House M.D. is a medical drama television show in America that ran from November 16th, 2004, to May 21st, 2012. Gregory House, a doctor, is a misanthropic medical genius who led a team of diagnosticians at Princeton-Plainsboro teaching hospital in New Jersey. He was the main character in this medical drama show. The TV show, which is a series, came up with Paul Attanasio and was created by David Shore because he was responsible for the conception of the title character. The show’s filming and airing received high critical acclaim, making it the most and highest-rated series in the U.S. (Keveney 5). During the first three seasons of the TV series, House’s (the main character in the TV show) diagnostic team comprised of three doctors. The first one was Dr. Robert, who acted as Spencer. The second doctor was Dr. Allison Cameron, who acted as Jennifer Morrison, and the third one was Dr. Eric Foreman, who acted as Omar Epps (Keveney 5). Before the end of season three, the team dissolves where they are rejoined by Foreman, who selects other new team members to execute different roles. The chosen ones were Dr. Remy “Thirteen” (Olivia Wilde), the second member was Dr. Chris Chase, and the third member was Dr. Lawrence Kutner, who acted as Kal Penn (Keveney 6). Both Chase and Cameron continued to appear periodically in various duties at the hospital. Later, in season five, Kutner, and early in season six, Cameron leaves the hospital, and Chris returns to the diagnostic team (Keveney 6). Remy goes on a leave where he was absent for most episodes of season seven in the television show, and her place was filled by Martha Masters, whose real name is Amber Tamblyn (Keveney 6). Cuddy and Masters leave before the eighth season, where Foreman is promoted and becomes the new dean of medicine as Jessica Adams (Odette) and Dr. ChiPark (Charline Yi) join the House team.
The TV show “Doctor House” is structured and developed around a common plot with supporting stories and narratives across all its seasons. Most of the episodes are about the diagnosis of a primary patient, and they start with an unsympathetic sent outside the hospital, where events are shown to end with the start of the patient’s symptoms. The episodes show that the team went ahead to diagnose and offer treatment to the specific patient’s illness, which often fails up to the development of a critical condition of the patient (Keveney 7). The patient gets misdiagnosed at least once, leading to more complications. The nature of difficulties and circumstances often dispenses new evidence that helps diagnose the patient appropriately. Dr. House makes the correct diagnosis, where he is often seemingly out of the blue. However, the team faces numerous diagnostic difficulties from the patient’s concealment of symptoms and personal histories, which makes House proclaim that the patient is lying during the team’s deliberations (Jerrentrup et al. 8). Due to many hypotheses based on epiphanies, House has trouble getting permission to undertake medical procedures because he considers them necessary. During the execution of clinical duties, House confounds the patient with unwelcoming observations of their own lives and unorthodox treatment. After appearing not to bother the complaints, he goes ahead and impresses them regularly with rapid and accurate diagnoses.
The Vicodin used by House to manage pain caused by an infarction in the quadriceps of his right leg for five years before the start of the show’s first season is a significant plot element. In season one, the eleventh episode, House admits that he has an addiction to Vicodin but claims he does not have complications because the pills let him execute his job and relieve him of pain. His continuous use of Vicodin and addiction has led some of his colleagues, like Cuddy and Wilson, to tell and encourage him to do drug rehabilitation several times (Keveney 7). House then goes into denial about this for some time, but he commits himself to serve the Mayfield Psychiatric Hospital at the close of the season finale.
The best lesson we can learn from the Dr. House TV series is that everybody lies for either a good reason or a bad one, their selfish reasons, to save their skin or for the greater good. People never change; they just become more of who they are in reality. The above theme is illustrated by the doctor himself (Dr. Gregory House) since he could not trust what patients told him. He always proved this to be accurate and time again to be probably true for everything and everyone with a degree of skepticism. The second recurring theme is that you cannot always get what you want (Keveney 8). Based on the cases of Dr. House, none of them were typical, making him solve only one in a week. Based on his mind, he knows he will not get the result House wants since he will constantly be tested. The third theme is that you will always get what you want if you try for sometimes without giving up. Since things do not go the way people want them to, one has to find a way to keep them the way they want them. The fourth theme is that friends will never leave you aside. No matter the circumstances, Dr. Wilson stood by Dr. House in this TV show. No matter what, he did not leave him side by side, especially when things turned worse.
The TV series opened doors to attract and bring medical students to learn more about rare diseases through seminars that featured this show. The teaching of medical students with the help of the House M.D. series require constant and accurate evaluation. There is also teaching medical students since the TV show attracts medical students who are taught some diagnostic strategies for the rare disease (Jerrentrup et al. 1). The students always see the TV series from a critical perspective, and most of them strongly agree with Dr. House’s interpersonal skills in handling both patients and colleagues. The TV series positively influenced them to improve their diagnostic and clinical skills since they acted as role models. Most medical students have chosen the House MD (Dr. House TV show) as their learning tool because it is well known to them and delivers medical information with a high proportion of entertainment (Jerrentrup et al. 2). The context humor patterns illustrated by the students enable them to trigger positive socio-economical communication, solutions, and procedural structure. The students were interested in attending the seminars since they learned a lot through the TV show. The medical students diagnosed a patient with severe cobalt intoxication, which was accompanied by hearing loss, hypothyroidism, and cardiomyopathy caused by a metal hip replacement. The act used a comparable House MD episode in season seven, episode eleven, titled “Family Practice.”
The show’s impact on individuals and culture is significant. As for individuals, the show illustrated that there needs to be true friendship between colleagues in the same or different fields of work, as shown by Wilson and Dr. House. The TV show offered a platform for learning and interaction among the medical students where they developed new ideas about the world surrounding them (Jerrentrup et al. 9). Also, the program was brilliant where it revealed some insights on how we think and act, why we do things, and offered knowledge of solving medical mysteries. The program led to the contributions of fewer racial minorities, which slowly killed racism up to this point, where there are only minimal cases. The TV series was an fMRI of cultural studies where we can see the platitudinous assumptions of social and professional promise practiced in the medical field.
Works Cited
Jerrentrup, Andreas, et al. “Teaching medicine with the help of “Dr. House.”” PLoS One 13.3 (2018): e0193972. https://web-p-ebscohost-com.libraryproxy.harding.edu/ehost/viewarticle/render?data=dGJyMPPp44rp2%2fdV0%2bnjisfk5Ie46bZQt6iuUbKk63nn5Kx95uXxjL6orUqwpbBIsKieTrirrlKyqZ5Zy5zyit%2fk8Xnh6ueH7N%2fiVauns06vrK5It660PvHf4lW3rK9Ot9qufquns0zio7JKtK2rULKt30Xfpq9Is6y1ea%2bmr0q%2b6ON85%2bmkhN%2fk5VXj5KR84LPfUeac8nnls79mpNfsVa%2botkyxrbJPspzkh%2fDj34y75uJ%2bxOvqhNLb9owA&vid=21&sid=96169d0f-154d-4267-847a-a010567a1012@redis
Keveney, Bill. ‘House’ raises cane till the end. (2012): J0E197880814712. https://web-p-ebscohost-com.libraryproxy.harding.edu/ehost/detail/detail?vid=20&sid=96169d0f-154d-4267-847a-a010567a1012%40redis&bdata=JkF1dGhUeXBlPWlwJnNjb3BlPXNpdGU%3d#AN=J0E197880814712&db=a9h
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