Diagnosis is a documentary web series about patients with undiagnosed, mysterious medical conditions. Through the internet, Dr Lisa Sanders, a professor and physician at Yale University, solicits the help of doctors, researchers and laypeople worldwide to come up with the right diagnosis in each case.
For example, take the case of Angel—a 23-year-old girl from Las Vegas who has been suffering from an agonising pain since the age of 14. It begins in her legs, shoots up her back and spreads throughout her body. After having unsuccessfully approached hundreds of specialists and doing a battery of tests that turn out negative, she seeks Sanders’ help. Finally, the right diagnosis comes from an unassuming pediatric researcher from Italy.
Based on The New York Times column by Sanders, Diagnosis is an exploration of medical mysteries that have been difficult to solve. Each of the seven episodes of the first season focuses on the story of one person with an undiagnosed condition. In her experience of 15 years, Sanders says that she has learnt that diagnosing diseases is not as straightforward or exact as mathematics. Rather, she compares it to the work of Sherlock Holmes, with each problem potentially having multiple solutions.
Each episode is a gripping emotional drama which exposes the frailties of the human form and the complexities of medical science. The narrative moves at a fast pace as Sanders guides the viewer across geographies and time zones to answer some of medicine’s most complicated problems.
DIAGNOSIS
Available on
Netflix
Rating: 4/5