Is ‘The Pitt’ accurate? Medical experts weigh in

Medical drama The Pitt https://www.imdb.com/title/tt31938062/ is winning Golden Globes… and health care workers’ hearts. Medical experts say the show, which chronicles a fictional Pittsburgh hospital emergency department, is perhaps the most medically accurate show that’s ever been created. But what about The Pitt makes it so accurate… and does the second season hold up as well as the first? Stanford Global Health Media Fellow (and fourth-year medical school student) Michal Ruprecht https://www.npr.org/people/g-s1-75872/michal-ruprecht joins Short Wave to discuss. Have a question about YOUR favorite show and whether science supports it? Email us at [email protected] mailto:[email protected]. Listen to every episode of Short Wave sponsor-free and support our work at NPR by signing up for Short Wave+ at plus.npr.org/shortwave http://plus.npr.org/shortwave. This episode was produced by Hannah Chinn. It was edited by Rebecca Ramirez. Tyler Jones checked the facts. The audio engineer was Maggie Luthar. See pcm.adswizz.com https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences. NPR Privacy Policy https://www.npr.org/about-npr/179878450/privacy-policy

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This message comes from Google Workspace with Gemini. One subscription that does it all. Personalized AI and premium business versions of Gmail, Google Docs, Drive and more. Try it free for 14 days at g o o dot g l e slash Workspace with Gemini.

• 0:18Speaker 01

  You're listening to Short Wave from NPR.

• 0:23Regina Barber?

  Hey, Short Wave-ers. Regina Barber here with Michal Ruprecht. He's the Stanford Global Health Media Fellow embedded with us here at NPR. Hey, Michael.

• 0:31Speaker 03

  Hey, Gina.

• 0:32Regina Barber?

  Michael, welcome to the show. I hear you are bringing us a story about one of my favorite things: TV.

• 0:38Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's a medical drama.

• 0:40Regina Barber?

  Awesome.

• 0:41Speaker 03

  But can I admit something to you, Gina?

• 0:43Regina Barber?

  Definitely.

• 0:44Speaker 03

  I'm not a huge fan of medical dramas because I'm a med student in real life. I'm studying to become a doctor and I feel like most medical dramas like ER or House, they aren't super accurate.

• 0:57Regina Barber?

  House, really?

• 0:58Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 0:59Regina Barber?

  Yeah, I know.

• 0:59Speaker 03

  But last year, all of my medical school friends, literally all of them, were talking about this one show. And they told me that this one was different. This one, like, I had to watch it. It's called The Pit.

• 1:13Regina Barber?

  Yeah, I just started watching that one. It's the one about a fictional emergency room in a hospital in Pittsburgh, right?

• 1:19Speaker 03

  Yeah. Season one came out last year and the show just won two Golden Globes, including the prize for best TV drama.

• 1:26Regina Barber?

  Yeah, I thought it was a really cool concept that each episode is a single hour of a 15-hour shift. So it's like, one season is one day.

• 1:34Speaker 03

  Yeah, you know, it's pretty fast-paced. And that means there's no time for deeply romantic subplots or even the sometimes far-fetched storylines that usually dominate those other medical dramas.

• 1:48Speaker 04

  The Pit is by far the most medically accurate show.

• 1:53Speaker 04

  That I think has ever been created. And I'm not the only one to share that opinion. I hear that a lot from my colleagues.

• 1:59Speaker 03

  That's Dr. Alok Patel. He's a pediatrician at Stanford Medicine Children's Health. And she's obviously a fan of the show.

• 2:06Regina Barber?

  Yeah, I mean, I'm a fan, too. I'm not in the medical field. I'm a different kind of doctor. But I found it really resonated with me, like especially the way they portray political division and mistrust in science, which we've definitely talked about in Short Wave.

• 2:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, totally. Not to mention even the corporatization of healthcare. On the whole, it's pretty realistic.

• 2:27Speaker 01

  Patients, they check in for registration here. A nurse eyeballs them, make sure they're not dying. If not, they're moved to one of two triage rooms for vitals and a quick chair exam where you can do labs and your x-rays. And then they come back to... Waiting room, till bed opens up.

• 2:43Speaker 05

  Is it always this busy?

• 2:45Speaker 01

  Uh, no. It gets a lot busier.

• 2:48Regina Barber?

  And the new season, it just started. Michael, I heard you got to watch it early.

• 2:52Speaker 03

  Yeah, Gina, it was so cool. And the show's new season is streaming on HBO Max now. So we're here to discuss whether it really holds up to the last one.

• 3:03Regina Barber?

  Today on the show, we dive headfirst into the pit, the medical drama that's breaking barriers on how hospitals are portrayed, and why healthcare workers are obsessed with it.

• 3:13Speaker 03

  Plus, a sneak peek at what season two has in store, from AI to misinformation and the realities of healthcare insurance.

• 3:22Regina Barber?

  You're listening to Short Wave, the science podcast from NPR.

• 3:30Speaker 00

  Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors. This message comes from Edward Jones. Where they believe rich is more than caring about the latest and greatest, it's also about taking care of what gives your life meaning. That's why your dedicated financial advisor meets you where you are with personalized financial strategies that help protect what matters so you can preserve your progress while creating a path forward. The key to being rich is knowing what counts. Let's find your rich together. Edward Jones. Member SIPC. This message comes from Mint Mobile. Ditch overpriced wireless and get premium wireless for less.

• 4:11Speaker 00

  Go to mintmobile.com/switch to see which plan works for you. This message comes from Google Workspace with Gemini. Ever notice how every new AI tool asks you to explain your business to it all over again? Google Workspace with Gemini skips that. You get Google's AI built right into the premium versions of Gmail, Google Docs, Sheets and more. No new tools, no extra logins, just one subscription that gives you personalized AI right inside your actual workflow. Try Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle/workspacewithgemini.

• 4:47Regina Barber?

  Okay, Michael, we're gonna dive into season two of The Pit, but before we do that, let's get a quick recap of season one.

• 4:54Speaker 03

  Totally. So the first season centers on the main character and veteran attending physician, Dr. Michael Robinevich, also known as Dr. Robbie. He's played by Noah Wiley.

• 5:05Regina Barber?

  Okay, I remember him from ER, but what's an attending physician?

• 5:10Speaker 03

  Yeah, that can get pretty confusing. So attendings are doctors who have finished years of training and they manage the students, residents and fellows on their teams. They're basically the boss, just like Dr. Robbie is the boss in The Pit. Plus his right-hand man, a woman. That's the charge nurse.

• 5:28Regina Barber?

  This makes sense to me. You've got your attending and the charge nurse, they go hand in hand. It's the blonde lady that I remember. But you had mentioned, you know, med students, fellows, residents. What do those terms all mean? Like, who are these people?

• 5:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, totally, Gina. It's a lot to keep track of. So let's start with med students. That's me. I'm in my fourth year and med students typically start working in the hospital in their third year of school. Their job is to examine patients on their own and learn how to start diagnosing them.

• 5:58Regina Barber?

  Okay.

• 5:59Speaker 03

  Next up on the totem pole, we've got residents. They're doctors who've just finished med school, and they're training in some kind of specialty. And that training lasts for several years. And then we have fellows. Those are doctors who already finished residency training, and they want to specialize even further. Finally, there are the nurses, the physician assistants, the social workers, and other people. They're just as vital to the ER and how it functions.

• 6:25Regina Barber?

  Yeah, I'm still in season one right now, and I was very surprised, and I know I shouldn't be, but there's like a social worker that's there all the time.

• 6:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, and speaking of season one, to finish the summary, Dr. Robbie's struggling to cope with some pretty traumatic memories while also treating patients and managing all those members on his team, who themselves are also going through some personal struggles.

• 6:48Regina Barber?

  Yeah, it sounds like so much. Plus, he has to remember all the patients he's like working with all day. It was kind of boggling my mind.

• 6:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, and Dr. Patel told me that that's one of the most realistic parts of the show.

• 7:02Speaker 04

  The reality is, if you're working a busy shift and you have things happening in your personal life, the line between personal life and professional life gets blurred, and people have moments, and the pit highlights that.

• 7:15Speaker 03

  Episode 11 was the climax of season one. In the last few minutes of that episode, Dana, the charge nurse, played by Catherine Lenasa, talks with Dr. Robbie outside the ER. And she has this big bruise around her eye.

• 7:28Regina Barber?

  Oh, my gosh, what happened? Like, I haven't gotten to that part yet, but it's OK. You can spoil it for me.

• 7:32Speaker 03

  I mean, basically, she got assaulted by a patient just two hours ago. And she tells Dr. Robbie that she feels like she's at her rock bottom. People are angry, her temper's just shorter, and we're still just trying to help.

• 7:46Speaker 06

  I don't know. Maybe what I want and what the patients need isn't what's best for you anymore.

• 7:51Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 7:54Speaker 06

  I just honestly don't know what I'm gonna do without you.

• 7:57Regina Barber?

  That's so heartbreaking.

• 7:59Speaker 03

  It is Gina, and it's also the reality for a lot of people in the medical field. Up to three quarters of healthcare workers have reported experiencing violence. Whether that's verbal abuse, or physical threats, or even outright assault. It all takes a toll.

• 8:15Speaker 04

  The new season of The Pit still has some of that tension between patients and healthcare professionals. And sometimes it's completely projected or misdirected. People are misunderstanding, they're frustrated, they get pissed off, they can't see a doctor in time in the ER, and they may act out. That whole concept of having to suppress this aggression, and then the frustration that there's not enough protection for healthcare workers, that's a very real issue.

• 8:40Regina Barber?

  Yeah, it's something I hadn't really thought of until I started watching this show. Michael, can I ask, what other aspects of The Pit are like similar to what healthcare workers have to deal with in real life? Like, do they go into any new issues in season two?

• 8:55Speaker 03

  Yeah Gina, you know, the second season gets into some new themes like insurance, AI, and it even gets into the weeds of charting.

• 9:03Regina Barber?

  Okay, let's take a step back. Let's talk about the first episode of season two, which aired last Friday.

• 9:10Speaker 03

  Yeah, episode one opens with that same busy and crowded ER that we're all familiar with from season one. But this time around, it's July 4th, and we meet a new doctor in the first few minutes of the episode.

• 9:26Regina Barber?

  Wait, I haven't started it yet. Is Dr. Robbie gone?

• 9:28Speaker 03

  Oh, no, no, no, no, no. He is still there, don't worry. But there's another physician joining him. Her name is Dr. Al Hashemi. She's played by Sepe Demowafi.

• 9:38Speaker 07

  She's some sort of clinical informatics expert. When she started talking about AI, I started thinking about robots and kind of stopped listening.

• 9:47Speaker 03

  Clear. That sort of captures the headbutting between her and Dr. Robbie that kind of becomes evident as we progress through this first episode. Her take on using AI in the ER, she actually encourages the residents to use it to take notes.

• 10:03Regina Barber?

  I just got a new family doctor and she used AI. She recorded our exam and she was like, there's gonna be a transcript, so I know what we talked about.

• 10:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, totally. This is something that's on our radar and people are excited about it, but there are some real concerns, like patient privacy and accuracy, and they talk about that in the show.

• 10:23Regina Barber?

  Yeah.

• 10:23Speaker 03

  Another interesting aspect of the season is how it gets into disability and access.

• 10:28Regina Barber?

  What do you mean?

• 10:29Speaker 03

  Well, there's this scene in the first episode where we see a patient sitting in the waiting room, and this waiting room is super busy, but as the camera pans over to her, it all goes silent.

• 10:47Speaker 03

  And we quickly realize that this patient is deaf, which really impacts her experience in the hospital, how the doctors interact with her, the type of care that she gets, and that's unfortunately true in the real world as well.

• 11:01Regina Barber?

  What do you mean the type of care she gets? Like, can you give me an example?

• 11:06Speaker 03

  Well, when a patient, like in this case, needs an interpreter who can sign ASL, the doctor-patient relationship can thin out. And later in the season, we see this patient's first interaction with the doctor. Instead of making eye contact with the patient, the doctor faces the ASL interpreter during the interaction, and while it's subtle, you know, it can leave patients feeling pretty sidelined or even invisible.

• 11:32Regina Barber?

  Yeah, that makes total sense. How else does disability make its way into this season?

• 11:39Speaker 03

  You know, later in the season, we also meet a doctor who uses a wheelchair to get around, which is just a reminder that medical experts are not a monolith, right? And there are both disabled and non-disabled people working in the ER.

• 11:53Regina Barber?

  Yeah, that's a really powerful message. You'd mentioned earlier that insurance was a theme in season two as well, right?

• 12:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, and we don't quite get into it in the first episode, but viewers will definitely notice in later episodes that insurance takes a big role. You know, it's almost like a character itself, which seems pretty apt for this moment when many Americans are facing a really sharp rise in costs. And in real life, this unfortunately happens pretty regularly. While patients shouldn't have to worry about insurance, they do. Like, sometimes my patients only get what their insurance will reimburse. And, you know, that treatment they do get, it's not always the best, or even the standard of care.

• 12:42Regina Barber?

  Yeah, and along these slightly depressing lines, there's growing misinformation that doctors are battling in the real world, right?

• 12:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, you'll find it in the pit too, unfortunately. And I don't want to spoil anything here, but it does involve someone getting their information from social media.

• 13:02Regina Barber?

  My doctors have actually mentioned this.

• 13:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, it's a pretty accurate representation of how misinformation can spread. I still remember this moment from my pediatrics rotation when I was counseling a parent on immunizations.

• 13:16Regina Barber?

  Okay.

• 13:17Speaker 03

  And I could tell the parent really, really loved their kiddo, but they ultimately declined to vaccinate their child because they were worried about a debunked myth. And while I think it's incredibly important, patients do their own research and are empowered in their care. The sources they turn to are equally as important.

• 13:37Regina Barber?

  Yeah. Did Dr. Patel or other experts you talked to say what was less accurate to real life in this show? Like, was there anything the show got wrong?

• 13:48Speaker 03

  Not everything is totally accurate. For instance, med students can't order meds. You need that MD after your name to do that.

• 13:57Regina Barber?

  That makes sense.

• 13:58Speaker 03

  And another thing that is unlikely is for One Shift to have so many complex cases. These cases definitely happen, but usually not all in one day. And one common complaint among all medical dramas is how inaccurate CPR is.

• 14:16Regina Barber?

  Really? How so?

• 14:17Speaker 03

  Well, CPR is pretty violent, actually. Rib fractures occur in a majority of patients who undergo CPR, and other trauma can happen, too.

• 14:26Regina Barber?

  Well, it is a show. They can't be too violent with their actors. Michael, thank you so much for talking to me about all this. I'm excited to watch the second season.

• 14:36Speaker 03

  Thanks so much for having me. This was such a blast.

• 14:41Regina Barber?

  If you liked this episode, follow us on the NPR app or whatever podcasting app you're listening from. Also, you might want to check out our episode on the history of tuberculosis with John Green, or our episode on the closest thing we have to a cure for allergies. We'll link to them in our episode notes. This episode was produced by Hannah Chen. It was fact-checked by Tyler Jones, and it was edited by our showrunner, Rebecca Ramirez. And Maggie Luthar was the audio engineer. Beth Donovan is our vice president of podcasting strategy, and I'm Regina Barber. Thank you for listening to Short Wave from NPR.

• 15:22Speaker 01

  Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors.