Hollywood's Health Experts

A CDC-funded organization has advised TV shows from Grey's Anatomy to Law & Order on how to write plots that deal with medical and health-insurance issues.

ABC

The questions from producers run the gamut: Could a body be stolen from a hospital? What do infectious disease specialists wear during an outbreak? Do surgeons really say Stat!?

In a bright office building in Beverly Hills, Kate Langrall Folb and her team at Hollywood, Health, and Society are on call to field queries from the mundane to the obscure. Operators are standing by, Folb, the groups director, often tells TV and movie writers.

The organization was established with money from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2001 to provide the entertainment industry with free, accurate health information. Since then, the group has worked with hundreds of television writers as they tell stories about performing complicated surgeries, coping with depression and fighting insurance companies for coverage.

They consulted on Walter Whites cancer battle in Breaking Bad and on Max Bravermans Aspergers syndrome in Parenthood. They advised writers for Law & Order on an unvaccinated child who infected a classmate and on Disneys Doc McStuffins on treating her broken toys. And as millions of people gain coverage through the nations landmark health law, they are also providing producers with information for storylines about Obamacare.

The CDC now provides between $300,000 to $500,000 a year in funding, along with other sources. Hollywood, Health, and Society relies on a roster of experts around the nation, even bringing medical professionals into writers rooms and taking producers on field tripsincluding to the county morgue.

Recently, the center convened producers, writers, health experts, and patients to discuss the Affordable Care Act. They delved into topics including enrollment problems, obstacles to mental-health treatment and coverage for immigrant families, with the goal of inspiring and informing writers, Folb said.

Healthcare in the Time of Grey's Anatomy

The arrival of Obamacare has meant that the [health] stories get a brand-new dimension, said Marty Kaplan, director of the Norman Lear Center at the University of Southern California, which oversees Hollywood, Health, and Society.

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Hollywood's Health Experts