1.14 Control
From tv.com: Billionaire entrepreneur Edward Vogler spends $100 million on the clinic and becomes the new Chairman of the Board. As a businessman, Vogler intends to turn the clinic into a profitable venue for his biotech venture and plans to eliminate the financially draining services of Dr. House. Meanwhile, a businesswoman who has it all – perfect life, perfect body, perfect job – finds herself inexplicably paralyzed. When he diagnoses her secret, House must risk his job and his medical license to get her a necessary transplant.

See, I would NEVER do that for a patient. I just spent the second half of the ep. thinking about the poor bastard who would die waiting for a heart for a woman who would probably relapse. What did y'all think?

I remember a lot of debate about it, about how House didn't seem to arrange for any psychiatric care for her afterwards other than saying "be good" and buying her dinner. Maybe we're supposed to assume that her brush with death would shock her out of her eating disorder, but I'm pretty sure that's not how mental illness works! In the big picture it was wrong, but that's just it - House isn't a big picture kind of doctor. I think the point was that House will fight for his patient's life single-mindedly, risking not only some other poor bastard's life but his own medical license, because that's what he regards as his duty. The theme came up again in 'Sex Kills' when House acknowledged that the transplant committee made the right decision in not giving Johnny Fever a heart, but he still did everything he could to get Johnny Fever that heart because he's his patient. I think it's the only way House knows how to practice medicine.

He also did it with the liver in Detox. As he said in Sex Kill, "Advocating for my patient." I suppose, considering that he feels his patients are the only ones that matter, it's a good thing that he doesn't treat too many of them.

I can see a rightness in House advocating to the max for his patient while disregarding the well-being of everyone else. You can't control the world; if everytime anything is given to anybody it is denied to someone else and it is beyond your power to change that, one way to act is to try to be a Solomon and look at every possible alternative and try to decide where to allocate all resources to the greater good. Or be the good, rule-obeying citizen and do what the powers that be tell you to do. But another way to look at it is, you can't control the world or the fair/unfair allocation of resources or have some magical key into knowing who is really the most "deserving" or whose future life will do the most good for humankind; so you avoid all moral judgements and devote yourself to doing your very best (which includes rule-breaking if you happen to be that sort) for those whose lot it is to fall into your care. I can see that as a valid--and from one pov more humble--way to be. eta: I don't think it is so much that "his patients are the only ones that matter" as it is that his patients are the only ones who are his responsibility and for whom he is obliged to advocate and act. I think he would argue that other doctors' patients have the right to expect their doctors to advocate for them--"matter" to them-- just as deligently and deviously as House does for his patients. It isn't that being his patients makes them more deserving, it's that being his patients makes him responsible and requires him to act.....? Not his place to judge, only to doctor...?

There are many instances when I do admire House's obsessive nature in advocating for his patients. This one is not one of them. I find House's actions extremely unethical. There is a reason why this kind of decision is taken by a committee, why the patients are numbers, faceless people. No doctor has the right to make that kind of choice alone, based only on his POV. But I like that TPTB let the subject open, some viewers can admire House's decision and some just can't. I'm on the second group.

I just watched the rerun of Control on Fox (guess we'll be seeing more of that), and ITA with what has been said above. House is a character who picks and chooses where he would like to apply ethics. He is very "single-minded" when it comes to his patient, and will unhesitatingly ignore any ethical obstacle to saving his patient's life (unless the patient doesn't want saving, as in the Pilot). However, he will just as happily cry "ethics" on a broad level, when he has no personal involvement (as in Control and subsequent episodes where he saw the use of the hospital for clinical trials to be an ethical breach (it was)). As he told the little girl in the episode whose name escapes me, he's complicated. (that's why chicks dig him *g*) On a lighter note, I just have to say that I really miss the look of Season 1 House, where his stubble wasn't so much of a finely-cultivated three-day growth that never changes (they have been clearly using the same setting on the razor for some while), and instead looked like he just didn't bother to shave today (and sometimes yesterday, too, depending on the complexity of the case. He looks really good with just a little stubble, and I liked how an effort was made in S1 to make him appear a little uncaring about his appearance. As opposed to S3 & 4, where they just have him in a really short beard. That he obviously maintains each day to keep it at that length. JMO. Oh, and when did Chase lose the pinky ring? I think it suits him. :lol:

I just rewatched it too, it just reminded me why S1 is my least favorite season. I mean I loved S1 but more often than not it bored me, House just seems more...IDK subdued? JMO, and I realize it's an unpopular one, having said that Control was one from that season that I really enjoyed, despite it really bringing "the crush" out in the open. JM was at her prettiest though.

Whereas I preferred S1 because House seems to have become more outrageous just to attract fans. Look, House cheats death! Again! Look, House insults a patient for absolutely no reason! Really, it's funny! Back on topic... It made me realize how much I missed the ethical dilemmas that were at the core of this show and hope that we get them back once House has his team sorted out. Wilson's "Our friendship is an ethical responsibility" is prophetic and explains so much.

I just rewatched this episode - and I think it's one of the quieter, more affecting episodes. House is really likable in this episode, and not in an OOC way. But I've had personal dealings with my own personal Carly, so that affects my views. She was someone who DID change after her brush with death (no organ transplants required) so I'm not as ready to give up on Carly. Since I believe psychological illnesses are just as valid as physical ones, and are intertwined, it makes me uncomfortable to deny treatment (such as an organ transplant) based on the former but not the latter. Aside from just finding it an ethical slippery slope - I remember a lot of complaint about Larry Hagman, David Crosby, etc. getting transplants because addiction is still not considered a "real" illness to a lot of people. The thought by some was that those men should be denied treatment and left to die because they deserved it, having been addicts. But once you start down that road, then you're denying treatment to people who may problems caused by a bad diet, or who used to smoke, or who lived in a bad area and got the enviromental effects, etc. until eventually you rule out everybody for treatment except those who can prove that their illness is solely physical and hereditary and who have lived pure, chaste lives that can be approved by a corporate committee. It's injecting moral judgements as to who is more "deserving" for medical treatment, rather than judging on the medical facts.

I always thought the biggest complaint about Larry Hagman and David Crosby was that they had apparently been moved to the head of the line because of their celebrity. The problem with Carly getting a heart was that she needed therapy so that she wouldn't destroy the new one too. And there was no indication that she was going to get it. All other things being equal, yes, her need was more acute than that of many others -- she was going to die very soon. And, yes, people do blame people for their illnesses. I've seen many times when someone has died of cancer, the first thing people ask is "did he/she smoke?" I think it's sort of a talisman -- "I don't smoke so I won't get it."

About the therapy, I'd like to fanwank that House did get her some through back channels. He couldn't make it required treatment without alerting Cuddy that he had lied. But at the same time he's not an idiot, knows about EDs and at the very least would want to insure that his efforts weren't in vain.

This was one of the episodes that bugged me for a kind of side reason. I think this was the same season that House treats the senator. Vogler is trying to get rid of House under the guise that House's department loses money. Carly is a CEO of a huge company who knows that House took this big risk for her. Surely she would donate specifically to House and his department - restricted funds. the senator is a big deal who probably know lots of rich people who could donate. In fact, it seems that a number of the people that come to House have a lot of money. Now House may not care, but Cuddy would know and would have been working those people as donors. If House's work was designated as the purpose of the donations, it could not be used for anything else unless the donors agreed. That would have effectively neutered Vogler. IMHO