© 2003, Wendy Webb "Nurse Buxom, I'll just finish removing this brain tumor, then amputate that bum leg, and while I'm at it, I'll fix that botched circumsicion. Meet me in the supply closet in fifteen, then I'm off to the golf course. Hold my calls." She titters, tugs her tight, short, white uniform and minces out of the surgical suite on six inch heels. "Okay, doctor." What's wrong with this picture? Aside from bad writing, that is. Cliches, misspelling, and wrong information. Let's start with the cliches. Sexpot nurses, physician wizards that can do everything, closet quickies, and golf courses ... Get real. The medical environment is one business in which an overwhelming majority of the staff are highly educated and specialty trained. You have a brain tumor cases, you get a neurosurgeon. Call in orthopedics and urology respectively for the rest. And one at a time. Different case, different specialty staff, different procedure. The days of closet rendezvous, if they ever existed, are over. Ditto most white uniforms, and deep six the heels. We're talking people who spend their lives on their feet, running and thinking. And not just eight hours a day. Try twelve, or sixteen, and often enough, more than that. Who has time for golf? Misspelling. Did you catch that faux pas "circumsicion"? Too bad. There are plenty that will and your credibility goes down the tubes faster than the contents of a bedpan. Which leads me to the category of wrong information. A writer once had the gall bladder to tell me "I didn't want to do any research, so I made up the illness." Big mistake. In the "State of Adventure" alone, there are over 50,000 registered nurses. Let me repeat that, over fifty thousand registered nurses. Add the number of physicians, LPNs, respiratory therapists, physical therapists, lab technologists, radiology ... we're talking real numbers here. Almost enough for some serious lobbying. And we're not amused. But if we are, your material could be in real trouble. Read credibility. Remember the bedpan. By the way, know that the bedpan is not the pivotal point of the nurses existence. They are too busy titrating medications based on calibrated readings from machines in order to maintain a life. And don't, under any circumstances, refer to a nurse as "Nurse" whoever. Unlike the term Doctor, Nurse is not a title and should never be used as one. Along those lines, you might be interested to know that over half of medical school students are women. Minority physicians have taken their rightful places as well. Things like surgery and other invasive procedures are in everyone's repertoire now. So don't trot out the rough-on-the-outside, but heart of gold, white, male surgeon and a mousey, but cover girl, nurse who hangs on his every word. The other side of that coin is to avoid the castrating female doctor who would just as soon slit open any male with her scalpel as look at them, and the gay male nurse who lives for changing a newborn's diaper. We will not be amused, and we will not buy your stories. And there are a lot of us. Some other do not's: Do not slam your character's fist on the patient's chest to get the heart beating again. This might have worked for Marcus Welby, but it doesn't cut it for us. And the patient might slap you silly. Do not assume that if you saw it on tv or in a movie that it must be right. Soap stars are notorious for taking blood pressures with their stethoscopes tucked away in their pockets. Do not assume that since you are speculating on future technology, that it doesn't exist now or that no one will really notice. It probably does, and we do. Don't make the mistake of thinking that you're the only one who figures that today's hot topic disease will make a hot topic book. If I had a dollar for everyone who mentioned the idea of a Vampire with AID's .... Enough of the don'ts for now. But time for a big do. Do research your idea. Even if it is only to ask one or two of the fifty thousand nurses, a doctor, respiratory therapist, physical therapist or one of many, many other professionals in the field. Spell everything correctly, and know what you're talking about with medications. Better to get it right the first time than to have us meet you in the Emergency Room with "So you're the one that wrote the medical story. Good. I've always wanted to slam someone's chest. Guess you're it."
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