Grey’s Anatomy is one of my favorite shows, and has been since I graduated high school. I even credit the show for helping me learn about the median nerve due a wonderfully timed episode while I was in physical therapy school. I hesitate to call it a guilty pleasure, because why should I feel guilty for saying I like one of the most popular shows on television?
Although the scenarios on Grey’s are unlikely to happen, my understanding is that for the most part, they are medically possible. Most plot lines are taken from the news and other real cases, and a team of doctors make up part of the writing staff to lend credibility to the plot lines.
That is what makes the show’s depiction of physical therapy (or the lack of physical therapists) so frustrating. The surgeons are often depicted helping their patients get up and out of bed. While I don’t work in a hospital setting, I’m pretty sure that is about as likely to happen as one hospital having a shooting, two plane crashes, and a hostage crisis all in the span of a few years.
This week’s episode depicted one of the surgery residents doing “physical therapy” with a patient. Many of my physical therapist friends were offended by this. Physical therapy is a profession and not a modality, so it cannot be performed by someone who is not a physical therapist. Perhaps a surgery resident could encourage a patient to perform his physical therapy exercises, but he cannot “do physical therapy” as Schmitt attempts on the show. Instead, this would have been an opportune moment to show a physical therapist at work, as they did a few seasons ago when Dr. Webber required physical therapy.
Why does this matter? As freemvmt pointed out on Instagram, Grey’s averages 6 million viewers per week, while ChoosePT.com had less than 4 million visitors for all of 2019. For some people, Grey’s and other shows may be their only exposure to physical therapy. And, despite what we want to believe, media exposure colors our real-world opinions.
I read several studies about this as a communication major, but my favorite was a study showing that medical students attempted to intubate patients incorrectly as they saw the procedure on ER. If even medical students can be susceptible to what they see on TV, what does that mean for the average person?
For this reason, what we see on TV is important, and it is the responsibility of the show’s medical staff to accurately depict physical therapy.