History Main / ArtisticLicenseMedicine

->Quack! Quack! Quack!\\
--'''Many a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallard mallard]]'''

* ''Film/{{Terminator}} Salvation'' includes a character getting impaled through the chest, which requires a heart transplant to fix. This is a huge medical fail because there is no trauma that would require this. If the heart is not punctured, he does not require a new heart. If the heart is punctured, he would be instantly dead. It's one or the other, and there is nothing in between. The fact that there is no mention of infection, compatibility, rejection, or just the fact that it's a hard to accomplish procedure even in a non-collapsed society with functioning hospitals, makes it even worse.

* A banner ad that says "Low white blood cell counts can put you at risk for neutropenia." Neutropenia means you have a low count of a specific type of blood cell, so, yeah, that's pretty much exactly correct and completely useless.

** This is mostly due to ExecutiveMeddling. In the original ending [[spoiler:John Conner dies and Marcus Wright takes his face and identity to continue his legacy. Something at least marginally plausible given known terminator technology.]]

* ''Series/{{Stargate SG-1}}'' had a minor case with pathology in "The Broca Divide", the episode where SG-1 and -3 accidentally bring back a disease that causes humans to regress to a primitive mental state. [[MST3KMantra Leaving aside whether it's physically possible for a disease to do this]], the goof came when Dr. Fraiser referred to the organism causing the disease as a virus that feeds on histamine. [[spoiler:This allowed them to cure it with massive doses of allergy meds, starving the disease.]] Viruses do not feed on ''anything'': they use cells to replicate, plain and simple, so [[spoiler:antihistamines]] would have had absolutely no effect had it actually been a virus. She also refers to it as a "parasitic virus". [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment Viruses are parasitic by definition.]]

* In DC's latest reboot, ComicBook/{{Superman}} meets Lois Lane by saving her life, as usual--but this time it's by performing surgery on her following a gunshot wound rather than catching her falling out a window. And he does every step past the obvious one of using his X-Ray vision as wrong as he can. He starts by putting gloves on--and then immediately cutting a hole in them for the [[http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ImBy6nlNaEc/UBxerK9xfLI/AAAAAAAAHA4/rmkuNETfOs4/s1600/supermanaction12d+super+surgery.jpg only part he actually touches her]]. Then instead of removing the bullet, he [[http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jf8VVp1L_CQ/UBxersA1HnI/AAAAAAAAHBA/XjdNVXrZlkg/s1600/supermanaction12e+superman+saves+lois+no+scars.jpg uses his heat vision to vaporize it and then uses that same supervision to cauterize the wound shut]]. The writer is apparently unaware that heating lead to the point of ''vaporizing'' it would have cooked Lois from the inside out, and that cauterizing a wound is not the same thing as welding metal together--it isn't a quick healing that doesn't leave a scar so much as it is a fast way to seal bleeding wounds, and cauterizing two pieces of skin like that would ensure they ''don't'' heal together at all.

[[folder:/ComicBooks]]

* GreysAnatomyEmergencyMedicalResponse

* SelectStitchAtTheSurvivalMenu

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[[/index]]

[[quoteright:323:[[VideoGame/TeamFortress2 http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TF2_6714.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:323:"Anyway, zat's how I lost my medical license."]]

[[/index]]
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[[foldercontrol]]

!!Examples:

[[folder:Film]]
* ''{{Terminator}} Salvation'' includes a character getting impaled through the chest, which requires a heart transplant to fix. This is a huge medical fail because there is no trauma that would require this. If the heart is not punctured, he does not require a new heart. If the heart is punctured, he would be instantly dead. It's one or the other, and there is nothing in between. The fact that there is no mention of infection, compatibility, rejection, or just the fact that it's a hard to accomplish procedure even in a non-collapsed society with functioning hospitals, makes it even worse.
** This is mostly due to ExecutiveMeddling. In the original ending [[spoiler:John Conner dies and Marcus Wright takes his face and identity to continue his legacy. Something at least marginally plausible given known terminator technology.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:LiveActionTV]]
* Real-life surgeons are very reluctant to cut half a person's brain out. TV surgeons, on both ''Series/{{House}}'' and ''[=~Grey's Anatomy~=]'', are more relaxed about performing hemispherectomies.
* ''House'' often features chemotherapeutic drugs as a single "chemo" chemical that you just give a patient to kill any cancer that might be anywhere in the body. In reality, chemo can use alkylating agents, antimetabolites, anthracyclines, plant alkaloids, topoisomerase inhibitors, or any number of other chemicals, and it all depends on the specific type of tumor.
** Interestingly enough, there's often multiple treatments for the same type of tumor, depending on allergic reactions and bodily tolerance. (read: some are more toxic than others, and God help you if you turn out to be allergic.)
** In one episode of ''Series/{{House}}'', we see a patient ripping out his cochlear implant -- cue spurting blood and frantic attempts to save his life. In real life, the external parts of the device (the microphone and speech processor) are held on magnetically, with the actual implant itself safely under the skin. Deaf people and hearing itinerants remove them all the time. It's the equivalent of someone dying by removing their glasses. [[hottip:*:Some of the earliest experimental implants did have the external components physically connected. As this requires leaving a gaping hole in the patient's flesh, they don't do that anymore. Chances are that any of the recipients of those early prototypes are either dead of old age, or have upgraded to a newer model.]]
* ''GreysAnatomy'' In the second part of the bomb episodes in season two, all Addison Montgomery can do for Miranda Bailey--who is extremely distraught about her husband being in surgery next to the might-explode-at-any-second bomb--is tell her the baby could die if she doesn't push. Offering support and encouragement and taking charge is apparently something only interns do. And in the season three premiere, with the preemie who was left in a trash can at a high school, and the four girls who could have been the mother? All they had to do was give them a regular pee on a stick pregnancy test. The pregnancy hormone, hCG, stays in the blood for up to six weeks after birth.
* On ''Series/StargateUniverse'', one character donates a kidney to another. The location of the scar on the donor's belly suggests that they accidentally transplanted his spleen instead, as a donated kidney is best extracted from the lower back, not the front.
* ''StargateSG1'' had a minor case with pathology in "The Broca Divide", the episode where SG-1 and -3 accidentally bring back a disease that causes humans to regress to a primitive mental state. [[MST3KMantra Leaving aside whether it's physically possible for a disease to do this]], the goof came when Dr. Fraiser referred to the organism causing the disease as a virus that feeds on histamine[[spoiler:, enabling them to starve it to death by way of massive doses of allergy meds]]. Viruses do not feed on ''anything'': they use cells to replicate, plain and simple, so [[spoiler:antihistamines]] would have had absolutely no effect had it actually been a virus. She also refers to it as a "parasitic virus". [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment Viruses are parasitic by definition.]]
[[/folder]]
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* CleanPrettyReliable

* Real-life surgeons are very reluctant to cut half a person's brain out. TV surgeons, on both ''{{House}}'' and ''[=~Grey's Anatomy~=]'', are more relaxed about performing hemispherectomies.

* ''GreysAnatomy''" Addison Montgomery, awesome character though she is, is the worst OB on the planet. In the second part of the bomb episodes in Season Two, all she can do for Miranda Bailey - who is extremely distraught about her husband being in surgery next to the might-explode-at-any-second bomb is tell her the baby could die if she doesn't push. Offering support and encouragement and taking charge is apparently something only interns do. And in the season three premiere, with the preemie who was left in a trash can at a high school, and the four girls who could have been the mother? All they had to do was give them a regular pee on a stick pregnancy test. The pregnancy hormone, hCG, stays in the blood for up to six weeks after birth.

[[quoteright:323:[[TeamFortress2 http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TF2_6714.jpg]]]]

** In one episode of ''Series/{{House}}'', we see a patient ripping out his cochlear implant -- cue spurting blood and frantic attempts to save his life. In real life, the external parts of the device (the microphone and speech processor) are held on magnetically, with the actual implant itself safely under the skin. Deaf people and hearing itinerants remove them all the time. It's the equivalent of someone dying by removing their glasses. [[hottip:*:Some of the earliest experimental implants did have the external components physically connected. As this requires leaving a gaping hole in the patients flesh, they don't do that anymore. Chances are that any of the recipients of those early prototypes are either dead of old age, or have upgraded to a newer model.]]
* ''GreysAnatomy''" Addison Montgomery, awesome character though she is, is the worst OB on the planet. In the second part of the bomb episodes in Season Two, all she can for Miranda Bailey -who is extremely distraught about her husband being in surgery next to the might-explode-at-any-second bomb is tell her the baby could die if she doesn't push. Offering support and encouragement and taking charge is apparently something only interns do. And in the season three premiere, with the premie who was left in a trash can at a high school, and the four girls who could have been the mother? All they had to do was give them a regular pee on a stick pregnancy test. The pregnancy hormone, hCG, stays in the blood for up to six weeks after birth.

[[caption-width-right:323:"Anyway, that's how I lost my medical license."]]

* On ''StargateUniverse'', one character donates a kidney to another. The location of the scar on the donor's belly suggests that they accidentally transplanted his spleen instead, as a donated kidney is best extracted from the lower back, not the front.

** In one episode of House, we see a patient ripping out his cochlear implant -- cue spurting blood and frantic attempts to save his life. In real life, the external parts of the device (the microphone and speech processor) are held on magnetically, with the actual implant itself safely under the skin. Deaf people and hearing itinerants remove them all the time. It's the equivalent of someone dying by removing their glasses. [[hottip:*:Some of the earliest experimental implants did have the external components physically connected. As this requires leaving a gaping hole in the patients flesh, they don't do that anymore. Chances are that any of the recipients of those early prototypes are either dead of old age, or have upgraded to a newer model.]]
* Addison Montgomery, awesome character though she is, is the worst OB on the planet. In the second part of the bomb episodes in Season Two, all she can for Miranda Bailey -who is extremely distraught about her husband being in surgery next to the might-explode-at-any-second bomb is tell her the baby could die if she doesn't push. Offering support and encouragement and taking charge is apparently something only interns do. And in the season three premiere, with the premie who was left in a trash can at a high school, and the four girls who could have been the mother? All they had to do was give them a regular pee on a stick pregnancy test. The pregnancy hormone, hCG, stays in the blood for up to six weeks after birth.
* On ''{{Stargate}} Universe'', one character donates a kidney to another. The location of the scar on the donor's belly suggests that they accidentally transplanted his spleen instead, as a donated kidney is best extracted from the lower back, not the front.

[[quoteright:342:[[TeamFortress2 http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TF2_6714.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:342:Archimedes, no! It's filthy in there.]]

[[redirect:YouFailYourMedicalBoardsForever]]