TV and Medicine
This evening Neal Baer, producer of and writer for ER and Law and Order: SVU, lectured on the doctor's role in exposing medicine to the public. He envisioned his role as an agent for social change by dramatizing medical issues. He gave an example of a young female patient (in ER) who contracted Human PapillomaVirus (HPV) through unprotected sex. As you may know, this virus significantly increases the risk of developing cervical cancer.
By surveying viewers a while after the program, the show found that 60% recalled something about HPV and its risk for cancer, and 12% sought medical expertise directly as a result of the show. With a viewership of 50 million and syndication, Baer reasoned that an episode of ER could effect a tangible change in social behavior, this time regarding a virus and sex.
This is a great example of how the oft-secluded field of medicine can reach broadly to the public through popular media. This also means that there can be devastating effects from misrepresentations of medicine and science. The forensics drama CSI dazzles viewers with promises of DNA evidence pulled from every crime scene, magical clarifications of fuzzy video image. Here are two humorous parodies of the show's out-of-this-world technology.
While captivating, these misleading investigations have had a detrimental effect on evidence consideration in court. Jury members under the eponymous "CSI effect" are harder to please with forensic evidence gathered with realistic limitations.
Medical and scientific advisers to these shows therefore have a great responsibility to report accurately while employing dramatic license to gather an audience. Make the show too saucy and it can have a detrimental effect; make the show too dull and there will be no one to educate.
Print This Post
November 13th, 2009 - 16:22
Wow, your thoughts are really insightful.