March 20, 2006
"Just add water" TV health reporting
The Grade the News (GTN) website reports on the questionable medical âreportingâ? done by syndicated TV and radio celebrity Dr. Dean Edell, who calls himself âAmericaâs Doctor.â?
Edell appears on San Franciscoâs KGO Channel 7 with introductions that often say, âDr. Dean Edell reports.â? But the story points out that Edell does no original reporting in many of the stories.
GTN reports: âMany of his TV stories, along with transcripts under his byline on the KGO Web site, were taken nearly verbatim from a low-profile news service in Florida that mails out prepackaged video reports to more than 100 TV stations across the country.
The company, Ivanhoe Broadcast News, allows local reporters to put their names on stories they didn’t report, film or write — without mentioning Ivanhoe. Stations also are permitted to omit geographical information, giving viewers the false impression that the stories were locally produced and the patients and doctors quoted in the stories could be their neighbors.â?
Edell doesnât practice what he has preached, according to GTN: âIn his writing and in news stories on television, Dr. Edell has condemned the unattributed use of video news releases — ready-to-run stories produced by companies or government agencies looking for publicity.
In an opinion piece he wrote for the Knight Ridder news service in 1997, âBeware the Television Report of ‘Important Medical Breakthrough,’ â Dr. Edell scolded health journalists âfaced with shrinking budgets and staffs, pressure to produce more segments, and shorter deadlinesâ who succumb to self-interested parties pushing âpre-packaged video tape complete with ready-made scripts.â â
Itâs worth noting that the main product of Ivanhoe â“ the company from which Edellâs station buys ready-made news â“ is called âMedical Breakthroughs.â? But he was correct in his 1997 warning: this kind of “just-add-water” TV health reporting is proliferating.
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