Does anyone know if this is hospital policy anywhere? I ask because there has been SO much talk about Luka in these pages, and how his wartime experiences and personal losses have affected his perspectives and performance. It made me wonder if anyone ever screens doctors for warning signs of such behavior. After all, the emergency room is, by its very nature, a traumatic place, and I can imagine that it takes its toll on doctors in real life. If a person who's already volatile or emotionally damaged takes on such a job...On this show, at least we've seen that there's a sad dearth of meaningful, stable relationships (with the exception of M&E). So, anyone out there know if docs get psych screening?

-- Cecelia (evilstoat@hotmail.com), May 20, 2000

Answers

Cecelia, my best friend's hubby is an ER doc here in Montreal. He had to do a psych rotation as an intern, and during that time, he had to be "debriefed" at the end of each shift by one of the staff psychiatrists (psychologists?? I never remember which is which!). I believe he also had to go through some "routine" therapy (as opposed to crisis therapy, apparently) as part of his rotation. So I suppose that during this time the staff might build-in some questions specifically to look for emotional tendencies or past events that could be problematic later in their careers, or that could negatively affect their work in the ER.

Hope that helps.

-- Emma (bgallagb@dot.com), May 21, 2000.

That's very encouraging, Emma. Hopefully that procedure is in place in U.S. hospitals too--a lot of grief might be saved. Seems like our ER docs on TV only see the local shrink when something horrible and/or traumatic has already happened (Carter's stabbing, Doug punching the abusive dad). BTW, I believe the psychiatrists are the ones who have actually been to med school and can prescribe medications.

-- Cecelia (evilstoat@hotmail.com), May 21, 2000.