5 TV doctors that get it right

The first thing that surprised me when starting this review was the vast number of fictional TV doctors available to choose from. One website, for instance, listed the greatest 98 TV doctors of all time, covering over 60 years.

I suppose your favourite fictional TV doctor may depend to some extent upon your era: it often being said that most people’s favourite, Dr Who (there goes one already), most often depends on their own age, and this may well be a similar consideration here too. 

Another consideration may also be quite how far you need to stretch your reality in order to picture yourself as a patient of some of the listed docs: several of them are cartoons, and others are science-fiction characters; some are both. 

Many of the others are perhaps also too far afield or specialised to consider being a patient of: Dr Christina Yang from Grey’s Anatomy being a cardio-thoracic surgeon, for instance, and her colleague Derek Shepherd being a neurosurgeon; the endearing Frasier Crane, and his neurotic brother, Niles, are psychiatrists. Other TV doctors you may be even keener to avoid being a patient of, include Dr Quincy and Dr Nikki Alexander, as they are both pathologists. 

Here is my personal list of the top 5 TV medics, in order of the first episodes of their series appearing, trying to ignore the plausibility of being one of their patients.

This was a bittersweet comedy set in a mobile surgical hospital during the Korean War. Hawkeye was the chief surgeon who spent much of his time drinking, joking and womanising, but he was also a brilliant surgeon who had great empathy for his patients. 

The black humour used by him and his colleagues is very much in tune with medics I have worked with, but his open drinking and homemade alcohol production would be less likely to be tolerated. His charm and good looks certainly help, though, and this would likely still help him get away with mild transgressions in the normal world. 

Overall, his rapport would endear him to his patients, and being very good at the actual job would make him a great choice to be a real-life doctor.

The series was created by Dr Jed Mercurio. This was an intensely realistic, dark drama focussed around Andrew’s overwhelming first junior doctor posting in an NHS hospital.

I found it unwatchable on its first showing as it took me straight back into some distressing memories of doing the same job, only a few years earlier. It certainly felt like a faithful representation of being a real-life doctor, particularly the behind-the-scenes stuff that patients are not usually aware of.

I think that Andrew would make a good doctor in real life although (possible spoiler alert) some of his personal decisions may have an impact of his ability to get there.

He is a failed vascular surgeon who swiftly transitions to being the sole GP in a beautiful Cornish fishing village. He is grumpy and lacks most normal social skills but is otherwise a remarkably sharp doctor who saves numerous lives throughout the series.

Most realistic (certainly in the recent past) is the villagers’ 24-hour-a-day reliance on him for local medical care. Least realistic was his instant switch of medical careers without the appropriate training and qualifications. Also, in real life, his daily rudeness to many of his patients would likely result in numerous complaints and his likely suspension.

Despite those reservations I would quite like to be his patient as he is a good clinician who rarely misses a diagnosis.

House is a brilliant diagnostic physician based in a US hospital. He is unorthodox but has an unerring knack for spotting, often very rare, diagnoses in his patients.          

He is less humorously cantankerous than Doc Martin and has an addiction for strong painkillers. Most real doctors are equally determined to try and get the right diagnosis, so this aspect of the show is authentic.

Some behaviours by him and his team are a little bit too far, though, even for fiction. In one episode, for instance, some of his junior doctors break into a patient’s house to look for potential toxins.

House would make a good real life doctor if you needed only a diagnosis, with no need for long-term care.

This is a fictionalised story based upon the diaries of Dr Adam Kay, while he worked as a junior doctor in an NHS obstetrics and gynaecology unit. The series feels a lot less lighthearted than the original book, but still hits the mark with its authentic medical scenes, wit and humour.

The drama is very realistic and Adam is shown as an imperfect, but real, person. He may be disdainful of some patients, but always tries to supply them with the most appropriate treatment.

The honesty in the writing and the portrayal may lead many to not want Adam as their doctor, but that would be unfair. His actual real-life response to something going wrong showed his true level of care and empathy. 

Dr Andrew Collin from Cardiac Arrest. 

Hawkeye from M*A*S*H

Doc Martin (of course!) 

Dr Martin Stagg is the author of The Real Doc Martin: The Humour, Sadness and Absurdity of a Life in General Practice, out now (Whitefox Publishing), priced £10.99

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Banner photo: Doc Martin, played by Martin Clunes (credit: Millifanti)

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