The eyes of Noah Wyle they are always the same, even if 30 years have passed since the first episode of Er – cult series of the nineties, first true Medical Drama of history – where he played the very young Doctor Carterspecializing of first aid, constantly mistreated by all its superiors. Now, in the series The Pitt – set in an emergency department of a large hospital in Pittsburgh – the American actor plays the role of the primary Michael “Dr. Robby” Robinavitch: struggling with all the difficulties of the American first aidsurprisingly similar to those of our house. Created by the showrunner R. Scott Gemmill and produced by John Wells together with Noah Wyle himself, the series tells a fifteen hours of fifteen hours within the Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center. Each episode corresponds to an hour of that round, and builds an extremely tight narrative arc and teller of tension, which expertly intertwines clinical cases, personal lives and moral conflicts. Welcomed with enthusiasm by critics and public, The Pitt immediately won 5 Emmy Awards (the most important prizes of American TV): best dramatic series, best leading actor a Noah Wylebest supporting actress in Katherine Lanasa, best casting and best guest actor in Shawn Hatosy. To these was added the Gotham TV Award as the best dramatic revelation series, confirming the strength of the project, immediately became a cult Both among doctors and among enthusiasts of hospital TV series: it has already been renewed for a second season, expected in January 2026. The screenwriter team led by Joe Sachsalso former member of the team of Er (and in turn emergency room), was joined by a large group of medical consultants who have preventively drawn note and imagined choreography (such as moving around a traumatized, such as acting in case of resuscitation, etc.) to guarantee the correctness of the cases and clinical procedures. Furthermore, the consultants have always been present on the set, ready to support the actors during the most complex procedures: while some of the extras are really nurses in real life.
What the real emergency doctors think of it
All this medical-scientific precision work has affected the mark, because there is no professional of (true) department of emergency and urgency that is not seeing The Pittyou don’t talk about it, we do not compare with colleagues and do not advise your teams to see it and then maybe discuss it together. With many different reasons, but also some criticisms.
“In our emergency room we do exactly the same things seen in the Pitt, but we never seem so cool” jokes, but not too much, Fabio de Iaco former president of Simeu (Italian Society of emergency emergency medicine) and first aid primary in Turin. «But beaten separately, I found it well done and realistic, with some distinctions: for example, the bureaucratic part of our work is totally ignored. The primary never stops, He turns for the stations, gives good advice, makes procedures, he assists the youngest. Not very realistic, I also believe for the USA, where many PS have long since introduced the figure of the scribe who takes care of transcribing everything and managing the bureaucratic passages. In our reality it is all different: there are studies that say that For each minute spent in contact with the patient, we pass at least five on the computer».
The first limit of the series is therefore precisely this: an action rhythm that is not easily found in the real departments, and moreover it would have been decidedly impossible to break the adrenaline of the episodes by showing doctors struggling with the data entry work, without excessively slowing down the television narrative. Although it is not excluded that in the remaining 13 episodes, the computer troubles that so much impact on the lanes of our true hospitals are also shown. For the rest, to hear the doctors, the difficulties are quite well represented. “Apart from certain bloody scenes that tend exclusively to spectacularization, above all I appreciate the fact that the screenwriters have focused on what are some of the true dramas of the emergency rooms” says Dr. Giuseppe Carpinderi, primary of the emergency room of the Polyclinic G. Rodolico di Cataniawhich has more or less the age of Dr. Robby and that certain disenchantment that has been coming in the emergency room for more than 30 years. “That is, first of all The “dissociation” between available resources, time and number of patientsand the difficulties but also the strengths of the team work. Personally then I was very impressed by the fact that I wanted to face – Proprio in the first episode – also The burning theme of the “end of life” in the emergency room. Of the many elderly people who arrive in the emergency departments only to die, without adequate spaces and often without the comfort of family members. It is a problem that in Italy we hear a lot, to whom we cannot give adequate answers for “health system” and hospital problems, beyond our personal good will “.
The difficulties of the system and the strength of the group
The Catania primary, like many others, also wanted to involve all his team in the vision, especially the youngest. “I immediately thought, looking at the first episodes, that” we really seem! “. And I continued to think so practically for their entire duration, a clinical case after another, one story after another “he explains Francesca Cucuzza, young structured of his own department. «Looking at this series, for a Urgentist, is painful and cathartic together. Painful because, unlike most of the Medical Drama Facts of brilliant and improbable diagnosis, shows the real and constant oscillation of this category of doctors as a slap in the face, between exciting successes and devastating losses, without almost recovery time between one and the other. But it is also cathartic, because reviewing you in the dynamic and in the management of those patients you don’t feel alone anymore ». The Emergency roomon television as in life, therefore remains a place that tells the society. “In some ways I found the series very realistic, both in the positive and negative aspects” he explains Monica Solbiati, Emergency Department of the IRCCS CA ‘GRANDA GRANGE HOSPITAL POLICLINICO OF MILAN «The reasons why the Ps Sometimes it works badly are not internal to the department, but they depend on the system: few beds, long expectations for hospitalization, improper access of people who need another path, to have to take charge of more social and clinical situations. All this, combined with the need to deal with many things at the same time, makes the Emergency room unique. And the “human” vision is equally realistic: each doctor enters in turn with his own experience and comes out enriched, but often with a weight on his shoulders. But it is never alone: the relationship with colleagues creates an experience that those who do not work in PS cannot understand ».
Urgency medicine between ethics, leadership and dignity
A choral dimension that also returns again in the words of De iacowhich identifies a crucial ethical node. «Before even the theme of end of which the colleague Carpinderi speaks, I caught the hint of inappropriate treatment from inappropriate care. It is also a huge problem in Italy: very elderly patients, in the terminal phase, for which the continuation of aggressive care It would be futile, but that they are often treated the same, for fear of sanctions or because the shared planning of care are missing. In Emergency room Let’s see people who, in all likelihood, would need to stay in their bed receiving palliative care. Instead they pass through us. It is a painful but real phenomenon ». And it is precisely in the relationship with the death and dignity that the fiction finds perhaps its highest figure. But The Pitt Not only shows the clinical aspect. It also tells the relationship with patients and their families. “He hit me a lot – he continues Francesca Cucuzza – the scene in which, in the middle of numerous emergencies, the protagonist is interrupted by the hospital manager to discuss how low the level of lines was the PS. The cynical response of Dr. Robbie, that is, “if they are still alive they should be considered widely satisfied” makes you smile, but perfectly reflects reality: not only We find ourselves managing chronic or not serious pathologies which should be taken over elsewhere, but we are also accused of insensitivity when we cannot give news to relatives or allow access. In truth, if we do not move from our workstations, it is because we are working: we take care of the sick ».
Mario Guarino, Director of the CTO emergency room, in Naplesdraws attention to an aspect that the American series often neglect: the cost of care. “The Pitt It is an American hospital and only access you Insurance holders or solvents with credit card. In fiction you don’t see: how much do users really cost? An elderly man with low income, not self -sufficient, would not find space. It is a substantial difference with our health system ». Yet beyond the different contexts, the charm of the discipline remains: despite the specialization remains among the least requested by young graduates. “I think the emergency medicine in itself has a great appeal on students ” reflects Guarino. «It is not the discipline that frightens, but the entropy of the system: overcrowding, stressful shifts, boarding. If there was a model fully respectful of professional dignity, with a leadership capable of teaching, protecting and building the group of doctors and nurses, This would be a great tow to young people. And it is also here that the fiction captures in the mark: it shows how much the teamwork force has to count ». Team work that often, however, is only the emergency room: while the rest of the hospital is looking at, he prefers ignore what happens “in the well” (literal translation of the title of the series, which “plays” also with the abbreviation of Pittsburgh) does not facilitate hospitalizations or even plays the game of the Costracism. “In the series there is a nice reference to the fact that sometimes the PS is seen as the” problematic “department, when instead the problem depends on what is around” Solbiati says again. «The reference to specialists seems to me realistic instead. Of course, perhaps they involve them less than we do, sometimes. But even there you see how sometimes the specialist comes to PS to do the “superior” a little and decide if the patient concerns him or not. The problem of end of life is very extreme … I think of the patient who must understand at the request of the children … it would not happen to us. Unrealistic certainly seemed to me the very “advanced” preparation of the students». The Milanese doctor then continues remembering the times of Er and the influence he had on whole teams of Urgentists. “Many of my generation wanted to do medicine having grown up with er … I think that today the difficulties we encounter at work are all too stressed by the media, and this gives an impression sometimes even worse than things really are. I think the series can rekindle the interest in emergency medicine by making it clear the difficulties, the fact that it is a hard work, but also extremely satisfying And in which you really feel to make a difference. Not because they “save lives”, but because you can really act on the system and where every small decision, even organizational, can clearly change things ».
The lesson of The Pitt: the meat of the world.
In the end, despite the inevitable spectacularization, it remains a truth that crosses all the testimonies. “The density and variety of humanity that passes into a Emergency room It is really what makes it unique »he concludes De iaco. «For me it is the highest value of this work. Alda Merini called her “The meat of the world”: that’s exactly what we see every day ».
