so, whad'ja think?

I'm kind of "meh." Very interesting how the PoTW emerged. At first I felt bad for the guy, but as he got more and more impatient ("No! Can't wait another day! Kill me now!") I started to wonder what was up with him.

One thing that didn't seem to be "up" was any kind of human connection. Opening montage? No co-workers, only rats. Even the music was a solo instrument. The only personal connection he ever mentioned was his dead colleague. Otherwise, nobody: no visitors; no mention of friends, co-workers (!), children, or spouses (living, ex-, or dead.) This guy was alone. (I was wondering if he'd been depressed before he got sick, or if he'd made himself sick in a failed suicide attempt and that's why he was reluctant to pursue treatment.)

And then the reveal about his past activities.... I do believe this guy's one of the most despicable PoTW's ever.

I think it would have been nice if they had gone a little bit more into why it has traditionally been considered unethical for doctors to kill their patients.

Of course, I also think it would have been nice if the team had been a little more attentive to the fine points of comfort care. Come on -- how about oxygen by mask instead of that wussy tube, raising the head of the bed and giving the guy some extra pillows, diuretics, and maybe a touch of morphine? Just a thought :) Oh, and giving that stress test by thallium injection instead of the treadmill?

I'm still trying to decide if that doctor succeeded in committing suicide or if House helped him die. I was thinking that the nurse washing his body was in fact washing away evidence of what killed him.

I think the implication was that Cameron gave the lethal dose. The nurse was just giving standard post-mortem care (though apparently PPTH doesn't have body bags.)

Good point. I thought it was high praise for House to say, "I'm proud of you." to Cameron, but I hadn't thought it was connected to that.

And did anyone else think that the diagnosis details on what actually killed that guy were a little sketchy?

Just out of curiosity, did House wink at Cameron when she said the trio had jello shots and wild sex all night?

What is it with this show and people with fascinating eyes? Joel Grey has the most absolutely unnerving eyes; they looked almost as if they were all pupil. I mostly know him from his role as the emcee in Cabaret. He was so unnerving, and yet so perfect for the role, in that. I couldn't figure out why I found him so fascinating until tonight. It's the eyes.

I too thought that Cameron was perhaps the one who adminstered the shot. I don't know she seemed awful worked up about something while sitting in the chapel (I think it was). Of course it may have simply been the collision of her idealism with a situation that would make anyone cynical. I don't know exactly what to make of her in this episode either. She didn't bug me, but didn't exactly wow me either.

The nurse was simply cleaning up the body. Apparently they, or the nurses' aides do that before the body goes down to the morgue and/or the family comes in to view the body. Very touching scene, I must say.

Okay, so we're to take it that House has O.D. ed someone on morphine before then? I guess so, but I don't think he did it this time. I believe they made a specific point by showing House in his office thinking and the patient alone in his room.

Who knows, maybe the patient just suddenly decompensated, it has been known to happen before. I didn't think that he'd done it himself, but then again, considering he is a doctor too, or at least a scientist, he'd probably know how to do it effectively and without being too obvious.

Now what is it with me and feeling sorry for rodents? It's a rat, granted a specially bred lab rat, and it's diseased, but I still cringed when Grey's character anesthetized it then cut it open (aw, cute, fluffy, and feisty). It and it's brethren (and sistren ?!?) seemed to be in pretty good shape for having severe liver cancer. Steve, rise up, unite your brothers and sisters against the vile oppressors ;) :o :P B) (well I guess the one did get his shot in while the scientist was unconscious, me I thought, oh, isn't that sweet he wants to know what's wrong with the bringer of food--as all animals view the humans in their lives I'm sure).

Cuddy and Wilson, hmm. I'm starting to forgive Cuddy,-- and I'm beginning to think " the lady doth protest too much", as well-- but Wilson still seems really, I don't know, aggressive. Not out of character mind you, we have been warned of and have even seen his dark side before, but it seems so much closer to the surface now.

Auditrix, I noticed the lack of comfort care too. Not only did they not do any of the things you mentioned, but there was an ethical, as far as I know, middle ground alternative to either letting the patient suffer, or purposely O.D. ing him. Couldn't they give him enough morphine or other pain medication to pretty much keep him "snowed" aka pretty unaware of the pain and what's happening, but not enough to suppress any autonomic functions? Maybe this isnt' a possibility, as I have stated many times despite my delusions of grandeur and bizarre knowledge, I am not in any healthcare field, but I did think that was something that was done in end stage patients with a lot of pain.

Also, didn't think of this, but your post made me think. Have we, in this patient, seen a preview of the possible end of House? He too is brilliant, respected and frequently alone (not to mention he hangs out with rats too :) ). Do you think House wonders about that too?

I thought he sort of blinked in surprise, Cakemixo. But got over it quickly and just kinda ignored it.

Alright, here are my thoughts (rather disorganized):

First off - why did they do nothing with House and Wilson? They just pretended nothing happened between them. No resolution whatsoever. Sigh.

Once again, I am going to complain about Wilson. Wilson is a great character, but the writers are not using him well. Wilson's only purpose right now seems to be to explain to the audience how bad House's motives are. Go away, pyschologist!Wilson! Come back, friend!Wilson. You used to go to monster truck rallies with House! You used to eat chinese food at his house for Christmas!

Oh, and I hate that Wilson said specifically that House had a "one patient per week quota." Come on, that's just lame. Can't the writers just let us imagine/assume that there are other cases that we're not seeing? It's just unrealistic to think that House really cures patients on a weekly schedule. And that he storms into Cuddy's office "24 times a year." Stop with the meta! Where is the realism, people? Realism, subtlety! Where is it? (Oh right, in fanfiction.) Sigh again.

Now, while I am irritated with Wilson, strangely, I am not hating Cameron as much this season. I almost like her. I know, I'm shocked. Sure, her preaching is annoying, but... I'm with her on being just very confused and torn on the end-of-life issues. The thing is, though she was undecided on how where she stood, she argued/peached as if she knew what was right, on contradictory sides. Which was irritating, and I was glad when House called her on it and really yelled at her. But I also understood it. It's a tough issue. And then, at the end, when House put his hand on her shoulder and said, "I'm proud of you." (And yes, I think that was because Cameron euthanized the guy.) It was a sweet moment. Part of me screamed, "Oh no! Not House/Cameron!" but for the most part, I was struck by how fatherly it seemed. Which is as it should be. It's a student/mentor relationship.

Speaking of which... Crazy stalker 17-year old! House, stay away!! I trust that House will choose to not be a creepy old man and take her up on her offer. I mean, obviously he's flattered enough and tempted enough that he's not really putting her off - but the man does have morals, if unorthodox ones, and I don't think he'd go there. When Cameron first started making advances on him, one of his arguments was, "I'm twice your age." It makes him uncomfortable. Sure, he made all those jokes about the 15-year-old model that was a patient a while back, but those were jokes, and he was making a point - that people shouldn't let 15-year-olds be models and pose, looking all sexually provocative in magazines and stuff, if they are outraged by someone looking at a 15-year-old sexually in real life.

Anyway. The point is - the writers better not do that to House's character. I'm pretty sure they won't though.

And uh, the issues of the patient's rights and patient's consent, and the right to life vs. the right to die stuff... Maybe I'll get into that later. It might be interesting to compare House's actions in this episode with "Autopsy," "DNR," and the pilot.

You know - I'm sure htis point has been made before, but House would really hate to have himself as his doctor though, I think. I suppose that is sort of what happened in Three Stories, with Stacy. He went into a coma, probably thinking (and kind of hoping) he'd most likely never wake up, and then was woken up to find that part of his leg had been cut out against his will. I think on a rational level, he knows that it was the right thing to do - or what he would have done had he not been the patient, anyway, and is/was really only angry at Stacy and Cuddy about it on an uncontrollable, emotional level.

I think ultimately he would respect and recognize that someone was acting as he would, if he was in that situation... Much like the patient in this episode, being frustrated and angry at all of them for not following his wishes, but then saying, "Good for you," when Cameron went against his wishes anyway and did that test. Catlady, I think you make a good point about that being possibly a look at what House's end could be like.

Favorite line:

"Who was that?"
"Your protegee."

Creepiest line: Tie between Wilson's "You've done it before plenty of times..." and Ali's "Six months and counting!"

I was actually expecting House to say something like that during the episode and for everyone to go back to the "Sex Kills" debate about how much age really matters (and to have to endure Cameron and possibly Wilson being all disturbed about how "creepy" House is being). I was really surprised with how it ended up happening--was anyone else actually a little creeped out on House's behalf? The calendar thing reminded me of something that happened on SVU once. :blink: :rolleyes:

Anyway, the fact that she made it clear that she's going in for the kill, rather than following him around all doe-eyed and innocent, should make for some interesting conversation next time.

I enjoyed the PotW, maybe just because I like Joel Grey. I agree that the "wanting to die right this second" thing was a little abrupt, but I can forgive that in light of for once having a patient who wasn't loud or stupid or a basket case. He decided what he wanted and he went after it. (Like Ali, I guess. And House.) And I hadn't noticed, but yeah, he didn't have any visitors or anything. Now that I think about it, I'm sure that contributed to my liking him. I don't think there's been one parent or spouse or whatever that's been on this show that hasn't annoyed me. It was refreshing to have no one else to get in the way.


I thought the title tie-in for "Informed Consent" was going to end up being "even if they think they know what they want, they're wrong because they don't know everything, or because they're naive, or because no one can ever really know what they want or need, etc, etc" but they actually ended up looking favorably on the people in the episode who made a decision and acted on it, whether it was what was "best" or not. Whether I agree with what everyone did or not, I think it was a clever way to handle the episode--the writers themselves decided exactly what they wanted to imply rather than weaseling out with "well, the whole issue is just tricky and tough and what everyone did was really neither completely right or wrong..."

House and his cane...poor Cuddy. She looked pretty downhearted the whole time. I wonder if worry or guilt over House is keeping her awake. (Or maybe it's hormones. ;) )

On a completely random note...isn't it funny how much control House really has over the Ducklings? They'll say they disagree with him and they'll "refuse to take part" in things they don't like, but they could physically stop him relatively easily if they thought about it, but they don't. It's like that's not an option. (Maybe they just don't want to get fired, but it still amuses me. Even when they think he's wrong they eventually go back to tagging after him dutifully. :) )

And yeah, if you'd told me beforehand about the House-Cameron scene at the end I would have grimaced, but it ended up being acceptable to me because, like Narsil said, House's demeanor was that of a teacher rather than an "equal" like a potential lover or even a coworker.

Oh--we might know this already and I just missed it, but...does Wilson know House is back on the Vicodin? Did he give him another prescription when the pain came back or he still using the stolen one?

Thanks to everyone who made the connection about Joel Grey for me. I'm not good at recognizing actors and connecting them to past roles. (Like Sheryl Lee last week -- all I could think of was "she looks familiar". Never made the connection to Laura Palmer!)

And yes, Joel Grey was very good. It's funny -- I saw him very recently. On the Season 1 DVD of the Muppet Show. He looks a little different now than he did in 1976. :P

Picking up from Catlady's post:

Yup. Standard post-mortem care. I thought it was very moving as well -- I don't think that final act of care gets shown too often on TV.

I guess so. I was disturbed by House, Chase, and Wilson asserting that "it happens all the time." Do the TV writers actually believe that -- or want us to believe it? Because no, it doesn't.

That's what I thought had happened when Cuddy first delivered the news. It would make perfect sense -- the guy was very sick, and with then his despair over the diagnosis... It's not unheard of for people to just up and die after they've received bad news or have lost their last bit of hope.

(I also think it would have been a little bit more dramatic if he'd just died naturally before anyone could kick the bucket out from under him.)

Yes, you are absolutely right, there was a third option and it was comfort care. Morphine can be used in exactly the way you describe -- to relieve pain and anxiety without actively seeking to kill. And there are other options as well.

It is indeed not only a possibility but a science: there are physicians who specialize in palliative care (and here's a lovely link about it.)

Interesting to compare this case to the case in "Meaning," in which House did take a serious interest in a patient's quality of life and got nothing but guff about it.

YES. I think House may fear ending up like Dr Powell -- alone and in intractable pain.

Some episode – very much reminded me of early season one because I was totally focused on the patient of the week, the various issues and the main cast in so far as they related to him. It is a mark of how well the writers balance the pure character vs patient that they held back this week on major plot advances. Normally I’d be doing a ‘Where’s Wilson/Cuddy?” mid way through but this was one was so involved. This is straight off the cuff and random so feel free to slap me if I get it wrong.

I loved again that the writing looked beyond the obvious party lines that get drawn over a lot of the issues. The final House and Cameron scene was superb and although it will get hijacked by ‘ship’ wars, stands alone as a fabulous scene and the montage was perfect. As for the patient of the week – this one hit me pretty close to the bone when the reveal about his past involvement in ‘non-consent’ experimentation arrived. My youngest sister died after an unsuccessful surgery to repair a complex congenital heart defect in a hospital in Bristol which was later at the centre of scandal involving many consent issues and included ‘organ stealing’ and experimentation . It is very likely that she fit within the timeframe, age group and rarity of condition that her heart had been removed without my parents consent. The media ‘storm’ when the story broke and a witch hunt ensued. Whilst their can be little ethical justification for removing organs without consent there are a wealth of, personal and professional issues beyond the obvious. Stem cell research is considered a much more pro/anti issue than non-consensual organ removal which is a definte ‘no’ in virtually all eyes and yet in practise the lines blur. IVF has been used as a scientific research jackpot for more years than people appreciate and ‘backdoor’ ethics have been practise in a lot of scientific research.

My parents looked into the issue a great deal and concluded that it was more than possible that the surgery carried out on my sister had very possibly evolved and advanced from techniques carried out by the same surgeons on other babies bodies without their parent’s consent. The type of transposition of the major arteries my sister had was hugely rare and even simpler forms of the defect had eluded even vaguely successful surgical correction until the sixties and seventies. The advance during the eighties was pioneering and the surgeon pool able to perform the technique was tiny – the chances are that they had used babies of the many parents affected in the scandal to advance to a point where they could attempt a repair for her. There is no doubt that it was hugely unethical at the very least but they did operate on some children who lived because of their decisions to override consent. It’s hugely wrong but the parents of surviving children would have huge and understandably conflicting emotions upon discovering the realities which led to a positive outcome for their situation. My parents also weighed in the degree to which surgeons are worn down by the emotion of working in such a tough environment. Expecting the height of professional excellence and standards should be a pre-requisite for involvement in the field. But does that compromise humanity? Does it make a doctors actions understandable if not forgivable? Or is the opposite true and that humanity is a mask for a numbness that leads to corruption of morality?

Ultimately it is a situation which should be avoided and absolutes should be applied – it appears though that drawing the line which is tougher. Cells in a dish versus a newborn, babies in a morgue versus babies critically ill in intensive care cribs- and all the emotive images that form a spectrum between. Should there be one absolute?

Personally I think so – and I did find Ezra difficult to stomach – more so than Cameron, whose ethics I probably don’t align with either. Cameron had faced up to the reality in human terms. She had interacted with patient and she had taken in the situation from more angles than Ezra who appeared to have been shut off in a lab with babies instead of rats. It is that slant on him which makes him even more unpalatable. Do I think he deserved to die an uncomfortable death – probably not and I loved that for once Cameron’s position wasn’t (skin slashing aside) too clear cut. I often like to think I know exactly where I fall with most issues but I do think there is an element of 'walk a mile in my shoes' that we can never fully reconcile and impinges upon our conviction. It's that lack of empathy- or more acurately the apprecaition that you cannot empathise- in Cameron's character rarely appreciates which usually (and for thirty-nine minutes of this ep) which get me

Did she give him a ‘lethal’ injection and why? Empathy or revenge? Something of both, fascinating stuff.

Sorry to make it personal - I’ll be feeling lighter later and will post *ducks arrows and slings* on the funny because it was there in spades- I did laugh a lot too :) .

Wow, great thoughts and comments all around! :D Great to see you back in force Aud! :lol:

There's just so much that can be discussed this episode I don't know where to start. Aud, great comments, you pointed out some things I hadn't noticed or hadn't thought about in quite the same way. Interesting.

I guess I' ll go with some things that have not been explored yet to open it up a bit more.

Two major things I'm still thinking about, one is Chase staying in the room when House is supposedly administering the fatal morphine shot. He's usually the first one to bolt when there's trouble or the first sign of danger.

I believe this say a lot about his motives all around. I think he stayed because the potential for House losing his license is huge and figures there's no point in being there if House isn't so why not stand in for what he believes.

I think he wants to be around House and if House isn't there, there's no point in him being there. And, I believe that was his motivation in the Vogler arc as well. That he felt House would take care of himself but he, Chase, was under serious threat of getting let go. He aligned himself with Vogler as protection. This way, House would be there but would be unable to fire him so he could remain and maybe, over time make ammends with House over it. This is just a quick first thought, I do need to mull it over some more, but thought I'd throw it out for debate.

Next, Why was Cameron in the chapel? I thought she was a declared athiest?! She has proven herself to be a big time hypocrite on most things but this, although not a suprise, seemed an interesting choice. I wonder what her motivations were for her actions and if she did it based on her principles or out of spite. (I see you beat me to the punch on this Benj! Good call)

I really love the scene with her and House. Not a House/Cam shipper but I think it was so very in character for House. Even though he has never done that before I think he has been pushing all around him to "do" not just talk. And not only "do" but do it with sound reasoning, disregarding societies rules and the consequences to yourself if you believe it is in the patients best interests. Cameron I believe is the first duckling to follow through on something that met this line of thought.

Just a very rich scene in a very rich episode.

And a comment on the Wilson thing. I likened it to the feel after the Vogler arc and Chase. Wilson is guilty, he know it, but he still believes in what he was trying to accomplish. He's more mature than Chase and maybe feels he has been friends with House long enough to know how House will react. House is basically putting Wilson on notice. That all is not forgiven and there will be a price to pay. I believe Wilson already knew this but is testing the waters anyway, seeing just how bad it's going to be.

I didn't catch the thought that House had used morphine to kill a patient before, I'll have to rewatch and see what you all are getting that I missed.

On that subject, do you think, give time that House would have done it? Did Cameron beat him to the punch or give him an out?

ETA: Wow Benj! Some very heavy stuff. :( Not an easy issue from a distance, I can't imagine being that close and how I'd feel about it.

does anyone know the name of the song at the end of the episode?

I don't know. I wouldn't say Chase is the first one to bolt, really. He does look out for his own skin, but I think his usual course of action is to just go with the flow. He hardly ever butts heads with House, unlike both Cameron and Foreman. And on this issue, he had already made it clear that he actually thought euthanasia was ethical in a case like this.

I think it's interesting to consider that Chase is the most religious of the ducklings, and how that might influence his stance on end-of-life issues. I know he was struggling with his faith in the first season, and obviously struggled enough with it in general to not become a preist - but he still had enough faith to want to become a priest in the first place, and tha kind of thing doens't just disappear. And from a couple scenes in season 2, it seems like he has rediscovered hi faith to some extent. Now, usually, you might think that being religious would make someone be adamantly against euthanasia, following Christian teaching (at least, I know it is definitely the Catholic teaching that injecting a patient with a lethal dosage of morphine with the intent to end their life, under any circumstance, is wrong). However, I think Chase's view of death is probably different than the others'. To him, for an old man who's lived a long life and is now sick and in a lot of pain - death would not be a negative thing. Death would be a kind of rebirth, a homecoming...

Now to Cameron's religious views...

Cameron isn't really an atheist - she just doesn't prescribe to any anthropological religion and doesn't believe in a personal, intervening god. But she does seem to be an idealist (and I mean that in the philisophical sense, not just ethical/moral), with a sort of platonic god, or even an eastern (buddhist/hindu) god. And it's very likely that she grew up in a christian household, so even if she didn't believe in the christian god on an intellectual level, she still found comfort in that kind of prayer, or in just being in a chapel. But she could go there and try to sort things out mentally/emotionally and try to feel close to her idea of god, even if it's not a personal god.

And I think her intention was mostly to the end the guy's suffering and respect his wishes. But at the same time, she also disliked him, found him morally repulsive, and even though she didn't want that to be part of it, you can't control feeling that way. So then she inevitably felt guilty for that, on top of just feeling guilty for killing someone, period. So that guilt and intense confusion is what led her to the chapel.

As I said before, I actually kind of liked Cameron in this episode... And the last one too. What's going on??

But I think it's because the writers are doing a better job with her lately. I think she's being the character she was intended to be, but which never came across quite right before. She's naive and sweet and idealistic and moralistic -- but she shouldn't be pathetically insecure and oozing an aura of being "tragic" or "damaged" as in season 1, nor overly preachy and bitchy, confident, bitter, sanctimonious and snarky as in season 2. There's got to be a balance for her to be believable and empathetic. So far, the writers have been doing a better job at that this season. Let's hope it continues.

(But let's not hope that that improvement in Cameron is a setup for increasing House/Cameron... -- I liked the father/daughter element to their relationship in this ep, and I hope that that continues. It was an interesting contrast to the stalker-girl, as well.)

It was when Wilson asked House why he was so reluctant to follow the guy's wishes. He said, "You've done it before - plenty of times." House replied that all those times had been when he knew for sure that the patient was terminal. Wilson, I believe, then said something about that not having anything to do with it - that House's problem wasn't whether or not he knew the guy was terminal, but whether or not he got to solve the puzzle first.

Which I think is rather unfair. Yeah, House wants/needs to figure out what's wrong - that's part of who he is; it's his "one thing," - but it's not that simple really. It's extremely reductive and just not true to say that that's all House cares about. If someone has a chance at living, House wants them to live and will fight very hard to give them that chance, even after he's found the solution - he wants to implemet the solution as well - for in stance, in "Control." Unless, there is no chance of survival. For isntance, in "Autopsy," after he found out how he could fix the girl, he was willing to not actually go through with it, because she was terminal. But for the most part, House is determined to make his patients live. He seems very disappointed at the end of this episode to find out that the guy is terminal after all.

Would he have given him the morphine? Well, since Wilson did say that he's done it before and House didn't deny it, I would have to say that yeah, he probably would have done it, if the guy asked him again.

I'm definitely going to have to rewatch, I didn't catch that at all! Where was I?! But if that's the case, why would you feel House needed to be asked again? If he has done it before and in this case knows the guy wants it and knows the guy is terminal, why didn't he just do it?

Might it be that he feels the guy needs to suffer? Just playing a little devil's advocate here folks :D . I didn't catch that exchange with Wilson and assumed it was because he just couldn't "kill" someone. He would be willing to let the disesae run it's course once he knew it was terminal, possibly making the patient comfortable, but that he couldn't actually kill someone.

I mean with Andi, I don't think he would have "killed" her. She never asked but if she had asked him not to do the procedure he would not have done it and let it run it's course. But if she had asked him, would he have done it?

But, that exchange with Wilson, and I have to see it to be sure, suggests that he has done it before so why the hesitation? If he knows it's terminal, and the guy has already asked, what is he waiting for? Might it be that he saw too much of himself in Powell and that scared him a little? Made him hesitate and think more thus allowing Cameron to beat him to the punch.

Or, maybe he wanted Cameron to do it, not because he couldn't or wouldn't but because he felt she needed to do this. Needed to face her demons and take a stand. That doing this would make or break her. Either way a solution to all her inaction and talk. She'd either face it and move on to become a better doctor than she would have been otherwise or fold and have to face the fact that maybe she chose the wrong profession.

Hmmm, lots to think about and this is just scratching the character surface, not even venturing into the others and the issue of assited suicide. Love this show and this board!!

Joel Grey was simply awesome in his guest appearance. I love those episodes when they get great guest stars as patients. The music that was playing when he was in his lab was Bach and it was used on The West Wing. It was the Christmas episode when Josh was suffering from PTSD. Sorry but that scene was so powerful that I just go there in my mind when I hear that music.

I was seriously annoyed by the lack of Wilson. We need some resolution there. Or some more fighting. Bascially, anything but just pretending like nothing had happened.

Cameron didn't irritate me as much as she often does. I do think she is the one who gave him the fatal dose and that is why House was proud of her. That would also explain why she was crying so much.

Chase showed way more backbone than normal when he stayed in the room with House when he thought House was going to give him a fatal shot of morphine. Of course, then he just helps House save him.

It's been awhile since we've had an episode in which House could not save someone. It's sad but honestly it has to happen occassionally. ;) Besides, as much as he wants to save people he also wants to figure out what is wrong with them. At least, he was able to do that.

Next week's ep looks kinda scary.....get your mits off House, creepy calendar girl!

Lord I hope so. If they go down that road, I think a lot of people will freak out big time. It weirded me out enough that she was sitting on his bike in the teaser.

Cameron and House is still a big age difference, but Cam's got 10 years at least on creepy calendar girl. (Ugh, please tell me that no one will write fanfic about her, but I'm sure there are people out there who have already gotten started.)

ANYWAY, yes, I too read it as Cameron had given him the injection.

And yes, the final scene in the chapel was brilliant. It was sincere and not done in a shippy fashion, which is what make it work so well.

I'm not necessarily against them hooking up, maybe, eventually, but I hope it doesn't happen for a long time, if it's going to. To quote Teen Girl Squad: "I'm......hesitant." Am not violently opposed, but certainly am not violently for it either.

Which is why the last scene was perfect, 'cause it wasn't about any of that.

A friend warned me that it opened with a rat being dissected, and I yelled, "Not Steve!!!???" Whew. Steve McQueen the wonder rat lives on.

Though now I will think creepy thoughts about labs whenever I hear that cello piece.....thanks a lot, Fox.
<_<

Just think of Yo-Yo Ma, and that'll rinse that image right out of your head. :wub:

By the way, it's the first movement of Suite 1, Bach's Suites for Solo Cello. The whole work is just magnificent.

Narsil, a couple of your comments on an earlier episode, and then this:

reminded me of something from "Distractions" last season.

House: An eye for an eye, LSD and antidepressants. Everything in balance. Buddhists call it karma and Christians call it the golden rule, Jews call it... I don't know. Rabbi Hillel said something poignant. Universe always settles the score.
Cuddy: Does it?
House: No, but it should.

Cameron says he does what's RIGHT, and the above -- especially the way he delivers it -- gives me the impression that he's got a strong sense of justice, and I can almost picture him being... OFFENDED at wrongs... and imbalances... maybe especially when they're the kind that are just random, no explanation, no reason, no sense of fairness. Like an infarction. Or any of the myriad illnesses he comes up against.

Random thought, fwiw... not necessarily related to the ep...

I don't mean to shoot this thread or your comment off on a tangent, CathyNH, but you're right.

I've heard people say that they think House doesn't have ethics. But I think he does. All the way. One of the ironies of the show is that House, in all the unconventional and crazy things he does, is more ethical than many of the other characters, and consistently.

One of the tragedies of the character is that he'll do whatever he can to make something right. And he is offended - or affronted - by things that don't fit his view of the way things should be. That's why he's so unspoken, and why we see him make these sacrifices that seem almost unsupported and 'heroic' - you'll notice that a lot of the time we see House paying for the things he does. Classic dark hero material.

And he does seem particularly angry, almost, at some patient afflictions. Because he can sense this injustice and is bothered by it. What a character.

Hmm. Interesting.


Cheers.

AE.

"You can’t be angry with God and not believe in him at the same time. No one can. Not even you, Dr. House."

Bingo! Another one of my favorite quotes...!

And because there's no reason, there's no one to blame (except God, whom House claims not to believe in), and therefore no one to get even with, which maybe fuels even more of the anger... (Cf. "Distractions" again, and getting even with "von Lieberman" 20 years later...)

*attempts to bring this around to the current ep*

So, was at least part of Cameron's decision motivated by getting even with Ezra? Would there have been some of the same in House's decision, if Cameron had wussed out and House had had to put the lights for the patient?

Finally had a chance to rewatch and pick up on this scene. But now my question is what the hell kind of statement is that coming from Wilson?

He seems to be perfectly okay with the fact that House has done this before. I'm fine with that. But when House says he only did it to patients he knew were terminal and Wilson questions his motives in this case...

What?! Does Wilson want him to end it for the guy just because he asked? That Wilson feels it's okay to follow the patients wishes at all costs? No diagnosis, no confirmation that there is a reason to end it? That House is somehow being selfish because he wants to make sure the guy is terminal before he jabs a needle full of morphine into him? :blink:

What is Wilson's point here? We don't know about the past cases but in this one, we had no clue what was wrong with the guy. At least in my mind it would be a bit premature to kill him without a diagnosis. But maybe this is a peek into Wilson's dark side. That he thinks it would be better to put people out of their misery than let them suffer. that he is in a field where most patients are terminal and suffer and that he's kind of slipped into that mind set. Maybe doesn't practice it himself but believes in the theory so to speak. Or maybe he does we just don't know.

But this seems in direct conflict with his attitudes in "Autopsy" where he was dead set on giving Andi any time that they could. Granted, she wasn't asking to be euthanised. But what about Grace in "House vs. God"? she was terminal and she wanted to give up and he kept pushing. Again, she wasn't asking for it and Wilson had feelings for her but if he is so ready to jab a needle in Ezra's arm without a diagnosis why would he push for treatment in these other cases? What is his deciding factor or was he just calling House on his past behavior in the matter (Which still makes no sense and House would be smart enough to throw all this back at him now)

Very strange scene indeed.

And Aud, I agree with you on palliative care and that doctors knocking off terminal patients with morphine doesn't happen all the time. I think they played it up a bit because they needed the setup. I think they wanted to add one more potentially unlikeable characteristic to House's resume. Push us a little, see if we still like the guy, knowing that he has killed (assisted suicided) patients in the past. Depending on which side of the fence you're on in this argument it could cause you to look at House in a different light.

And, I think there are doctors out there who do these kinds of things. I know I've seen several stories on TV and in the newspaper of medical professionals doing just that. When caught, most times, it has been revealed that they've been doing it for years. Kevorkian has just been out in the open with it. So even thoguh it doesn't happen all the time, it certain does happen.

And not to open up a can of worms but I agree with House on this one. If it can be proven that it's terminal and the outlook is lots of suffering or drugged out of my mind to the point where I don't know what's going on around me, what's the point? I'd certainly consider it and would let my doctor know. OTOH, if they can't prove it's terminal I'm not giving up just yet. Bring on the comfort meds and get ye to the lab!!

As far as Ezra's morals and lack of remorse, I don't know. The remorse is a bit questionable but if at the time he thought he was doing the right thing I can't hold that against him. We all do stupid shit that we think is the right thing to do at the time. Granted, his was a little more extreme but there are so many factors that could have convinced him to do this is the name of progress and for the 'good of the many'.

The lack of remorse may just be his way of keeping it all together. (Oh God, I'm sounding like Cameron. Wanting to see the good in all people! :P ;) :lol: ). That something good did come out of it may be what he hangs on to so he can live with himself. Over the years it has become so ingrained that he makes no distinction now.

Then again he could just be an unfeeling bastard that got what was coming to him. :huh: And thus one of the themes of this whole episode. Should that matter in the end?

And on a completely different note, damn baseball anyhow! :angry:

Yeah, looks like House has done PAS before, but that doesn't quite make him Kevorkian. It's still a morally grey area no matter what, but there definitely is a difference between terminal and non-terminal patients.

Which I think Wilson agrees with, and no I don't think his point was that House should just go give the guy the morphine anyway. I think Wilson just wanted to point out that House's real motive was not to make sure he was terminal, but to solve the case before he died. It seems like an irrelevant point really, because either way it results in the same actions. And motives are never that clear-cut. House wanted both. So he's not perfectly altrustic - no one is. I find it irritating that Wilson keeps needling him about things like that when it serves no purpose. Wilson just wanted House to admit that he's a bad person, I guess.

Wilson's motivations when he makes these kinds of analyses rarely make sense to me. I think it's more the writers talking than the character. They just want to point things out about House to the audience, and Wilson is the easiest way to do it.

But really, if you followed Wilson's logic about House, if you accepted that all he wants is to solve the puzzle and it doens't actually matter whether the answer to that makes the patient teriminal or not terminal... then House would be willing to euthanize someone who he had a cure for. And I seriously, seriously doubt he would do that. He would let someone refuse to take the cure - because really, he can't make them (like the mother in "Forever" or even the kindergarden teacher in the pilot) - but he would not kill them.

Remember the John Henry case in DNR... He said that he wanted to die, and House told him that he would help him to die after he solved the case. I think that that was just a trick to get him to go along with House's wishes (the same trick he pulled on Ezra Powell, actually); House was hoping that once he found the cure for John Henry, he would no longer want to die. Which is exactly what happened. But imagine if Henry had still wanted to die, even after House had cured him. Would House have agreed to kill him? I'm sure he would not have held to his promise in that case.

[QUOTE]Wilson's motivations when he makes these kinds of analyses rarely make sense to me. I think it's more the writers talking than the character. They just want to point things out about House to the audience, and Wilson is the easiest way to do it.[/QUOTE]

That's a really good point. There are probably other out-of-character moments that can be explained by "Well, somebody had to say it." or just needing to move the plot along.

Or maybe Wilson is just so accustomed to arguing with House, it's automatic at this point? Hmm.

[/QUOTE]He would let someone refuse to take the cure - because really, he can't make them (like the mother in "Forever" or even the kindergarden teacher in the pilot) - but he would not kill them.[QUOTE]

I also thought about the woman (I can only think of her as Nina the evil, thanks to 24) from Control - he had to know that she wouldn't do this again and that she wanted to live before he risked his job to get her that heart. I think it was more than wanting her to say it - it was wanting her to believe what she said.

Yeah I think Wilson was arguing that House was keeping this guy around so he could solve the puzzle not so that he could do anything for him. It does seem a little out of character for him to be so quick to give up hope though as Grace could have been considered equally terminal, at least from the way it sounded and to somewhat tie into this episode, an excellent candidate for palliative care in the sense that it seems to have reached the point that you can live a year but likely spend a lot of it sick/uncomfortable vs. you can live six and we can make you feel pretty decent/able to enjoy your life/do some things you've always wanted except for maybe a few days or weeks at the end. I guess it was the personal attachment there because I was expecting Wilson to say something along the lines of "Okay, sleep on it and if that's still your decisions we'll talk about what we can do to get you to be able to see Italy and then have a relatively comfortable death".

Back to topic, sort of, the stance on euthanasia is not totally out of character though. We know from the episode where Wilson is rolling joints for a patient that he's not opposed to treatments he feels are appropriate but not accepted or even legal, as evidenced by the aforementioned marijuana.

Also not to excuse Ezra's violation of informed consent but I wondered about something that might have made it seem like less of a violation at the time he did the experiment in 1960 or actually before as that's the date of the journal it was published in but good scientific studies are many years in the making, plus quite awhile in the publishing. I'm hoping the more medical-historical minded can help me out here, when did the true risks of x-ray exposure become common knowledge? At one point, if I'm remembring my history correctly, they were even considered beneficial, though I know that was long long before the 50s or 60s. There was quite some time though when they were considered benign I believe. I know both my parents remember being able to get your boot x-rayed when you went to the shoe store when they were kids--it was one of the highlights of the visit for them, along with the new shoes-- and I velieve they even showed a machine for this purpose on some show about historical medical devices, especially ones that were a bit ill-conceived. My point is perhaps if Ezra's experiments occurred during the period where the full harmfulness wasn't know, or x-rays were considered pretty benign that may have justified to him his ignoring of informed consent. It would sort of be in the same way that we and Cuddy (as well as House) justified the Cortisol injections, it's not standard procedure, but it won't hurt anything.

Naturally, Ezra should have gotten consent period. Do not pass go, do not collect 200 dollars. But there's a difference between I'm going to perform an experiment without consent that could potentially give the subjects an aggressive cancer vs. I'm exposing my subjects to a substance that probably won't harm them without consent,

Though the cost/benefit thing applied to human life (one or two lives lost or ruined is worth the thousands of lives saved with the information we gain) more often than we probalby want to know. In the famous, at least among the bleeding hearts like me, case of the exploding Pinto gas tank it wasn't even applied for the purpose of health research (long story short Ford discovered that the gas tanks were more likely to explode under certain circumstances than they should, they figured out a fix for this, then they did an analysis of how much it would cost to recall the affected cars and fix them versus what they could expect to pay in wrongful death lawsuits. It came out that fixing the cars would cost more than the lawsuits, so they left the tanks alone. This was later exposed, possibly by Ralph Nader, in a magazine, Mother Jones--admittedly a very liberal publication). Granted that was back a while ago, but I imagine similar, less dramatic cases still occur.

It's even a philosophical question. Benj is our philosopher here so I'm hoping he'll correct me if I mess this up too badly as I'm going somewhat from memory and a second hand source. There was a philospher one who asked the question of whether it would be worth it if via the adject misery of one person the rest of society could experience utopia. I dont' know if he answered it. I'm familiar with the concept via a short story roughly based on the idea by Ursula LeGuin called "Those Who Walked Away From Omelas"--which, along with virtually any of LeGuin's work, is a great read BTW.

Okay, enough trouble making on my part.

I just watched this episode last night on USA Network. It was ok. I think that House could've been snarkier and Wilson and Cuddy could've been more involved in the episide. It seemed to me that Cuddy's reaction to House giving the guy morphine was "off" ya know?

I hope the episodes get better, this season is just okay so far, jmho.

God and peace
Vanessa :)