Nurses urge TV dramas

"Nurses urge TV dramas: Get real; Portrayals deceive public, groups say."
By nursingadvocacy

This piece on Hollywood's "medical accuracy" ignores nursing and the arguments of advocates that the overall depiction of the profession has been highly inaccurate, despite the presence of physician writers and advisors. Not a single nurse is quoted in this piece. Having scrubs nurses on the set does nothing to insure that nursing is portrayed accurately, especially when they teach physician characters how to do the work that real-life nurses do such as triage, defibrillation, patient education and patient advocacy. Moreover, though dramatic license and inevitable inaccuracies are mentioned, no one quoted argues that the products under discussion could not really have any effect on the real world because they're fiction. On the contrary, the piece stresses just how influential serial TV depictions can be on the public's health-related conduct, and the need to be as accurate as drama allows. This article clearly assumes that only the work and opinions of physicians matter. For an excellent article depicting the inaccuracies in Hollywood healthcare which drive the global nursing shortage, see Carol Ann Campbell's article in the NJ Star-Ledger from January 11, 2007 "Nurses urge TV dramas: Get real; Portrayals deceive public, groups say." http://tinyurl.com/2gv88f
Accuracy in entertainment
By dconner on 1/29/2007 1:57:PM

This article sheds light on an important reality: the entertainment industry does, in fact, take accuracy seriously and in most cases, it does consider the health and well-being of its audiences, even while working toward the main goal of entertaining people. That said, the article overlooked an important part of "how TV docs keep you well." Since 1983 the Entertainment Industries Council (EIC) has worked with Hollywood to provide information, resources and recognition in order to encourage accurate depictions in entertainment. Among EIC’s accomplishments are the PRISM Awards for outstanding depictions of substance abuse, addiction, and mental illness. In 2006, EIC convened many of the nation’s top experts on health and social issues at meetings in Washington, D.C., enabling them to talk in group and one-on-one with writers and producers from such influential television shows as HOUSE, ER, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Bones, and others. It's great to see the press finally picking up on the hard work that creators of TV, feature films, music, music videos, comic books and all other form of entertainment put into researching for accuracy in the development process. For more information and news about what the entertainment industry is doing, go to www.eiconline.org and www.prismawards.com.
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