Taking Risks With the EMH

I just finished watching "Life Line". I enjoyed it, a lot. Dwight Schultz and Marina Sirtis are always fun to have as guests, but this was Robert Picardo's episode... he helped write it, and he perfectly played both himself and a terminally ill and irascible Lewis Zimmerman.

Be that as it may, though, this is the second time I can think of offhand that Janeway has put the EMH at risk at what was essentially his own request. The first time being "Latent Image". Note that in "Tuvix" and "Nothing Human", she completely ignored the wishes of organic crew for what she saw as the greater good. However, she let the EMH very nearly kill himself in "Latent Image", and then sent him tumbling off through 30,000 light years in "Lifesigns", with no guarantee that she would get him back. Given that with him wiped out, Voyager has basically a field medic in charge of Sickbay for the rest of its journey (and loses it's best pilot), which could last three decades.

Wouldn't it have made more sense for Janeway to instruct the holo-sawbones to isolate the relevant data and send it, where it could presumably be integrated into an EMH in the Alpha Quadrant? When you have one doctor, and ONLY one doctor, it stands to reason that you take precautions to preserve him.

 

They had the EMH backup module thing that ended up being found in "Living Witness"

There was also the Equinox EMH. Perhaps that could have been kept around as a spare for Voyager.

 

Good point... but if they had a backup, why was it such a big deal for them to say they didn't? I always assumed that with their level of technology, duplicating the EMH was impossible (in the Living Witness timeline, they procured or developed it later on).

If they had had two EMH programs, why did "Latent Image" even happen? The Doc could have fired up EMH #2 and saved both Harry and Ensign Whatsherface. And hell, just pop out a third copy and let him stay in the Alpha Quadrant as Zimmerman's personal physician (and maybe play Voyager with Reg in his spare time).

 

The whole basis of not being able to duplicate a computer program was an iffy premise at best. They handwaved it a few times for plot convenience, but you're simply best off taking it at face value and moving on.

 

I seem to remember (but I might misremember) some line in early Voyager to the effect that the Doctor could not be downloaded or copied, because he was fully integrated with Voyager's on-board systems? That somehow changed after Braxton's 29th century tech was introduced, allowing Sterling to download him after all. That ability was then also given to the crew by the 29th century mobile emitter. Possibly some reverse-engineering allowed Torres to make a backup of him by the time of Living Witness.

 

They had the episode where Harry and Tom were trying to make another EMH while he was gone and completely flubbed it.
But I agree, is being 1 doctor/nurse/whole sickbay and he goes on road trips that may not come back.crew crew of 140/170 and not 1 has an interest in medical? If not, id be looking at the roster and checking all crew files to see who has experience. And volen/telling them to take shifts and learn.

 

Agreed. Once Kes departed, the Doctor should have had a full time medical student, recruited from the crew.

 

Something interesting occured to me, regarding the EMH... Zimmerman was as bald as his creation, and given that the Federation can cure baldness easily, it's probably not a big issue for him. He presumably programmed the EMH to make remarks about his own baldness, probably to put patients at ease. After all, "curing" him would be simple: "Computer, modify EMH parameters as follows... give him a full head of hair. End modification."

 

I believe in the episode where Kes is old and they go backwards in time, a future timeline shows the doctor with a full head of hair.

 

I think this is the same episode being discussed here? Tom was in charge in the doctor's absence and was dismayed a pilot like him could potentially be the permanent replacement.

 

Yes, it does. And he has a name, too: Dr. Van Gogh.

 

Personally, having the EMH's programme being lost wouldn't be a bad thing, I couldn't stand him by the end.

 

I think that Ms. Jurot was a combat medic, the equivalent of the guy on the SEAL team who carries the pressure bandages and morphine. Probably comparable to Tom's field medic training. Trained nurses like Kes and Ogawa on TNG are probably more capable, and even they aren't certified MD's.

 

But Voyager still needed him, despite his... idiosyncrasies.

 

To quote Tincoo (as seen in this fragment): 'it is a very irritating program'