Probably because my mother was a nurse, I will always have an interest in medical shows, good or bad. An early TV addiction to St Elsewhere helped fuel that interest. With the summer upon us and cable networks bringing out their slate of shows, there are three new medical related series to make you laugh, cry and possibly inspire.
First up is USA Network’s Royal Pains, which premiered last Thursday and runs after Burn Notice. Mark Feuerstein stars in this improbably set up series about Hank Lawson, a New York surgeon who loses his job after he decides to save a sicker patient than one of the medical facilities chief benefactors. Because the dead patient has so much money and pull, Hank is blackballed and can’t find another job. Apparently the need for excellent physicians does not extend outside of New York and Hank sits around, drinking beer and watching television while the bills stack up and his supermodel-hot fiancée breaks off the engagement when it appears that he has no future. Enter his horndog brother, Evan (Paulo Costanzo), who drags him away for a weekend in the Hamptons. Evan talks them into a huge summer party hosted by a German blue blood played by Campbell Scott.
Hank happens to be in the right place at the right time when a girl collapses, vomiting. When the resident “concierge” doctor misdiagnoses her as an overdose, Hank halts him before she’s injected with medicine that could kill her. Of course, Hank saves the girl’s life. Scott’s German happen to witnesses the whole incident and is so impressed that he immediately offers him a job as the Hampton’s concierge doctor for the summer. (more…)
