Medical Investigation (2004) s01e01 Episode Script

So a lot of "sue me".
Who are you at? Ask him.
His name's Martha Stewart Isabel.
My immed emption doesn't give him inside information.
Yeah.
I'm on with Hunt, what? What does that mean, partial ocean view? I'm sorry, I'm lost.
/ Hold on.
How do I get to Statue of Liberty? Take the ferry from Battery park.
To get to Battery park, you take the number 1 or the number 9 line to South ferry station, all right? Tourists.
I'm not paying 700 bucks a night for partial anything.
I got to go.
I've got Hunt on the other line.
He's having a meltdown.
Hunt.
Hold on, I Hunt? I got to get back to you.
There's something Safe! Bethesda, Maryland Connor.
Glen.
/ You guys stop that bird flu, yet? Yeah.
Up to my elbows in that stuff all morning.
You look good, Lis.
I like your hair.
It's Thanks.
I'd like your key to the house, Stephen.
You sure that's such a good idea? I mean, what if something happens? Something doesn't always have to happen, Stephen.
What do you say, Jackie boy? Let's get one now, buddy.
Come on.
Let's get one.
Please let him get a hit this time.
Yeah, you're not kidding.
Let me guess.
This one you have to take.
What part of "do-not-call-me-for- two-hours" do you not understand? Now? Okay.
Okay, okay, Fine.
Jack.
Jack, what kind of ball is that? A wilson or a spalding? Dad, I have no idea.
- Dr.
Connor? - Sorry.
Isolate the ball from everything.
Forget about the pitcher.
Forget about the score.
Just focus on the ball, and tell me what the word is between the stitching then swing through it.
Dr.
Connor! / Thank you.
You can do this, Jack.
Durant, we got an incident.
One 47 year old male, one 32 year old female.
Get everyone.
We're going to New York.
St.
Jerome's Hospital New York City Eva, check the other hospitals.
If any other blue people show up They'll be brought here right away.
- And don't forget.
- No press.
I'm on it.
- Powell? - Yeah.
Something has to link these two people.
Same family, same apartment,same food, same Drug use.
Start where they liveand move out from there.
Check and see if there's been HAZMAT spills in the area.
You got it.
Durant? / I'll check the preliminary blood panels, see if anything jumps out.
Run down what they ate, drank, breathed smelled or smoked.
I'm on it.
What should I be doing, Dr.
Connor? How long you been on this team, Mccabe? Three weeks.
/ Three weeks.
You should have known exactly what you were doing two weeks ago.
I could use some help.
Dr.
Stephen connor, NIH.
I need you to check the senior physician in charge.
Thank you.
Don't take it personally.
He suffers from a bad case of high expectations.
/ You think? Try having two bosses.
I've got the director back in D.
C.
, who's very straight-laced, and then, on the road,I got this other guy.
The gonzo doc upstairs.
Which is why I need your help.
I'll alert the other E.
Rs.
If any more blue people show up, you call me.
I'll take them upstairs.
The whole thing can be really hush-hush.
I got to be able to say where this order is coming from.
NIH, press relations.
You can always blame Washington.
Liver function, normal.
Drug screen, normal.
- White blood cell count? - Totally normal.
Based on these results, these people could run a marathon.
Except they're blue.
Third call today from a student I worked with on the listeria outbreak in Virginia last year.
She's a resident now, so naturally, everything is high drama.
Kelly, please, I already said no.
They just took the baby away.
The dad's been arrested.
I'm, I'm telling you, there is something off about this one, and no one will listen to me but you.
I'm not listening to you.
Stop trying to guilt me into this.
You should know by now that is a guaranteed dead end.
This is a baby we're talking about, Natalie.
What? It's a one year old with fractures and bruises.
The D.
A.
says abuse.
Kelly's not so sure.
Why are you sending me? I'm the least experienced person on this team.
We could spare you.
You know more than you think, Dr.
Mccabe.
Go! Mr.
Douglas, is there anything about this morning that seems remotely different, other than ending up here? Blood shows nothing? We'll retest the blood ourselves.
What's the differential diagnosis? - Food poisoning, but with food - the body'd try to expel it, and neither have vomited.
I mean, look at this bag.
They hung dextrose and water on him.
I hung that bag myself.
Dr.
Natalie durant, Dr.
Stephen connor.
We're from NIH.
You must be Dr.
Gordon.
Thank god the Feds are here, because us local yokels, we see a guy come in bright blue, we just put his feet up and give him a glass of lemonade.
The '91 cholera pandemic in Peru? 12,000 were dead before it even got up to speed.
The '93 hantavirus outbreak in New mexico over 50 dead before they knew it was mice.
I am very well aware of the history of infectious disease.
Good.
Then you're aware if the wrong person coughs on a plane in Hong kong, two days later, 100 people are dead in Boston.
Your guess is as good as mine.
No, my guess is better, but only one of us gets to make the call.
Do you want to make the decision that could affect the lives of 8 million New Yorkers, or do you think you'd better leave that one to me? A general rule of thumb.
One victim is a fluke, but two means you have a problem, and you have two very ill patients in here.
Three very ill patients.
Switch out the dextrose for a bag of normal saline.
Let's get to work.
The blood is brackish.
I better go draw the others.
What's brackish? We have to test it first to see what it means, but we're missing something.
Wes, what are we missing? I'm going to die.
- You're not going to die.
- Yes, I am I'm dying alone.
Look, I'm sure we're trying to contact your family as we speak.
There's no family.
My wife left.
My daughter could someone try to contact my daughter for me, please? I'll do my best.
Stephen, six more patients are on the way.
Place is tiptop.
You're wasting your time.
I need to check the basement heater, the water heater, gas and sewer lines.
Richmond, Virginia See, when they brought her in today, the leg was fine.
But two hours later, under observation It's bruised.
But wouldn't residual bruising be expected with contusions? This is spontaneous bruising.
I, I mean, I may not have been a resident long, but this is not normal.
How long have you been a resident? Almost a month.
So, where do we start? Let's start with the mom.
I can take the notification of family members off your hands, just for the blue people.
Just, you know, make your life easier.
A bureaucrat who cares.
Thank you.
Eric novak, New York examiner.
I'd like to talk to the doctor in charge.
What is this about, Mr.
Novak? New Yorkers turning blue.
Public has a right to know if this is a serious, possibly terrorist-related crisis you're covering up here.
Fine, I'll hold.
How's Gordon? He sees what we see, liver and kidney functions deteriorating.
We started a valium drip to head off the seizures.
Wait a second.
Douglas has a blood alcohol of .
12? They all have traces of alcohol in their system.
Well, maybe they went to the same bar, ordered from the same liquor store.
Maybe we're just looking for bad booze.
We already ran it down.
They all drank different things in different places.
And most only had a beer or a glass of wine.
So we've got nothing? That's just great.
Uh-oh.
Looks like he's about to hand somebody their head.
Very Re-animator.
It's an excellent flick.
Can I just ask, why are you obsessed with horror movies, when your day job pretty much is a horror movie? Because I love my work.
All right, listen up.
We have nine patients out there.
They all have something in common.
Tell me what it is.
And don't say they're all blue.
It's not in their homes.
All right, it's no gas leaks, no odors.
There's nothing rotten in the fridges or pantries.
No neighbors show any symptoms.
Check this out.
Six of the patients live within three blocks of each other.
Two work close by.
But what doesn't connect is the ninth lives and works in Brooklyn.
The pattern still holds.
The ninth was there for some other reason.
It's something in those six square blocks, so go back and start again.
Where they live is a dead end.
Then it's where they work, where they play chess, where they get their groceries, where they do their laundry, - where they get a massage, - Stephen? where they talk to their shrink.
I don't care! I'm going to order in dinner.
You got that blood sugar thing going on again.
Or maybe it's in their clothes.
How are you doing with the press? Quiet mice, sir.
They said there's a restraining order.
They won't even let me in to see her now to hold my own baby.
It's going to be okay.
It's not going to be okay.
She's sick.
We don't know what's wrong with her.
That's why Dr.
Mccabe is here.
The D.
A.
, she says my husband's been hitting Emma, but he would never, ever.
On my life, I know he didn't hurt our little girl.
My attending doesn't even know that I called you.
You have to hurry up.
You think I want to drag this out? Hey, Emma.
How are you doing, sweetie? I just have to do a couple little checks here.
That's it, very good.
Okay, sweetheart, can you look at me? Can you look at me, sweetie? Look at me, sweetie.
Can you look over here? What does that mean, Miles? It means this looks like abuse.
Sorry, but it does.
And the poor kid's been beaten to where she can't even hear anymore.
How severe are the head injuries? I didn't actually see any head injuries, and the MRI came back completely clear.
Miles, what color are the whites of the baby's eyes? Maybe white? Find out.
Call me back.
It's a building they have in common.
Dobro's.
local diner, big breakfast crowd.
Every patient ate there in the past 12 hours.
It can't be food poisoning.
The symptoms are all wrong.
Plus, we're talking about big crowd.
There'd be a lot more cases than this.
Look, I don't know what happened, but I know where.
This is your building.
That was Wes douglas' daughter.
I told her her father was in critical condition.
She said she had nothing to say to him and hung up the phone.
Wes.
Wes, I need to talk to you about Dobro's.
Did you reach my daughter? We're still trying.
We've isolated the problem to the diner.
So, let's go back.
Let's start when you walked into the place.
She was born eight weeks early.
She was so little, only three and a half pounds.
Well, they can do pretty amazing things with preemies.
She was so tiny.
yet so strong and beautiful.
I knew then I was going to change my life for her.
Yeah, kids will do that to you.
Except I never changed anything.
Not one damn thing.
Not one thing.
Hello.
Is the ball still in the air? It wasn't wilson or spalding.
It was rawlings.
You see what happens when you focus? So proud of you, pal.
Yeah, first hit this season.
pretty tight, huh? Very tight.
The championship game's tomorrow.
Are you going to make it? I'll do everything I possiblycan to be there.
- Talk to your mom? - Okay.
Just a sec.
Mom, it's dad.
/ Okay.
Is everything all right? What, I can't just check in every once in a while? Well, you should try Jack back later.
Mrs.
Brewster is baby-sitting, and I think he finds her extremely dull.
Where are you going? To dinner.
With who? Stephen, we have to move on.
Yeah, uh, I know you keep saying that, but, uh, the reason for it, is, is kind of escaping me a bit.
I'm sorry, Stephen.
I got to go.
Connor.
It's asystole.
There's no rhythm.
What do we got? What's the clock? 12 hours, 40 minutes from the moment he collapsed until his death.
That leaves Eleanor cochran with two hours and ten minutes.
I don't care what his daughter said.
Call her back.
Push Eleanor cochran's fluids.
Dilantin at 50 mg I.
M.
If her respirations drop below ten Intubate her.
I've done this before.
I'll get samples back from the diner as quickly as possible.
In fact, I'll use Mccabe, run him back and forth.
Mccabe, right.
There's that.
/ There's what? We got another case.
A baby in Virginia with spontaneous bruising.
We don't have time for another case.
You know we don't have time for another case.
We'll find it.
Chopper had to go back to Washington.
You think this kid's a pain in the ass.
You already sent him, didn't you? Quite a while ago.
Damn it, Natalie, I can't afford you taking time out to supervise him.
If I say I can handle it, I can.
No, you can't.
We lost one patient already.
How many more are you willing to lose? None, which is why I will not turn away from someone who needs us.
You're talking about one child versus a city of eight million whose lives are at risk.
You made a bad choice.
In case you've forgotten, Stephen, for those parents, that one baby is the entire universe.
They're jerking me around, of course.
Yeah, another 15 minutes.
Yeah, yeah, they know I'm a reporter.
Yeah, I know.
I know.
I'll call.
Dr.
Stanton, please report to the third floor nurse's station.
Dr.
Stanton, please report to the third floor nurse's station.
Don't you hate hospitals? Hate.
That's weird.
I just put my phone down.
Did you see it? Your phone? / Yeah.
Sorry.
Owner's name is Daryl cooley.
Cooley.
Mr.
Cooley, open up.
Mr.
Cooley.
We don't have time for this.
That saved time.
I don't like the sound of that.
Hey! - Get him, get him, get him.
- All right! All right! All right, man! Come on.
All right, so I tipped a few back last night.
Just give me the CUP and let's get this done.
What, you all not from parole? Mr.
Cooley, a man is dead, and more will die, because something that happened in this restaurant in the last 24 hours.
What? / Look, I need you to call everyone who worked here today and get them down here now.
Oh, I remember that time as being so free.
Hanging out on this little Greek island, incredible food.
Oh, and the beaches.
I used to sunbathe topless, sometimes even naked, and nobody ever cared.
Uh, yeah, well why would they? Hey, you want to grab some dinner? I'm sorry.
That was, that was a, a jerk thing to say, because I know your dad's upstairs recovering from surgery, and I'm asking you out.
It's okay.
I'd like to have dinner with you.
So, uh, what do you feel like? Oh, I I didn't mean tonight.
What about your dad? Well, he's recovering like you said.
A girl's gotta eat, right? You know, whatever's upstairs must be one hell of a scoop for you to go to all this trouble.
Who do you work for? Leave this one alone, Mr.
Novak.
When it's safe to give you this story, I promise you'll bethe first one I call.
Well, that's touching.
Now give me my phone back, because I'm gonna file this story, with or without your help.
Fine.
Meet me here in 20 minutes.
I'll give you your phone and your story.
Incredible.
The whites of her eyes, they're not white.
They're blue.
Which means? I don't think she's been abused.
I think we're dealing with an orphan disease.
A what? It's a disease so rare it's almost never diagnosed correctly.
Is that supposed to be reassuring? I'm gonna have to take a DNA sample to make double sure, but I need a DNA kit.
Send a sample rush to the NIH.
In less than two hours, they can get it back Dr.
Mccabe, this is, uh, Dr.
Strickland, my attending.
- Uh, D.
A.
Musgrave.
- What the hell are you doing, Kelly? Dr.
Mccabe, it's the senior staff only that invite visiting doctors.
I know, and I'm sorry.
But the good news is, I think I'm coming close to understanding what's going on with the haskell baby.
What's to understand? The child's been abused.
With all due respect, I don't think so.
I think she's sick, and I think I can prove it with a DNA sample.
We already did a genetic work-up.
It came back completely normal.
An orphan disease would not show up in a regular genetic work-up.
Dr.
Mccabe, I want you out of here.
The last time I checked, the NIH does not involve itself in the jurisdictions of family services and the local police! Then let me tell you what the NIH involves itself in.
Answers.
Your tax dollars pay for the NIH, so that when, god forbid, some unforeseen, nasty, never before seen or heard of calamity strikes you, Dr.
Strickland, that some rubber-stamping bureaucrat doesn't write you off without even trying, which is why I am going to take this DNA sample, and if you don't like it, you can call your local police and have me hauled out of here in leg irons.
That's exactly what we're gonna do.
Leg irons? I'd better get this sent fast, before Dr.
Miles goes to jail.
Okay, they're not happy, but they're on their way.
Thank you.
Yeah.
When? Okay.
Three more patients showed up.
That's 12 victims total.
Oh, man, somebody else is dying? Listen closely.
All that matters right now is you.
You need to focus right now on what we're doing here.
Do you understand? Yeah.
/ Yes? Yeah.
/ Walk me through your routine.
Okay, come on.
I'm sorry for the run-around.
We all have our jobs to do.
Whatever, you did your job, now I'll do mine.
What's going on? Well, it's complicated.
I used to work on Wall street, big brokerage firms, Chase, Goldman sachs, Leeman.
I had quite the client base, but it's still Wall street, right? So I found myself at this little crisis of conscience, which led to a whole downward spiral, which led to a life reevaluation period.
I meant what's going on with the blue people? I'm getting to that.
Any recent power outages? Heating problems, cooling problems? Do you remember using any ingredients from a new distributor? Anything past its expiration date? / Never.
I take my work seriously.
I'm from a family of chefs.
Cooley's in Lafayette, Louisiana.
Even a cooley can make a mistake.
Not that kind.
Dairy is delivered twice weekly, and I've used the same distributor since I bought this place.
Besides, I keep my kitchen spotless.
Who do you trust most out there? That young kid, Ernesto, is good people.
He ain't missed a day in two years.
Ernesto.
Come here.
How fast can you get to st.
Jerome's? What? Yeah.
I think we're dealing with some form of nitrate poisoning.
Well, that makes no sense.
I got a nitrate hit from one of the kitchen surfaces so I retested the blood, and sure enough, there's nitrate in the blood, too, in pretty whopping doses.
Well, I've never seen a nitrate strong enough to kill.
I know, but I also know I got a vial full of blue.
Okay, sodium nitrate's most basic application is / Saltpeter.
Right, meat preservative.
Maybe the victims got a huge dose in something they ate.
Cooley, what food do you put meat preservative in? None.
I don't use that stuff.
He doesn't use saltpeter.
Ay, if it's ammonium nitrate, it could be a cleaning system, a boiler or a heater unit, but that all came up clean.
Could be cold packs in the freezers, fertilizers, some connection between fertilizers, grain, animals, meat.
Yeah, or eggs or milk, cheese, butter.
I don't like this either, Stephen, but maybe we should start treatment.
If we're wrong, we'll kill them faster than they're dying already.
But we are running out of time.
Do not tell me that I am running out of time.
Then I will tell you Eleanor cochran has a half hour left.
Peter has 50 minutes.
So you tell me we're running out or not.
Okay.
I need more information.
Let's go back to the food.
It has to be there.
I need to know what each of them had to eat.
All right.
I'm on it.
So, I slunk back home to mom and dad.
I mean, doesn't everybody at some point? And it turns out that they had just moved to within a stone's throw of the NIH.
- National institutes of health.
- Exactly.
Which should explain why all the secrecy now.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Hey, hey, hey, hey.
You don't actually think you're gonna ditch me down here, do you? Around that corner is a door.
Behind the door is an isolation unit.
You won't find it on a of the hospital plans, but inside you will find your story.
Puh-lease.
The choice is yours, Mr.
Novak.
Oh, that's nice.
Sneak away, you little snake.
I still got my cell.
She took my battery? It was the special.
They all ate the breakfast special.
Good work, Natalie.
The breakfast special, what's in it? Eggs, bacon and sausage, potatoes and toast.
All right, get samples of all that.
All right, 12 people have gone down so far, how many people ate the special? Well, on a good day, and today was pretty good, 250.
250? Yeah, but only 12 people got sick, so what does that mean? It means we'd have more patients if it was just your special.
Either it's not your special or there's some other combination of factors involved.
No, I'll tell you what it means, it means we're back to square one.
Connor.
I see.
We've a whole new cluster of victims.
Four more people in Dover, Delaware.
We had to intubate Eleanor cochran.
The dilantin isn't stopping the seizures.
Her blood pressure is 65 by palpation.
- Okay, what's the clock?- 15 minutes.
Maybe we should check with Dover.
Whatever is happening in Dover is happening here.
We keep going with what's in front of us.
And how long have you been open? Uh, six six years.
And where do you get your meat? The answer is here.
What are the variables? No bacteria, no bugs, no viruses.
Everyone would be down if it were airborne.
Everyone would be down if it was in the water.
250 people would be down if it was in the breakfast special, but only 12 got sick.
I need to know what they put on their food.
Stephen, these people can barely speak.
Find out what condiments they used.
They're all over the map with the condiments.
Ketchup, mustard, tabasco.
Maybe we should move off this, try some other angle.
What about salt and pepper? Did you hear me, Stephen? - Maybe it's not there.
- Natalie, just ask them.
Not all of them used pepper, but they all used salt.
I'll call you back.
Eleanor cochran, Kyle peters, Alesandro denova, Sam walker, Janice handerford and Wes douglas.
Of those six, how many were regulars? You talking to me, the phone, or your imaginary friends over there? Wes is.
Eleanor.
Uh, Sandro's been coming here for a couple years.
Listen, regulars always sit in the same spot.
Where? They sit in that section, all of them.
I need spoons and a cup of vinegar.
Quickly.
Only three.
Who last refilled these saltshakers? / I did.
This one's not salt.
What? Where's the salt supply? It's right over here.
When did it arrive? Shipment came in last night.
Okay.
so you cooked with this all day, and you forgot to refill the shakers until this morning, when you filled only one, the one that all the victims have in common.
It is sodium nitrate.
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
But 35 to 40 people sat in those seats, and most of them used salt.
We still don't have it.
Think! This diner, those customers, that salt shaker.
Why did only 12 get sick when so many more were exposed? I don't know, man, but I need a drink.
Start activated charcoal, ascorbic acid and methylene blue on all 11 now.
Eleanor cochran first.
You sure? / Now! Are you sure? Someone had to make the call.
Miles? You know, I've only been on this job three weeks.
They sent me down here to make a diagnosis.
What if I'm wrong? You're not wrong.
It's no fun playing god, huh? Help this one.
They live.
Don't help that one which makes this a hell of a job.
You don't do this because it's a job.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world.
The unreasonable man fights to make the world adapt to him.
That's why our progress depends on the unreasonable man.
Yeah? / Stephen, you won't believe what I'm looking at.
They're better? They're better.
They're better.
Yeah.
Spontaneous bruising, hearing loss, and the whites of her eyes turning blue led me to brittle bone disease.
Now, I'm not going to tell you brittle bone disease isn't serious.
It is but Emma has type one, it's the mildest form, so with the right course of treatment and Kelly's help, I'm sure you can learn to manage it.
We'll do whatever we can.
Thank you.
I'm just glad you called us.
That was it, sodium nitrate in the form of saltpeter.
But saltpeter's in preservatives.
It's not supposed to make you sick.
It usually doesn't in small doses.
The victims got a dose of saltpeter from the breakfast special and an additional raw, undiluted dose from that saltshaker.
They also had alcohol in their body.
Sodium nitrate deprives cells of oxygen, so does alcohol.
Put the two of them together, they were literally suffocating from the inside out.
The bag of salt came from the Greggson & Mann food plant in New jersey.
They also process saltpeter.
Somehow, the two got switched.
They ship it to the Dover site? Plus a hundred other cities along the east coast.
Get a list of Greggson & Mann's customers now.
The story you spent the last 12 hours trying to stop, let it roll.
/ Got it.
Hello? A little help, please? Rat maze down here, isn't it? For the record, you're going to jail.
Kidnapping, endangerment, stolen property.
I have an incredible scoop for you, unless you get all huffy, in which case, I can speed dial the New York times just as fast as I can tell you.
We've just received word of an urgent recall of all Greggson & Mann food products.
Now, those most at risk include anyone with compromised immune systems, the young, or the elderly.
Now, if you have these items in your home, it's suggested you return them to the store you purchased them at, new or used, for a full refund, or simply throw them away.
One saltshaker.
It's always one something.
Hey, you guys leaving already? How was Richmond, Mccabe? Uh, went very well.
I made the diagnosis.
Technically, it's called osteogenesis imperfecta, - but it's commonly known - brittle bone disease.
You don't see that one every day.
Yeah.
I guess it was my day.
Then there's tomorrow.
Pretty great, huh? How'd that feel? / Hey.
How'd it go? You didn't miss much.
We got killed, 11 to one.
11 to one? Yeah, but tell him how you did.
Two hits.
You got two hits? Just focus on the ball now.
Focus on the ball.
Come here.
Come here.
I'm proud of you.
Look, uh I know it's your weekend and all, but I was wondering if I could spend some time with him tomorrow.
You know, hit some balls around, hang out.
What do you say? I think we could manage that.
See you tomorrow, buddy.
See you, dad.
/ Good job.
Connor.