Why TV is still our happy pill

It's never lupus. But medical dramas love dramatic prognoses. Here are their favourites

-  Arshia Dhar

1 The God complex. Of course, doctors save lives. But they only use remedies and treatments that have already proven to be effective from years of research. Don't believe it when Dr Meredith Grey magically finds a cure for Parkinson's disease in Season 18 of Grey's Anatomy. Or when Nurse Jackie comes up with a solution when doctors are stumped. That's wishful thinking, not science.

2 Surprise pregnancies. On a medical drama, it's only a matter of time before babies crawl into the script. Women didn't know they were pregnant (Call the Midwife), a man is his own twin (House). Virgin River, about a nurse in small-town America, is about the joy of birth and the toil of pregnancy, which is great. But after five seasons of pregnancies, even the miracle of childbirth begins to seem ordinary.

3 Defibrillators. Giving a lifeless body a jolt? Everyone's Frankenstein fantasy. The procedure is meant to shock the heart back into beating. On Scrubs and Transplant at least, it seems to always work. In real life, it simply fixes a heart rhythm gone awry and finds more use in first aid outside a hospital.