It took me four months to watch The Pitt. I kept pausing mid-episode, knowing I might cry.

As an emergency physician, I’ve never seen my work so accurately portrayed — the clinical cases, the colleagues and the system issues that define emergency medicine.

The Noah Wyle-led hospital drama has earned critical acclaim for its realism, and I’m often asked about the show: “It’s only like that in America though, isn’t it?”

I’ve shocked quite a few friends now by explaining that almost everything you see in the show is happening right now in EDs across Australia — the overcrowded waiting rooms, the occupational violence, the shortage of inpatient beds.