False information shown on medical dramas influences people's perception of health professionals

America has been known, especially in recent years, to have a fascination with reality television shows or show related to that genre in content. In particular, the world of hospitals has intrigued Americans for many years. This love for hospitals comes from America’s passion to know what is going on in different cultures or worlds they are not a part of or associated with. Also, according to Professor George Ikkos, the president of the Royal Society of Medicine's psychiatry section, he believes the reason why medical dramas are very popular because it is more to do with learning about ourselves from other people. Medical dramas give viewers a visual image of how physicians interact with the human body. 

This love for television adaptations of the hospital world dates back to the 1950’s. The first medical drama to air on television was City Hospital, in 1951. Ever since then, the popularity of that genre has continued to rise and has led to the shows we love today such as Scrubs, House, ER, etc. These shows rank amongst the top rated shows on television. ER became most nominated television series in TV history, acquiring 122 Emmy nominations and 22 Awards while attracting a staggering audience of 47.8 million viewers. 

Medical dramas can serve as a great place to learn health information from such getting tested for different things such as sexual transmitted diseases and cancers. Although these television shows give us an insight into what the hospital world is like, these shows do not accurately depict the hospital world.

Medical Dramas place a heavy emphasis on physicians

In medical dramas, physicians are the ones who play the leading role in the television shows. They are the ones who go around the hospitals completing various tasks, sometimes daunting, on a daily occasion. They also play the hero role in each episode by saving the critically ill patients’ lives towards the end of each episode. From the viewer’s perspective, it seems like the physicians complete all of the work needed to be done around a hospital daily without much help from other people on the medical staff such as nurses. Nurses play a small role in these medical dramas and are seen just observing in the background while the physicians lay it out all on the line to treat the patients. According to Dr. Sacared Bodison, an adolescent medicine pediatrician and pediatrician at the University of Maryland Health Center, nurses play a larger role in the hospital world then shown on television.

           

Nurses are vital to success of physicians on a daily basis. The relationship physicians have with nurses is very important as they are the ones who manage the patients moment to moment which gives the physicians an accurate update on the patient’s status, allowing them to give the proper and correct treatment. Downplaying the role of nurses in medical dramas gives people the false perception that they are not really needed and used in the hospital setting. 

Improper techniques are conveyed on medical dramas

           

Many surgical procedures are performed on these shows to increase the excitement of the episodes. However, these operational procedures are show in a short variation as the allotted time slot for the show would not be enough to show the entire process of the procedure. Certain techniques that are performed on these various shows are not done entirely correct. Some techniques like CPR aren’tdone as they are done in real life. The procedure is much more complicated than indicated on television. This gives viewers a false representation of a technique performed my health professionals and those naïve to it may interpret it as the correct way and attempt to perform it in situations that call for it. Completing the improper technique may be fatal to those that need the procedure done on them in cases where they don’t have access to a hospital. Dr. Bodison goes in depth on how medical dramas simplify techniques used to treat patients.

Over dramatized content leads to an effect on people’s perception of the medical world

            

Most of the time in these television series, the shows are more about what happens outside of the professional setting as they involve other aspects not relating to the hospital world. Personal relationships and stories are intertwined in the plot of the show and play a huge role in increasing the entertainment value. Without those plot add-ons, the shows wouldn’t be nearly as exciting and people may not even watch it as it would be really boring. This causes medical dramas to add twists to the show to keep the viewers on their heels pertaining to what’s going to happen next. People are very interested in drama, which is a big part of medical television shows. The entertainment value added to the shows also changes what is being presented as the things that happen in the hospital world.

             

According to a study conducted by Solange Davin, people that are highly intelligent and insightful can interpret the information being presented to them while watching the shows. That means the shows do little to enhance or affect their knowledge of the medical world. They know what is correct and not correct in their viewing of medical dramas. Those types of people aren’t people who fall under the category of people who are considered “sponges” for information. On the other hand, viewers who are less educated use these shows as learning tool for learning about health related topics. This presents a problem as they cannot tell what is factual or fictional within the show, thus leading them to soak in all information as factual as the shows are supposed to depict the real hospital world. Dr. Bodison provides her insight on how medical dramas can either excite or scare people about the health profession.

             

Although medical dramas’ main purpose is not to serve as learning tool about health related information for the audience, they cannot assume everyone knows this and might use the show for that very reason. These shows must be aware of the information they present to the public as may play a huge role in determining a person’s perception of the medical world. These shows may influence people to be involved or not involved in medicine for the wrong reasons as they used the television shows to help determine their judgment. It may also lead to the spread of misinformation and inaccurate views on health care and the health care system. Medical dramas should be more selective in the content they display in their shows.

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Medical television dramas fictionalize several aspects of the shows for entertainment purposes

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A promotional poster for Greg's Anatomy

Television has been a very popular medium in the American society for quite some time. Television is an essential tool where real life situation and fantasies can be depicted in visual form. Recently, many television producers have venture into some form of the reality genre. Shows like “Greg’s Anatomy” and “ER” are medical television dramas that attempt to depict the reality of hospital settings. These shows are very popular and give viewers an intriguing insight on how people in the health profession field interact with each other and how they deal with different situations. Although the medical dramas are designed to represent what goes on in a hospital on a daily basis, there is still a large amount fiction integrated in the shows. This fictional displaying gives viewers a false representation of hospital life and may negatively influence their perception of those individuals in the health care profession.

The main characters from ER, mostly doctors and physicians

            Most of these medical television shows place a heavy emphasis on doctors and physicians, while neglecting to depict nurses abundantly. The are main characters are mostly physicians and they are shown as the people who go around providing significant care to the seriously ill patients. Nurses, who are barely even shown in the shows, are shown just standing in the background and observing as the physicians do all the work when they’re visible. In actuality this is not accurate. This is part of the process of making the shows more entertaining by having the doctors, mostly men, be the hero and save many lives. Some would say there are sexist traits that exist with some of the shows. In the reality, nurses play a vital role in taking care of ill patients and there is larger amount in hospitals than shown on television. How much does television representation of hospitals affect people’s perception of health care professionals?

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Mobile Social Networking Apps such as Vine and Tinder Allow Users to Interact With Each Other in a Variety of Ways Relating To Media Sharing and Communication

The creation of the smartphone has transformed the use of cell phones from just being a device to call people from to a device that can help manage an individual’s entire life regarding communication, business transactions, and personal decisions. The original smartphone was created in 1992, which incorporated PDA (personal digital assistant) features. This gave cell phones the ability store phone numbers in an address book, receive emails, and browse the web. This phenomenon took the world by storm and gained popularity quickly. As technology continues to advance, so did the smartphone.

Smartphones of today basically feature everything a computer can do along with its calling feature. Smartphones account for nearly 50% of cellphone usage in the United States and is projected to hit 70% in the near future. With the advancement of the cell phone, along with came mobile social networking applications. People no longer have to access social networking from their computer and can now do it from their phones. Mobile social networking applications can range from social gaming to dating services. These applications give people the opportunity to interact with each other on the move without physically being together.

Dating service applications gives users the ability to establish relationships with others people in different areas

Dating services have continued to grow as the internet has gotten bigger and more interactive. These applications allow people to find people that have similar interest as them, so a potential relationship may form in the future. There are many social networking dating services available but a new application called Tinder has emerged and has gained some steam. 

Tinder, a dating service application, was launched in September of 2012. Tinder was designed exclusively for smartphones, so there is no website for this program. Tinder accounts are setup through Facebook accounts, another social network. There are nearly half a million users using the app. Users are able to like or dislike pictures and rate profiles on the Tinder browser, within the designated mile radius that they have set. Users are able to see who likes and dislikes their photos, which shows the people who are interested in them and potentially sparking a relationship. If two people like each other’s photo, they can talk via private messaging on the app and go on from there.

This app helps avoid awkward physical communication. Most of Tinder’s audience tends to be of college age, with 27 being the actual average age of users. The designated audience prevents a large age discrepancy among the users. 

Tinder has had a large effect, in some cases, leading to marriages. This app allows people to make the effort to find a person who share similar interests, which helps with finding the right one.

Media sharing applications provides users the opportunity to entertain people with different kinds of media, including video sharing

The video-sharing has already been addressed as seen in the creation of YouTube and many others. Recently, Vine, a mobile video-sharing app that contains postings of 6 second video clips, has taken off. Vine was introduced to the public in early 2013. There are 13 million people that are using Vine. This app shown to be an excellent source for entertainment and advertising, as Vine users share up to 1 million videos a day. 

The time limitation on the videos forces people to be creative and get their point made quickly. Videos cover a wide variety of material ranging from the comedy to daily news. Users have the ability to interact with millions of people by creating short video clips with their mobile devices.

Media share applications such as Vine, have allowed people to express themselves to large population of people. A few people have emerged as Vine celebrities due to the popular videos they posted. There are video clips of these “Vine famous” people with Hollywood Celebrities such as Marcus Johns, a popular Viner, has a video clip of him Jerry Seinfeld participating in 6 second comedy skit on his Vine profile.

The target audience of Vine seems to be aimed towards young people as there are mostly young people on the app making and sharing videos. Vine continues to grow every day and other mobile social apps are adding this type of media share to repertoire, as Instagram has recently incorporated videos in their app.

Mobile social networking has opened new doors for society as a whole as it has provided with us new methods of interacting with other members of society without physically seeing each other. People are always updated on what others are doing in their lives by viewing their profiles on various applications. A lot can be learned about a person via social networking, which can help determine whether or not a person wants to meet the other individual in real life.

Satellite Radio's Commercial Free Programming, Wide Variety of Stations, and Freedom of Speech has led to its Prevalence over Traditonal Radio in Recent Years.

Satellite radio, a form of broadcast radio that emerged in the 1990's, provides listeners with a captivating radio experience. Satellite radio is a digital radio signal that is broadcasted using a communications satellite. Older radio broadcasting stations are composed of only FM and AM channels intertwined with commercial advertisements, whereas, satellite radio provides a much larger variety of stations that range from music to comedy, with a notable smaller amount of commercials. Since the launch of the SirusXM radio, the largest satellite broadcasting radio company in the United States and Canada, millions of people have obtained subscriptions to the company to become a part of the intriguing experience. Despite the government limiting the US to only to one satellite radio program in SirusXM, new cars are being equipped with satellite radio receivers, giving people more access to buy it.

Satellite radio offers wide variety of stations that can be heard around the US unlike older radio broadcasting 
 Although traditional radio offers its channels for free, more people are paying for the satellite subscription each year. Traditional radio offers far fewer channels than satellite radio, which has convinced people to willingly pay for more variety. There are still more people that listen to traditional radio, but as society is going the digital route, that number will change in the future. According to a poll conducted in 2011, which covered a three year span from 2009 to 2011, the number of people subscribed to SirusXM has grown from 18.9 million in 2009 to 21.9 million in 2011. Based on the technological shift society has taken over the past couple of years, the number of subscribers will increase, putting traditional radio in jeopardy of being competitive. Even though satellite radio offers a wider variety of channels, it also allows listeners to listen to their favorite channel anywhere, despite their location. Traditional radio stations are based on a particular area. A radio station broadcasted in Baltimore will not be accessible on the same frequency in a different city, such as Atlanta. This technological advancement gives satellite radio a big advantage over traditional radio. 

Satellite radio is mostly commercial free

Traditional radio has been a platform for businesses to advertise its products through the radio airwaves. All radio stations on FM/AM frequency have commercials incorporated within because the advertising helps them afford to stay on air since they receive no fee from subscriptions. Since satellite radio funds itself through subscription fees, it has no need to flood their stations with sponsors unless warranted. Fewer commercials allow the stations to focus on providing certain types of music to listeners instead focusing on when to play an advertisement. This is beneficial to the listeners as well as they get to solely enjoy the music continuously without any commercial interruption.

More freedom is allowed on satellite radio compared to traditional radio

Howard Stern, an outspoken radio personality, has made his radio station transition from traditonal radio to satellite radio. Howard Stern is known for is obscenity and profanity and satellite radio allows him to speak his mind freely. Stern is able to do this due to the fact that F.C.C., the Federal Communications Commission, has no jurisdiction over satellite radio. After being fined many times by the F.C.C., who regulates interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable, Stern and other provocative radio personalities felt the need to make the move over to satellite radio. Traditional radio doesn’t allow much freedom of speech due to the wide variety of people listening to it, such as children. The F.C.C. does not want to expose children to inappropriate content and if people want to listen to more racy content, they must pay for it on satellite radio.