Television appears to be a potent medium for influencing people. Channels and production houses may just need a little more careful about what they portray on TV, especially if its concerning medical procedures. A study now claims that first aid for seizures are inappropriately shown in TV medical shows.
Scientists scanned the most well-known medical dramas and discovered that doctors and nurses on the shows seem to react unsuitably to seizures nearly half the time.
“Television dramas are a potentially powerful method of educating the public about first aid and seizures. Our results, showing that television shows inaccurately showed seizure management half the time, are a call to action. People with epilepsy should lobby the television industry to adhere to guidelines for first aid management of seizures,” commented, study author Andrew Moeller, with Dalhousie University, Halifax, in Nova Scotia, Canada.
The study included examining all episodes of the top-rated US medical dramas like Grey’s Anatomy, House, M.D, Private Practice and the last five seasons of ER for seizures. In the 327 episodes, around 59 seizures took place. About 51 seizures occurred in a hospital. Virtually all first aid was carried out by ‘nurses’ or ‘doctors.’
Guidelines on seizure management were apparently applied to decide whether the seizure was controlled correctly.
The study seemed to discover that unsuitable practices, counting holding the individual down, attempting to halt spontaneous actions or placing something in the person’s mouth supposedly took place in around 25 cases. First aid management was said to be exhibited properly in around 17 seizures. Suitability of first aid apparently could not be verified in roughly 15 episodes of seizures.
The study was presented at the American Academy of Neurology’s 62nd Annual Meeting in Toronto.