Polite Dissent

This comic can best be described as “medicine done wrong — very wrong.” It features some of the worst medicine (the worst medical decision making, anyway) that I have ever seen, and that includes four seasons of Grey’s Anatomy.

The Young Doctors was a series published by Charlton comics at the same time Dell was publishing Ben Casey and Dr. Kildare and clearly designed to taget the same audience. It featured two senior residents, Doctor Martin Burke and Doctor Cliff Landon, and their exploits at Metro Hospital. Dr. Landon was a stuck-up surgeon and Dr. Burke was a stuck-up psychiatrist. They couldn’t stand each other, and apparently no other doctors could stand them either since they always seemed to be the only two doctors in the entire hospital.

In the first story, Doctor Burke and Doctor Landon have reluctantly agreed to attend a fund raising dinner hosted by one the local big wig politicians in preparation for the upcoming election. In the middle of his speech, the politician suddenly loses his voice and develops difficulty swallowing and breathing. He is admitted to the hospital and placed under the care of Dr. Landon. Landon performs a thorough examination including lab work and x-rays and can find nothing wrong with the patient. He suspects it is a psychosomatic illness and he brings in Dr Burke, the psychiatry resident. Dr. Burke evaluates the patient then talks to his family and finds that the politician has these symptoms before every election. Dr. Burke agrees with Dr. Landon: the problem is not physical, but psychological. The two of them attempt to discuss their diagnosis with the patient, but he will hear none of it. The two residents run for cover and repeat the tests, but everything comes out the same. It is a psychological problem.

So what do Dr. Landon and Dr. Burke do? In the end, the two residents take the easy way out and lie to the patient. They inform him that his tonsils are giving him problems. Dr. Landon removes the tonsils and the politician returns home, satisfied.

But should he be satisfied? No, he received poor and deceptive medical care. Rather that address the actual problem — and admittedly that would have been difficult — the doctors chose to perform an unnecessary and potentially dangerous surgery on healthy tissue. A tonsillectomy is not always an easy surgery; it can be risky, particularly in adults. And in the end, the politician’s problem still exists. He needs therapy, no surgery. When he develops the same symptoms at the next election, what are they going to blame and remove then?

In the second story, Dr. Emile Braddock, a famous surgeon who was Dr. Landon’s mentor, comes to Metro Hospital. Dr. Landon is shocked to learn that Dr. Braddock has given up surgery and is now a researcher. He confronts his former teacher, who tells him that he was involved in a traffic accident that injured his hands. After recovering, Dr. Braddock returned to surgery, but his first patient after the accident died on the table, so he now believes he no longer has what it takes to be a good surgeon. Dr. Landon cannot believe what he is hearing. How can his mentor give up surgery? He decides that Dr. Braddock has simply lost his confidence, and that there is nothing physically wrong with him. Enlisting the help of Dr. Burke, he decides that tricking Dr. Braddock is the best way for him to regain his confidence. Late one night, Dr. Landon put his plan into action. A patient with a head injury and subdural hematoma needs emergency surgery and Landon asks Braddock to assist him since all the other doctors have gone home for the day. Braddock reluctantly agrees and scrubs in. Shortly after the surgery starts, Dr. Landon feigns feeling ill and Dr. Braddock has to finish the case by himself. He finishes the surgery and the patient survives (this is a code approved comic after all), and in the end he thanks Dr Landon for showing him that he still has the “eye of the tiger.”

This all ended well, but I really cannot stress this point enough: purposefully and deceitfully placing the life of a patient at the hands of a potentially impaired doctor is never a good idea. There are many better ways to help Dr. Braddock get his mojo back that don’t involve a scalpel blade poised millimeters above an innocent man’s brain.

One last word of advice: if you discover that the Young Doctors #5 inspired someone to become a physician, find yourself a new doctor quickly.

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