A lot depends on nurses. Get a good one, and your healthcare crisis seems less scary. Get a bad one and the suffering never ends. During the coronavirus pandemic, you’re hopefully staying healthy thanks to social distancing, sheltering in place, and working from home. But if you got sick, who would care for you? While any healthcare worker tending to patients these days is putting their life on the line and should be applauded for it, during this terrifying life-imitating-Contagion time, we have a list of TV and movie nurses who we wish could take care of us instead.
Cover Photo: Showtime
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TV and Movie Nurses
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10. Ann Perkins on ‘Parks and Rec’
Nurse Ann Perkins (Rashida Jones) is an all-around amazing person. She's the kind of loyal, dedicated healthcare worker who shows up and steps up when no one else will. Even in her personal life, you can count on her; just ask the boyfriend with two broken legs that she nursed back to health (and who refused to take his casts off because he liked being cared for by her so much).
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9. Carol Hathaway on 'ER'
At Chicago's County General Hospital, emergency room nurse manager Carol Hathaway (Julianna Margulies) isn't afraid to stand up to holier-than-thou doctors. She knows nurses make the world go 'round and she's proud to be one. She takes charge without sacrificing compassion, and for that, we wish she'd take care of us.
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8. Eli Lloyd on 'Grey's Anatomy'
Nurse Eli Lloyd (Daniel Sunjataat) gets noticed by Dr. Bailey at Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital for his ability to lower the post-op complications for his patients. On top of his competency, he's a true gentleman, which is rarer than coronavirus these days. We could all learn a lot from his respectful behavior and can-do attitude.
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7. Carla Espinosa on ‘Scrubs’
Head nurse Carla Espinosa (Judy Reyes) was a mainstay at Sacred Heart teaching hospital for eight seasons of this popular comedy. She had sass to spare and didn't put up with any bullshit, making her the tough love caretaker we all need right now.
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6. 'Evelyn' in 'Pearl Harbor'
So this Michael Bay film bombed (at least where the script was concerned) but no warm-blooded male would refuse treatment by Evelyn, the gorgeous WWII-era nurse played by Kate Beckinsale who gets caught in a love triangle with pilot buddies Rafe McCawley (Ben Affleck) and Danny Walker (Josh Hartnett).
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5. Agnes von Kurowsky in 'In Love and War'
If nurse Agnes von Kurowsky was good enough for Hemingway, you know she's a keeper. Sandra Bullock played this real-life American healthcare worker with whom the author fell in love after being injured as an ambulance driver in Italy circa 1918. Though the relationship didn't last, she lives on as Catherine Barkley in A Farewell to Arms.
Photo: New Line Cinema
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4. Gaylord 'Greg' Focker in 'Meet the Parents'
Yes, nurse Greg (Ben Stiller) is awkward and bumbling and never seems to say the right thing, but this good guy's heart is in the right place and when need be, he can assert himself and even bust out a few kung fu defense moves, all qualities you want in a caretaker.
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3. Hana in 'The English Patient'
French-Canadian nurse Hana (Juliette Binoche) tenderly cares for her burn victim patient, mapmaker and adulterer Almásy, in an abandoned home in Italy at the end of WWII. She listens to his stories, reads to him, and keeps him pumped full of morphine until the bitter end.
Photo: Miramax
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2. Zoey Barkow on 'Nurse Jackie'
What Zoey (Merritt Wever) lacks in experience, she makes up for in enthusiasm. Peppy and eager to learn, she's the kind of nurse who will make you laugh even through the most unpleasant of procedures. Even as she gains more confidence and hands-on practice while working alongside nurse Jackie Peyton at All Saints Hospital, she never loses her childlike charm (or her silly scrubs).
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1. Jackie Peyton on 'Nurse Jackie'
Nurse Jackie boasts the most accurate and most entertaining depiction of nurses in TV or film to date. The titular character (Edie Falco) is, admittedly, a drug addict, but when she's on the clock, she's the smartest person in the (emergency) room and definitely the nurse you'd want at your side in a life-or-death situation. Jackie is so experienced and steady-handed, she even makes doctors seem superfluous.
