Saved, sorta excited, not going to lie

[jbar]

Yeah, I know. It'll be inaccurate, stupid, overly dramatic. But isn't anyone else excited that there is going to be a tv show just about medics? Not lumped in with firefighters and cops, but almost as if we are our own profession? Correct me if I'm wrong, but this may be the first (fictional) show about medics since Emergency. Anyone have a tv in West Virginia that I can come watch it on? (I'll be boating down there). Kidding, but only sorta

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[a_ditchdoc]

I'll have to wait and see it for myself. I find it hard to believe that they will make the show even remotely realistic. I know they have to produce ratings, but a small bit of realism would go far to garner respect for the EMS community. My guess is that it will be about some troubled guy, that is haunted by something from his past, never takes crappy calls, works only with gorgeous supermodels, is never exhausted, doesn't drink coffee all day, gets paid really well, never has anything go wrong, and is never seen heaving or picking up body parts off the highway.

I am certain the medics will also save nearly everyone, unless of course it adds a small amount of drama to have otherwise, then the star will be devastated by the "one he lost". I recall an episode of ER during which a victim of a GSW to the chest, a shotgun injury no less, was defibrillated about twice, regained a pulse, and the infamous words were "He stable, send him up (to surgery)". That was the last time I watched it. What a crock.

During the popularity of "Recue 911", there were times when, during a resuscitation, I would overhear the family saying "He's going to be ok, they are working on him". Because they never saw someone die on the show, they assumed that CPR and "Shocking" was going to save everyone. And, when you did't defibrillate, people would ask "Why didn't you try to shock him, he might have lived."

I have set my hopes low. Of course, I have not had a televison in 7 years...so, what does it matter...

 

[leviathan]

Yeah, I know. It'll be inaccurate, stupid, overly dramatic. But isn't anyone else excited that there is going to be a tv show just about medics? Not lumped in with firefighters and cops, but almost as if we are our own profession? Correct me if I'm wrong, but this may be the first (fictional) show about medics since Emergency. Anyone have a tv in West Virginia that I can come watch it on? (I'll be boating down there). Kidding, but only sorta

The show is called 'Saved'? What network/times will it be on? I'll check it out, but then I know that 80% of the medical shows that appear are not medically accurate and nowhere near realistic/representative of what the job is really like.

 

[jbar]

The show is called 'Saved'? What network/times will it be on? I'll check it out, but then I know that 80% of the medical shows that appear are not medically accurate and nowhere near realistic/representative of what the job is really like.

TNT, June 12th. not sure of the time.

 

[fiznat]

There was a quick article about the show in the most recent JEMS, and it wasnt flattering. Unsurprisingly, the show is supposed to have very little to do with real medicine (while "Emergency!" often did), and instead tells stories about a burnt out medic who is extremely lazy, treats patients like crap, and pulls ridiculous stunts like having sex with a (really hot, I admit) nurse in the back of the ambulance while posting. The JEMS article made it sound like an assault on EMS. I havnt seen it yet either so I dont know for myself, but I seriously doubt that its going to be what EMS workers are looking for in a show.

I am excited to see that a new EMS show is coming around though. I usually eat that stuff up, regardless of the quality. Do you guys watch the show "Paramedics" on Discovery Health? Everyone talks very highly about it at work, but I dont get that channel.

 

[jbar]

There was a quick article about the show in the most recent JEMS, and it wasnt flattering. Unsurprisingly, the show is supposed to have very little to do with real medicine (while "Emergency!" often did), and instead tells stories about a burnt out medic who is extremely lazy, treats patients like crap, and pulls ridiculous stunts like having sex with a (really hot, I admit) nurse in the back of the ambulance while posting. The JEMS article made it sound like an assault on EMS. I havnt seen it yet either so I dont know for myself, but I seriously doubt that its going to be what EMS workers are looking for in a show.

I would like to note that I know a lot of burned out medics, some of whome treat their patients like crap, and one of whom, yes, had sex while posting in the back (not while I was working with him). Just like to note that just becuase the show doesn't paint a nice pciture of EMS, doesn't mean it is inaccurate. Though the show may very well be inaccurate medically as well.

 

[psychbender]

Unsurprisingly, the show is supposed to have very little to do with real medicine (while "Emergency!" often did), and instead tells stories about a burnt out medic who is extremely lazy, treats patients like crap, and pulls ridiculous stunts like having sex with a (really hot, I admit) nurse in the back of the ambulance while posting.

So...Saved will be to EMS what Rescue Me is to Fire services?

As for the shows on Discovery Health (Paramedics, Trauma, etc), I like them, though sometimes I'm shocked by what I see some of the medics doing (packaging a pt from an MVA without C-spine considerations, not administering O2 on trauma pts, etc).

 

[celestialchoral]

There was a quick article about the show in the most recent JEMS, and it wasnt flattering. Unsurprisingly, the show is supposed to have very little to do with real medicine (while "Emergency!" often did), and instead tells stories about a burnt out medic who is extremely lazy, treats patients like crap, and pulls ridiculous stunts like having sex with a (really hot, I admit) nurse in the back of the ambulance while posting. The JEMS article made it sound like an assault on EMS. I havnt seen it yet either so I dont know for myself, but I seriously doubt that its going to be what EMS workers are looking for in a show.

I am excited to see that a new EMS show is coming around though. I usually eat that stuff up, regardless of the quality. Do you guys watch the show "Paramedics" on Discovery Health? Everyone talks very highly about it at work, but I dont get that channel.

Hi, premed, not EMT/para./doc., here. I haven't seen "Paramedics" in ages. (We only get TLC, which is where it used to run.) What time does it go on? And also, aren't there privacy issues that need to be settled before they show this kind of thing? Thanks. BTW, not intending to hijack the forum here, but does anyone here watch "Scrubs", "ER", or "Grey's" (or Gray's Anatomy (sp?))? I don't seem to hear very many good reviews on any of the above. I watch "Strange stories in the ER" or something to that effect. Thanks again.

 

[Gatewayhoward]

Personally, the only medical show that I enjoy is Scrubs, for one because it doesn't try to be medically accurate. Maybe if this show somehow dispels the whole "all you see is blood and guts" myth every non EMS person believes. And it would be great if not every call is a cardiac arrest that emotionally affects the character. Shoot, half the time my unit or another one rolls an arrest into the ER, we're thinking afterwards if there's any goodies in the EMS room or which hottie nure, doc is on call that day.

 

[DropkickMurphy]

As for the shows on Discovery Health (Paramedics, Trauma, etc), I like them, though sometimes I'm shocked by what I see some of the medics doing (packaging a pt from an MVA without C-spine considerations, not administering O2 on trauma pts, etc).

I believe that (along with privacy concerns) is one of the major reasons they stopped making new episodes. My personal favorite was the episode of Trauma: Life in the ER where the *****ic female Chinese resident is "fluid resuscitating" the fall victim by pouring saline down his NG tube. Then they cut to the surgeon (no pun intended )who can't figure out why they couldn't close his belly because his intestines are swollen. Could it be all the fluid the idiot poured into him? Maybe, ya think?

Shoot, half the time my unit or another one rolls an arrest into the ER, we're thinking afterwards if there's any goodies in the EMS room or which hottie nure, doc is on call that day.

Exactly.....it's like "Someone sign for this patient please...Thank you." *walks to nurses station* "Can I get a couple of meal tickets for the cafeteria?"

 

[leviathan]

I am excited to see that a new EMS show is coming around though. I usually eat that stuff up, regardless of the quality. Do you guys watch the show "Paramedics" on Discovery Health? Everyone talks very highly about it at work, but I dont get that channel.

I watch it sometimes, and it's not bad.

 

[caroladybelle]

"Saved"

The guy is totally hot...I'll watch for that reason.

 

[Gatewayhoward]

Love it or hate it, most of us EMS people will check it out just cause.

 

[psychbender]

Ok, after watching the premier, my friend and I have decided that we have to find the producers, and beat them with an ACLS book.

How much do you think Zoll paid for product placement?

I'll still probably watch the show for a while, simply because I like watching train wrecks.

 

[NontradICUdoc]

Although you have to admit that is DOES have that sick EMT/Paramedic humor.

I mean, we have always screamed at each other for saying the Q word and I don't know of a single rig jumper that would not laugh if a half naked mental patient took our band aid bus.

 

[Karl_Hungus]

I finally got time to watch the episode I recorded and:
I know that this show is a comedy/drama, and I expected a certain degree of un-realism (totally made up word) and several "oh, I'm so sure!" moments. I wasn't wrong in my prediction.
I'll save my rant about how I know much is unrealistic, and you know much is unrealistic, but there are several sub-geniuses out there who form opinions on real life based on TV written for entertainment. (The first month I worked in an ER we had a patient write in to administration and complain about the wait time, then point out that not once during his visit did he see nurses running around like they do on ER . My hope was that this was a joke; I am certain it wasn't.)

That said, Saved featured better music in its first episode than most shows do in a season. Any show that features a paramedic getting it on with a hot doctor to Hendrix can't be all that bad. The use of Cash's cover of NIN's Hurt was a nice touch also.

 

[QuikClot]

Actually being a paramedic in Portland, Oregon, I was excited to see the show (how often do you get a new TV show about someone doing your job in your hometown, unless you are a cop in New York or a lawyer in LA?) The show, I am sorry to say, failed to live up even to my fairly low expectations.

I didn't expect realism. Let's be adults about it; TV loves those clunky metal paddles and it always will; you will never see C-1s out of nursing homes as fodder for drama on basic cable; the notion that you perform CPR on all dead people, including traumatic arrests, is just too much engrained in the popular mind to fight (in fact, sometimes life imitates art; last week, a boy scout got smacked in the head by a log an hour up the trail on Mt. Hood and some poor, ill-educated med student did CPR on him for an hour and a half.)

What let me down was the dramatic stuff, the real dramatic stuff, that they left out. No firefighters except at a fire. Half the fun of my job is showing up at a call and seeing what crew I get. There's the interplay btw. the fire medic and the AMR medic. Great fire crews, and the ones that hold down the carpet.

They didn't seem to do anything on their calls (maybe because they didn't seem to carry any kits). Narcan. CPR. An IV that appeared out of nowhere. For a crew that boasts of doing everything doctors do "at sixty miles an hour" they didn't seem to do much. A good call, as you guys know, is when you have a bunch of hands and are using all of them. Nothing of the sort on "Saved."

And they had way too much free time. Usually TV plays up the busy life of emergency responders; police, firefighters, ER peeps, etc. Here, two crews are sitting down, having prepared food, to eat together. Not in Portland, no way. What are we, firefighters? We're on system status management. You go up, you go out, you go from streetcorner to streetcorner until you pop a call, then they clear you and send you to another streetcorner, like too little butter spread over too much bread. It's exhausting, it's lonely sometimes, but there is drama in it, which is more than I can say for "Saved."

 

[leviathan]

Actually being a paramedic in Portland, Oregon, I was excited to see the show (how often do you get a new TV show about someone doing your job in your hometown, unless you are a cop in New York or a lawyer in LA?) The show, I am sorry to say, failed to live up even to my fairly low expectations.

I didn't expect realism. Let's be adults about it; TV loves those clunky metal paddles and it always will; you will never see C-1s out of nursing homes as fodder for drama on basic cable; the notion that you perform CPR on all dead people, including traumatic arrests, is just too much engrained in the popular mind to fight (in fact, sometimes life imitates art; last week, a boy scout got smacked in the head by a log an hour up the trail on Mt. Hood and some poor, ill-educated med student did CPR on him for an hour and a half.)

What let me down was the dramatic stuff, the real dramatic stuff, that they left out. No firefighters except at a fire. Half the fun of my job is showing up at a call and seeing what crew I get. There's the interplay btw. the fire medic and the AMR medic. Great fire crews, and the ones that hold down the carpet.

They didn't seem to do anything on their calls (maybe because they didn't seem to carry any kits). Narcan. CPR. An IV that appeared out of nowhere. For a crew that boasts of doing everything doctors do "at sixty miles an hour" they didn't seem to do much. A good call, as you guys know, is when you have a bunch of hands and are using all of them. Nothing of the sort on "Saved."

And they had way too much free time. Usually TV plays up the busy life of emergency responders; police, firefighters, ER peeps, etc. Here, two crews are sitting down, having prepared food, to eat together. Not in Portland, no way. What are we, firefighters? We're on system status management. You go up, you go out, you go from streetcorner to streetcorner until you pop a call, then they clear you and send you to another streetcorner, like too little butter spread over too much bread. It's exhausting, it's lonely sometimes, but there is drama in it, which is more than I can say for "Saved."

Good review, QC. They film it in my city but I've yet to see the show.

 

[OSUdoc08]

I've seen both episodes and I approve, so far. I'm always very critical of medical shows, so that is a good sign. I haven't seen any gross mistakes in patient management.

The replay is on tonight at 10pm on TNT if you haven't seen it.

 

[Karl_Hungus]

How much do you think Zoll paid for product placement?

Not enough, apparently: The second episode they changed to the Phillips MRx.

 

[deleted6669]

Good review, QC. They film it in my city but I've yet to see the show.

they actually film a lot of it in vancouver, bc
the bridge jumping scene isn't any bridge in portland and "respond to freemont and taylor" doesn't work becuase although those streets exist they are on opposite sides of town and don't intersect......
fun show....and I have seen the lasix in coffee prank before while working ems.....
why is it that all medics have to be portrayed as burned out premed failures.....anyone seen/read "bringing out the dead "-that seems to be the model now for all paramedic main characters....although I knew/know a few like that they are not the avg by any means.....avg medic is either:
a: competent career medic, loving job
b: wanna be fire fighter getting medic experience for a FF job(hate working with these)
c: academic type doing medic as a stepping stone to rt/rn/pa/md (that would be me)
d: emt-b who went to medic school just because their friends did, not very good at job, but stays because it pays more than cleaning pools or detailing cars(hate working with these too)