My House Issues

[katallison]

I write this entry (which has been floating around in my head) with some trepidation; many of my friends are over-the-moon smitten with House, and I have no intention of raining on anyone's parade, pissing on anyone's cornflakes, or otherwise harshing the love. But there are reasons why I shall never, despite some geniune fondness for some aspects of this show, be able to be a *fan* of it, or in fact to watch it a whole lot, and I felt moved to type them out (possibly because I am cranky from spending way too much time in hospitals the last six months).

Disclaimer the first: I haven't seen all the episodes. I've seen maybe -- five? Six? Something like that, anyway. The last one I saw was the mysteriously-ill high school kids.

Disclaimer the second: My having reservations about something, or not liking something, implies *no* slur or disrespect toward people who unreservedly like that thing.

Having said which -- There's stuff I actually do like a lot about the show:

It's a by-god actual hour-long TV drama! With characters, and storylines, and dialogue! Not reality TV! This alone is (sadly, in our age) worth praise.

It seems on the whole to be well-written and well-acted.

In particular, Hugh Laurie is a whole big tasty bundle of rrRRAAWWRRrrrr, does a fantastic job in the role, and is clearly having a blast.

I love hospital series to an unreasonable degree; medicine really interests me, while at the same time I'm not enough of an expert to be bugged by inaccuracies/implausibilities in the show.

But I have one big difficult and apparently insuperable Issue:

It's the attitude. I mean, I'm not bothered that House is written as an arrogant, snarky, insulting SOB. I have been known to love such characters before (e.g., Methos, Toby, Ray Vecchio). And if the show was constructed so that the objects of his snark and arrogance were his peers, more or less (Cuddy, the members of his team, organized medicine in general) -- or if they were people who had in some way earned his attitude (say, if he were a help-desk tech for an ISP dealing with hordes of abusively clueless Entitlement Cases [and wouldn't that be a cool show?]) -- that would be just fine with me.

But. But.

The people on the show who frequently get the sharp edge of his tongue and his attitude are patients. As in, people who are sick, in pain, vulnerable, scared, and who have been thrown against their will into the meat-grinder that is Organized Medicine.

I know those people. I have *been* those people, from time to time. And I can tell you if there's one thing that truly and royally *pisses me off*, it's a doctor who pulls attitude on me--overrides me, dismisses me, implies that I'm stupid or hypochondriacal, plays the "I know better than you do" card. As House does, all the time, with his clinic patients.

And you know what? I don't *care* that he's a freakin' genius. I don't *care* that he's doing clinic rounds against his will. I don't *care* that he has chronic pain, and Issues, and whatthefuckever. He's being an asshole to people who are sick, in pain, vulnerable, and--relative to him--powerless. And in those moments he exemplifies everything I hate about the arrogance of Organized Medicine, a world where very real power differentials exist between patients and doctors, with results that range from the humiliating to the tragic.

And part of what's frustrating is that I can see how they've painted themselves into a corner on this one. I applaud, actually, a show that's willing to make their main character a right bastard; and if they relented and had a Very Special Moment on each show displaying him actually being a heck of a nice guy to his patients, it would undercut the audacity of that. ("Audacity" relative to the norms of mainstream US TV, that is.) Part of what I respect about the show is that they don't seem to take the easy fluffy-bunny way out on this; but they've placed House in one of the very few professions where consistent, across-the-board assholery is pretty much guaranteed to lose me, because it too closely and painfully reflects the ways that people in that profession do in fact abuse their power, and do actual damage to the lives of actual people in the process.

And there's a related issue -- I'm supposed to cut House some slack because he's portrayed as a diagnostic genius, but the fact is (at least, from everything I've heard from actual doctors) that diagnosis is as much art as science, that a lot of key information you gain about a patient comes not from lab reports or test results but from sitting with that person, closely observing, noting the nonverbal details of appearance and speech and manner. And asking questions in a way that will get honest unguarded responses, and truly listening to what is said. And he cuts himself off from all that data, which counts as willful stupidity in my book, and for no good reason. So he thinks all his patients lie to him? Well, no shit, the way he treats people, I'd lie to him too.

So. I repeat, perhaps needlessly, that I intend no slur towards those who dig the show--dude, I'm happy whenever anyone finds a new object of fannish love. I just wish I could enjoy it as fully, and am a little sad that I can't. But -- I can't.

Comments

[danielleleigh.livejournal.com]

The people on the show who frequently get the sharp edge of his tongue and his attitude are patients. As in, people who are sick, in pain, vulnerable, scared, and who have been thrown against their will into the meat-grinder that is Organized Medicine.


you are making a lot of excellent points, and I totally get where you are coming from...but I've started to take a different perspective. I don't think we are necessarily supposed to forgive him because he is "diagnostic genius" - I think we are probably supposed to empathize because it is clear that he, too, has been vulnerable to the fragility of his own body and chances are? He didn't deal with at particularly well at the time (this is probably a massive understatement) and he isn't dealing well with the aftermath (I think last night's episode did a lot of work on this issue, I don't want to spoil you because it appears you haven't seen it?)

I'm not trying to convince you out of your reaction - I think that the text is fairly ambiguous in a lot of ways. I just think I've started it reading it in a way that allows me to understand how he can say such terrible things to his patients (to be fair he actually tries NOT to interact - he sends his interns as his "human face" and I suspect he actually knows what he is doing when he does that.) and still be a person I want to know *more* about.

Also, this was an excellent meta-post on a show I have a hard time thinking about analytically.

[katallison.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much for this! You got me thinking on a whole new track, namely -- how cool would it have been if from the beginning they'd done something to show how House had himself in turn been subject to the medical system, had himself been a powerless patient, and how his own relations with patients are shaped by that experience?

I wish now that this had been more explicit in the character's set-up from the start (or that I'd been able to read that into my understanding of the character). I mean, I'm totally on board with the whole wounded-healer damaged-hero dynamic, but I've had a really hard time getting past the fact that House's history (or current status) of woundedness/damage is (in the episodes I've seen) secondary to the actual power he wields now as part of the medical establishment. If we'd seen *why* he wields that power so unfeelingly, it would have made a big difference to me.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much for this! You got me thinking on a whole new track, namely -- how cool would it have been if from the beginning they'd done something to show how House had himself in turn been subject to the medical system, had himself been a powerless patient, and how his own relations with patients are shaped by that experience?

Very unreliable memory speaking--but I think in either the first or second ep, he does imply soemthing like that in regards to his leg--that the doctors refused to listen/didn't know why his leg was in chronic pain and it ended in a leg-stroke (I guess a blockage in his leg?), hence the fact he doesn't have full use and pops vicadin, and possibly why he's so hot for trial and error in diagnostic medicine. Since so far on this show, we have *never* gotten a straight answer to anything whatsoever regarding everyone's past, I've kind of been hoping they'd address it again. It could have been the same ep where it's shown a flash of kids playing soccer at the end of the ep adn then flashes to him looking blankly at an empty soccer field, but man, that was many, many eps ago.

Wow, I didn't realize how many eps this show has been on now. I keep thinking it just started. Gah.

[danielleleigh.livejournal.com]

Very unreliable memory speaking--but I think in either the first or second ep, he does imply soemthing like that in regards to his leg--that the doctors refused to listen/didn't know why his leg was in chronic pain and it ended in a leg-stroke (I guess a blockage in his leg?), hence the fact he doesn't have full use and pops vicadin, and possibly why he's so hot for trial and error in diagnostic medicine.

I think you are right...wow, can't believe I forgot about that. Last night they also made it TEXT that there was an extreme personality change when he had his infarction (is that how it is spelled?), verified by House who knew him before the medical problem surfaced.

[danielleleigh.livejournal.com]

ack, I mean WILSON, verified by Wilson...gah!

[violetisblue.livejournal.com]

A genuine question, as I've seen even less of the show than you have: Are they justifiying his attitude with "Hey, he's a genius" moments or are they just sort of matter-of-factly portraying the fact that a lot of doctors are in fact power-tripping assholes? (Disclaimer: There's little else you'd expect a plaintiff's medmal attorney whose mother got royally fucked over by the medical system to say, I realize.) If the latter, I think that may be part of the show's popularity--Marcus Welby and that whole saintly mythological bullshit finally put to rest--if the former, well, typical Hollywood copout.

Your description reminds me of the stories my mother (an ER nurse, now retired) likes to tell of when she was working at Mass General under a literally world-famous pediatric heart surgeon--she remembers him literally screaming at the top of his lungs at the parents of patients, keep in mind these are the terrified parents of an infant with life-threatening congenital heart problems, and everyone put up with it because, well, he saved their kids. Was he using his skill and prestige as an excuse to be a horrible human being? Hell, yeah. Lots of doctors and other skilled professionals do that, more's the pity, so maybe again that's the attraction, that House seems like a much truer portrayal from the public's POV.

That said, I totally and completely understand why you wouldn't want to watch a character like that as entertainment. I don't think I would either, there's too many personal issues involved for me.

[violetisblue.livejournal.com]

Also, as Danelleleigh mentioned, I don't know how much his (the character's) own chronic pain issues are supposed to figure into all of this. If they are, it does add a very interesting angle.

[viggorlijah.livejournal.com]

They're putting it as him not giving a damn about the patient, but purely the medicine. That said, there have been a few patients who get past that - the pilot, the woman trying to max out her insurance before she gets fired who says "I don't like being told what to do", and the musician. He's very careful *not* to let them get past - there's an amazing scene with the babies, where you realise he's never gone near them if possible, until he has to, and he's incredibly tender.

All of the doctors - they're assholes to some degree, and they're all broken. None of them are particularly good people. The only one who comes close is Chase and he's an ex-priest-in-training and has Issues. The really nice ones - Wilson and Cameron - fuck up in other ways.

He doesn't want to do the clinic work, and it's partly revenge that he gets ont he administrator making him do it, but yes. He doesn't really care about the patient's feelings, past what he needs for his work. But they're making it that most of the doctors don't give a damn about the patients, unless they have an actual relationship. They just fake it better.

[violetisblue.livejournal.com]

"But they're making it that most of the doctors don't give a damn about the patients, unless they have an actual relationship. They just fake it better."

Sounds pretty accurate to me then, honestly.

[katallison.livejournal.com]

See, I think part of the problem is they're trying to have it both ways. If House was to medicine what, say, Action was to Hollywood--a cool-eyed exploration of the essential exploitative heartlessness of a privileged order--that would be one thing. But (and I respect this) they can't quite jettison the fact that the patients are people, in real pain, and so House's essential cold-heartedness comes across (to me, at least) as a jarring thing. I mean, I really do respect the effort and intent here, but they really have painted themselves into a corner, and they can't take either of the obvious routes out of it.

[violetisblue.livejournal.com]

That's what I suspected from your description of the show--they want to have that cool-eyed exploration, but they can't get away from the Hollywood "likability" adage (and of course, they'd point out to me that Action sank like a stone trying to go the other way).

[minim_calibre]

If you search the archives at Slate (I'd do it, but I'm on my way out the door for a childbirth class), there's an article on House by, IIRC, a doctor, who has many of the same complaints that you do, and points out that no way no how would that be allowed in the reality the writer lives in.

[katallison.livejournal.com]

Aha, found it! The article is here, and is by Sherwin Nuland, whose writing I've enjoyed before and who is considerably more pissed-off at the show than I am. *g*

[tzikeh.livejournal.com]

You know I'm not trying to convince you one way or another, and you know I'm totally on board with "The fact that I don't like it doesn't mean I think people who like it are dumb". But here are just a few notes:

1) In the pilot, he says that his infarction was misdiagnosed by doctors until it was far too late to save the muscle.

2) I personally never get the sense that we're supposed to cut him any slack, for genius reasons or otherwise; Foreman certainly doesn't and neither does Cuddy.

3) He is rude to *everyone*, including patients, which makes him a complete asshole, not a partial one. ;)

4) In last night's episode, Wilson and House argue rather vehemently about the fact that since his injury, House's personality has changed radically.

but finally -

5) In several sound bites and articles, both Hugh Laurie and the creator say that they do not believe that House *could be* for real -- that what many people enjoy in the character is the vicarious fantasy of telling off of the public/client/customer which 99.99% of the service industry fantasizes about daily. The wish-fulfillment of telling someone who is making your job hell "Wow, are *you* stupid." The fact that this particular revenge fantasy takes place in a situation where you, Kat, cannot bear it, may simply make you and the show incompatable.

[harriet-spy.livejournal.com]

3) He is rude to *everyone*, including patients, which makes him a complete asshole, not a partial one. ;)

See, this is the kind of thing that just doesn't work for me as a rationale. House *chose* to take on special responsibilities, responsibilities that demand an extra commitment to being caring and empathetic. He decides to ignore those responsibilities. Therefore, he's what you'd call a complete-*plus* asshole. ;)

Seriously, it's the difference between Batman as jerk and a member of the JL, among his peers, and Batman as jerk and mentor to a bunch of recruited sidekicks. I can put up with his systematic personality problems a lot better when he's not beating on the people who are vulnerable to and dependent on him.

[katallison.livejournal.com]

(It goes without saying, but I'm so happy that you're someone who gets the whole "we can disagree about a show I love" without it becoming "you hate my show! BITCH!!! Diediediedie!!!!11!!)

I do wish (as I said to danielleleigh above) that House's own experiences at the hands of the medical establishment had been woven more meaningfully, or propulsively, or something, into how he in turn deals with patients, from the get-go. It may just be that the sequencing in exposition within the episodes could have been done better.

And your point about the vengeful wish-fulfillment nature of the show is taken; god knows, I have at times (in my helping-professional role) muttered awful things about the hapless vulnerable students I'm supposed to be dealing with empathically and caringly. For people in such roles, there's always a tension between the "Wow, are *you* stupid" inwardness, and the outward maintenance of compassion. I know that's a reality for people in medicine, and I think what futzes the show for me is that the surface presentation is fairly straightforward-realistic, and (as Nuland says in the Slate article cited somewhere up- or down-thread) House's behavior would *never* fly in a real medical setting. There's a certain shock of refreshingness in House manifesting so blatantly all the hostility that lurks within the maintenance of compassionate-medical-facade; and yet there's a real reason for the maintenance of that facade that has to do with the actual wellbeing of suffering people.

And yeah, it may just be that me and the show are incompatible. *g* As I say, I dig it that others are enjoying it, and I actually am digging a lot of the good fiction in the fandom, which manages to dig beneath some of the binds the show has (by my judgement) gotten itself into.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

I do wish (as I said to danielleleigh above) that House's own experiences at the hands of the medical establishment had been woven more meaningfully, or propulsively, or something, into how he in turn deals with patients, from the get-go. It may just be that the sequencing in exposition within the episodes could have been done better.

You can blame that on Fox. Other than the pilot, they've been showing episodes out of order. I don't know how much the show knew about that going in, but either way it basically destroyed whatever chance they could have to tell a character-driven story over multiple eps, or even dribble out ongoing character details in multiple eps, because it was entirely possible that we'd be told D before we found out about A B and C.

It's not quite as bad for the minor characters, who can have their facts snuck in during the episodes that focus on them, but for the protagonist I have to imagine it's been frustrating as all Hell to want to unveil House's backstory and have their tools for doing that snatched away from them.

[katallison.livejournal.com]

Ah. Well, in a meanspirited and "that makes sense, I guess, in the making no sense at all" way, it's gratifying to once again be able to blame Fox for screwing up a show by completely disregarding the thoughtful and emotionally-logical development of characters. May I just say, die, Fox, die!!!!

Why, yes, I am not at all over Firefly yet.

But thanks for letting me know that there are (as always, I guess) external and irrational network factors contributing to my discontent with a show. Thank freakin' GOD for fanfic, is all I can say.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

I hear ya.

And fwiw I'm a fan of the show who totally gets where you're coming from in not liking it. When my grams was in the hospital a couple of weeks ago I didn't want to watch, b/c all I could think of was how if some doctor treated her like House treats his patients, I would beat said doctor to death with a shovel.

[thepouncer.livejournal.com]

I've been watching House, and enjoying it, but I agree that sometimes the patient's suffering can hit too close to home. That car accident this week was especially harrowing for me, since an SUV plowed into my car on the way into work last Friday.

[tzikeh.livejournal.com]

Where are you seeing that they're run out of order? Production #s match up on the episode guide up until this week - where they're showing 13 instead of 12.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

I've seen it reported in a few fan forums that they mixed up the order of the earlier eps. I don't know if the ones aired in the past couple of weeks are also mixed up or if we're getting the regular schedule. But past the pilot there was some mixing and matching.

vicarious thrills

[brak666.livejournal.com]

You know, that's exactly why I love him so much. Because he talks to his patients the way I sometimes want to talk to mine but don't because it's rude and won't accomplish anything (also, I'd get fired).

Re: vicarious thrills

[tzikeh.livejournal.com]

Hee! It was great fun watching with you in the consuite, sweetie - I can only imagine how much you must want to talk like House sometimes.

[caille.livejournal.com]

Interesting observations. I have no basis on which to criticize this show, because I've never seen it. Several people I know love it, which would normally be enough to get me to watch it...except what I'd read of it gave me the creeps.

Did you ever watch "Absolutely Fabulous"? I enjoyed that show. It was savage, but in the end, it was comedy. I guess there was some talk about doing a U.S. version, but apparently it never went anywhere because the American showrunners kept wanting to make Eddie and Patsy have hearts of gold. The original show never even hinted at that. These were two fucked up, mean, hilarious people, all crunch, no ooey gooey center.

But for a drama, I can't handle a similar kind of emotional disconnection. I started watching that Denis Leary show, "Rescue Me", and about 15 minutes into it, I turned it off. There just wasn't anything I could hang on to. It was all brittle, acrid and jaggedy. I remember a scene (for one example) when Leary or somebody is yelling at a squad of firemen (during training) and calling them pussies. Is it realistic? I have no doubt. Does it need to be watched by moi? No.

Maybe it's post BtVS/AtS burnout, or maybe it's Abu Ghraib, or maybe it's just my brain misfiring, but I can't pay attention if the main theme is bleak isolation or mundane cruelty. Maybe I just don't appreciate realism.

I mean, I don't need things to be all pretty. I just saw "Million Dollar Baby", and I appreciate the heck out of that film. But I can't sit through the CSI franchise, or that "Nip/Tuck" series....

Okay, well, here's your LJ back. Sorry about the rantism.

[namastenancy.livejournal.com]

I'm with you on this one. I think that the ones who like the show and those who don't can be divided into those who have had experience with doctors behaving badly and those who haven't. If you haven't been the target of bullying authority, it's easy to appreciate watching it on TV. But if you've had to endure it (for whatever reason), watching it on TV as entertainment is too painful.

Just my humble opinion.

namaste SF Nancy

[harriet-spy.livejournal.com]

And I can tell you if there's one thing that truly and royally *pisses me off*, it's a doctor who pulls attitude on me--overrides me, dismisses me, implies that I'm stupid or hypochondriacal, plays the "I know better than you do" card. As House does, all the time, with his clinic patients.

Honestly, when I saw the promo campaign, I rolled my eyes and said, "Do we really need *more* arrogant, condescending doctors on TV? 'Cause I get enough of that in real life."

I know that some of my friends who like the show have had similar frustrations with the world of medicine, so I'm not sure why they don't have the same response. I haven't raised the issue, because I haven't watched, so I wouldn't be able to discuss the nuances.

[cereta.livejournal.com]

You know, I've pondered that myself, because although I've never had a serious situation in which it manifested, I've had issues my entire adult life with doctors not taking me seriously (which I'd gotten used to as a child and adolescent - my mother was a nurse, so doctors asssumed both she and I knew what we were talking about).

If I had a doctor like House in real life, I'd have walked out of the clinic in under five minutes. And while there've been one or two episodes (particularly the one with the sick teens, when they just flat-out refused to listen to the mother) where I've winced. Mostly, I can just disconnect it from how I'd react in real life, but I get how someone couldn't. I don't think, for example, that I could do that if House were a teacher treating students like that.

[luminosity]

Your complaints here? Settle it for me. I work for a brilliant neurosurgeon who borders on asshole everyday. If I weren't so prickly *at* him and valued by him, I could be run over by his assholiness. I don't need to see that in my entertainment. No matter what the character's reasons.

[destina.livejournal.com]

The people on the show who frequently get the sharp edge of his tongue and his attitude are patients.

Your post really strikes home with me, and you've put your finger on the majority of what I dislike about the show. House as a diagnostician sucks mightily, yea and verily. And he sucks at patient care, too, which is critical to what he does. The show can be very sharp, and interesting, but it's the kind of sharp that gets on my nerves, rather than the kind that intrigues me. I've been really shutting down in response to people who tell me/explain how I'm wrong not to love the show. They mean well, in their attempts to convert the world -- I've been there myself, with various fandoms, and pimping can be a beautiful thing; I highly endorse it -- but this show frequently annoys me and turns me off, on many levels.

[bethbethbeth.livejournal.com]

Oh, how I understand this. I mean, 98% of the current fandom favorites are shows that didn't click for me, and every post I see in support of the shows drive me further and further away from ever giving them a second chance.

Now, for me...with House, it's about the character - and not even really the character in relation to anyone else on the show. It's like...hmm...there are many "Good Guy" characters that I adore (Benton Fraser, for example), but every so often, there are nasty pieces of work with vulnerabilities (like, Snape, for example) who touch me in some way. House is one of those.

[j-bluestocking.livejournal.com]

You know, what you're saying about House's manner with patients is utterly true. And it's something that I hate and despise in real life. In real life, my fantasy would be to be on the other end, using the sharp edge of my tongue to tell off the doctor.

And yet, it doesn't bother me in the show. I'm willing to give him a dramatic pass, and I'm not entirely sure why. It's partly, I suppose, because over the past few years I've met more people that I'd have simply pegged as assholes in the past, whom I now find to be "bright but deeply troubled." The fact that it's pretty much always "showtime" for House argues that he's one of these people; clearly, to him, patients are not really in a separate class, the way they are to many doctors. They are one with the rest of the world, the world he tries so assiduously to avoid.

I don't know if that's it entirely for me, but that's certainly part of it. If I only knew House as a patient, I'd walk away muttering under my breath. But if I had to spend days and days with him, I'd see him quite differently. As the audience, we're privileged with that overview the characters within the reality don't get -- in that, the writers of the show are using the same successful dramatic technique that's been used forever for the good old "dark lord" archetype. He allows people to think he's a schmuck when there are times he could easily set them straight -- but pride will not allow it -- and he'll often do terrible things for a good reason that not everybody can see.

Now that I think about it, it's kind of a classic. :)

Of course, I recently had a conversation with a colleague that went:

Colleague: "You're the only person I've met who ever speaks of that man with anything but hatred."
Me: "Well, he is kind of a sociopath. But he was always willing to push the envelope for the sake of the project." (As they look at me funny:) "Hey, I don't ask a lot of the people I work with."

[ardent-muses.livejournal.com]

I think your issues are totally reasonable and they make me wonder why I like the show so much. In real life, I prefer to shun people who are half the asshole House is. (If they do, indeed, come in halves.) On the show? I'm fascinated by the character. I don't *like* him, and I don't really want to like him. Like you, I think he's reprehensible -- I actually get more angry at him when he tells off parents and spouses than when he tells off the sick people -- but I still find him mesmerizing.

But then, I've really liked Hugh Laurie for a long time so I'm probably cutting the character more slack than he deserves.

And I need another show. I get tired of watching Due South DVDs. *G*

[brancher.livejournal.com]

All along, I've referred to this show as Richard the Third: M.D. And I think your problems will vanish if you stop perceiving House as a hero. He's not. He's a villian, and the show is built around villiany.

I'm fond of villians, and Richard III is my favorite. He's a beautiful monster. His psychological twists have some obvious roots: in a great production I saw, the actor playing Richard made a great show of getting down on her (yes, her - she was brilliant) knees before the king, wrestling with the gimp leg to do so, and it made you think that Richard wanted to off everyone and ascend the throne just so he wouldn't have to fucking bow any more. And then there's the verbal brilliance of the character, the incredible poetry of maliciousness. You see the parallels.

Great villians -- Richard, Macbeth, Lex Luthor -- all are great because their villiany encompasses some human virtue twisted and made malevolent. Pride, independance, ambition, even empathy. I think House empathizes with his patients. Their helplessness reminds terribly him of his own, and his disgust for himself becomes his rancor at them. It's horrible, it's a tragedy that he is like this, but it's fascinating to watch.

He's a very human character. There are things to admire in him -- his obvious intelligence, his pride, his verbal wit. But his thinly disguised self-pity and bitterness well up and overwhelm him. He's like a man clinging to beam in a stormy sea. I watch the show to see what will happen if, inevitably, he looses his grasp.

Hugh Laurie is late to Richard III practice...

[viedma.livejournal.com]

Having a wife who's a med-mal attorney has soured me on any prima-donna attitudes doctors (real or fictional) have. Then there's the fact that Laurie will never stop being Wooster to me, so the grumpiness seems a bit much. I don't think anyone who's been in your shoes for the past few months can be expected to have any sympathy towards someone who's supposed to be *doing his job*.

Much love to you, Kat. I know you've been through a lot lately. ::squeeze::

House? Not in my house.

[namastenancy.livejournal.com]

I love it that you can so eloquently state why I don't like the show. I tried to watch it; after all, there isn't a lot on TV these days that interests me. But I worked in hospitals for over 30 years and I just can't stand another arrogant, rude MD-asshat who is supposed to be some sort of (anti) hero. I can respect medical knowledge while deploring their behavior. Having been the brunt of the most vicious politics at UC, I just can't watch the show - the rudeness, cutting cruely and self righteousness made me physically ill. Laurie is a brilliant actor and I wish him well - but in another venue.

I'm with you on the being sad; a lot of people are crazy about Lost but, while I enjoy it, I'm not a big fan. So, I guess I'll just go back to the painting and the calligraphy.
Take care, ma cherie! I know that you've been through a difficult time

namaste SF Nancy

[leadensky.livejournal.com]

Haven't seen the show, so I'm just talking off your post.

There are two things I get told over and over - first, You will miss a hundred things by not looking before you miss one thing by not knowing. (Which harkens back to your comment on how diagnosises are actually made.)

The second one is The patients (clients) don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. You're not going to get all the info you need until you get their trust. And if they don't trust you, they aren't going to listen when you tell them yes, you really need to undergo this procedure/take this nasty medicine/listen to me and stop your unhealthy habits.

Having said all that, have they shown a patient yet who tells the nurse one thing, the attending physician another, House himself something else, and lies the whole time?

Just as people never remember the good docs, only the rude assholes, docs and nurses never remember the good, smart, helpful patients, only the rude, disrespectful ones who threaten to sue at the drop of a hat, try to lie so they can get controlled drugs, or who beg for special payment arrangements and then stiff the clinic for the bill.

Oh, for a perfect world where one only had to deal with "the right sort of people." *g*

- hossgal