough analogy, if you wrangled up a group of 15 second year law students and said, “help our esteemed colleague **Rand Rover** here prepare a tax return for a publicly traded company. You’re deadline is in two hours.” Would you be upset if, when polled as to where their expertise to carry out this practical assignment was derived from, they responded:
>
> 1. Hell if I know
> 2. _The Practice_
>
> Not that anyone actually makes television shows which deal extensively with the topic of filing corporate tax returns.
Tax lawyers don’t file tax returns. We give tax advice on transactions and litigate tax cases and other extremely badass shit.
Now file this! (Hurls shoe). 🙂
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### Author:  [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/30 "2009-04-02T22:52:02Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#):
>
> And a friend who runs a real police crime lab says the people there make jokes about the inaccuracies on the TV crime lab shows.
I remember a news story not that long ago where prosecutors were complaning about the CSI shows, that their jurors now expected the same exactness and precision that they see from the fake techs.
I have been in a 12 step program for more than 20 years. I belong to one, but have visited a number in my years. I have never, NEVER seen a TV show or a film get a 12 step meeting right.
Surprising, since so many movie and TV people are actually IN 12-step programs…
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/31 "2009-04-02T22:52:11Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#):
>
> Tax lawyers don’t file tax returns. We give tax advice on transactions and litigate tax cases and other extremely badass shit.
>
> Now file this! (Hurls shoe). 🙂
Some tax attorneys do - but only because they saw it on TV
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### Author:  [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/32 "2009-04-02T22:59:43Z")
“Perry Mason” was so far off it wasn’t just wrong, it doesn’t even look like court. Modern legal shows at least try to get the black letter law right if not the actual mechanics, but watching Perry mason is like watching some weird byzantine debate forum. The prosecutor will jump up and shout “objection!” and make some strange minute long comment on the evidence, without actually articulating what his legal objection is, which in real life generally takes five words or less. I’ve never been able to figure out what the heck is supposed to be going on.
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### Author:  [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/33 "2009-04-02T22:59:49Z")
> [@Typo\_Knig](#):
>
> The pendant in me wants to point out that [Scalia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalia) is a Associate Justice of the SCOTUS, not Chief Justice of the United States.
Yeah, that was a :smack:. At least Roberts had the good sense to say it (though for all we know, he’s just as likely to believe it :().
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### Author:  [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/34 "2009-04-02T23:21:55Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#):
>
> This is why They don’t allow TV shows about tax lawyers.
Excepting the short-lived “H.R. Blocknstuf,” a Saturday morning TV show designed to educate school-age children about the tax code, which disappeared quietly after test audiences deemed it “too psychedelic and not boring enough.”
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### Author:  [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/35 "2009-04-02T23:25:43Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#):
>
> QtM, who as intubated the incarcerated, and also reduced the incarcerated hernia of the incarcerated patient.
Does this mean that the hernia, no longer incarcerated, walked out the front door of the prison and caught a bus to the big city, wearing a cheap suit and ill-fitting, shiny shoes? “Sorry, no job at _my_ carwash for hernias with a Past.”
We had a patient recently who had a strangulated lipoma, but she didn’t even get booked and have charges filed. It’s our permissive society.
I was taught intubation technique by a real dummy. Of course, we didn’t get a fancy one like [this](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/south_east/7470390.stm) to work with in ACLS class. I’m not in practice much these days. I keep waiting for that overhead page in the hospital, though. “Pathologist to Medical ICU, STAT!!!”
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### Author:  [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/36 "2009-04-02T23:33:38Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#):
>
> Unless you are Deep Throat…
What does William Felt have to do with fucking with airways? Had you said “Unless you are Linda Lovelace…” it would have been witty. As it stands it just doesn’t make much sense.
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### Author:  [@Millit\_the\_Frail](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Millit_the_Frail)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/37 "2009-04-02T23:34:42Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#):
>
> Excepting the short-lived “H.R. Blocknstuf,” a Saturday morning TV show designed to educate school-age children about the tax code, which disappeared quietly after test audiences deemed it “too psychedelic and not boring enough.”
I usually don’t post just to say so, but this is the funniest thing I’ve read in a long time. Awesome pun, still laughing after about five minutes.
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### Author:  [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2009, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/38 "2009-04-02T23:37:23Z")
> [@pravnik](#):
>
> Modern legal shows at least try to get the black letter law right if not the actual mechanics…
You have not seen Boston Legal or Law & Order I take it.
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### Author:  [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2009, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/39 "2009-04-03T00:15:59Z")
Aren’t attorneys also encountering “the CSI effect” with juries?
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### Author:  [@incidental](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/incidental)
#### Post date: [April 3, 2009, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-says-young-docs-learned-wrong-procedure-from-tv-medical-dramas/491736/40 "2009-04-03T00:33:28Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#):
>
> So I would think that med students would react the same way – watching the TV medical shows and laughing at the mistakes they made. Maybe this will come later, after these med students get further along in their studies.
Okay - I take it back, I have sort of seen one episode of medical TV. I do remember one evening in which my roommates sat around heckling an episode of House. It was so wrong and bizarre, we had to laugh.
Of course, we were already med students at that point. Maybe high school students were sitting around taking notes or something…
One of the most spot-on gripes I ever heard from another med student about Gray’s Anatomy was that no surgical resident would even be walking in the doors of the hospital during daylight hours. So true.
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