The episode opens with Gina operating on a patient with Parkinson's disease, with her co-worker and former teacher, Cliff Bass. Cliff later consults Gina in her office and asks her to perform the same operation on him; he has developed Parkinson's disease. Although Gina is still a bit nervous about the procedure and more nervous to operate on a friend, she does agree to perform the surgery, and Aaron says he will assist her. So, Gina operates, and everything seems to be going well, but suddenly, as Cliff is in the middle of speaking (he is awake during the surgery), something goes wrong with the speech area of his brain, and he develops a blood clot. Once out of surgery, Cliff is unconscious but Gina tells his mother, Mrs. Bass, that the blood clot might go away by itself, or it might be possible for her to surgically drain it, but that they have to wait for test results to determine the next step to take. Mrs. Bass, however, does not seem particularly interested in Cliff regaining consciousness, as she has decided that the Lord has made Cliff a "conduit" for his powers, enabling him to heal others who pray over him while he is unconscious. As the day progresses, Mrs. Bass gets more and more people in Cliff's room (against Gina's advice), praying, and donating money. Gina, very upset that Mrs. Bass' behavior is endangering Cliff's life and recovery, consults Geiger, Stu and Phillip, but Phillip thinks that the prayers are not doing any real harm. Later, though, Mrs. Bass reveals that she plans to take Cliff home. Gina waits for the CAT scans, and finds out that she can, indeed, surgically drain Cliff's blood clot, but Mrs. Bass refuses it, since it is God's plan for Cliff to be healing others now. When Mrs. Bass says that she is filling out papers to take Cliff home, and then tells Gina that those who do not accept Jesus will go to hell, Gina replies that she believes that those who withhold medical treatment from their children will go to hell. She then devises a plan to operate on Cliff in the night, without Mrs. Bass finding out. She asks Aaron if he will help her, but he says that he may have to report her if she operates against Mrs. Bass' wishes, so Gina goes on to arrange to secret operation herself. Gina does complete the operation, and the next morning Cliff is awake and Mrs. Bass believes that his recovery is the work of God. Aaron does not ask Gina what caused Cliff's sudden recovery so that he will not have to report what she has done.
Meanwhile, we see Geiger, with an entourage of students following him through the hospital. As one student asks him what he says to patients who have no hope of survival, Geiger opens a curtain to reveal Morty, who has severe heart problems that can't be solved by surgery, and could be solved with a transplant, except that Morty is too old to be eligible. Geiger, who obviously knows Morty from outside the hospital, goes in to him singing "Take me out to the Ball Game" in Yiddish.
Phillip arrives and he and Geiger discuss Dr. Herman, who is working at the hospital and made the front page of the tabloids. It turns out that Herman received a grant to do age-defying research, but he has changed is mind and is now using the money to study human cloning. Herman even suggests that he clone Geiger, since Geiger is such a fine specimen of a human being. Although the representative from the company giving the grant does not seem fazed by Herman's change of research topic, Geiger eventually decides to fire Herman anyway.
Later, Geiger goes back to see Morty and tells him about Dr. Herman and the cloning business. Morty reveals that he wants all the machines that are keeping him alive turned off, and Geiger sings to him once more. Geiger later emerges into the hall to find Aaron, and tells Aaron that Morty is dead, and manages to convince Aaron to spend the evening with him.
Early in the episode, Alberghetti asks Jack if she can borrow one of his trucks to move an armoire that she just bought. Jack, over-protective of his trucks, refuses. Later, Jack proposes the purchase of a new laser for the hospital at the board meeting, but Alberghetti asks him many questions and makes him look unprepared for his presentation. Jack later tells Geiger that he thinks Alberghetti is just getting back at him for the truck thing, and although Geiger thinks Jack is somewhat ridiculous, Geiger approves the purchase of the laser and Alberghetti promptly resigns from the board.
Well, the first thing I have to say is that I can't believe that Gina could actually get away with "secret surgery". It just seems impossible to me that someone could use an operating room without anyone noticing. So that whole thing was rather unrealistic, in my opinion. The storyline itself was alright, but nothing extraordinary, in my opinion.
The tiff between Jack and Alberghetti was enjoyable…it adds comic relief and develops the characters in a simple and fairly realistic way, so that was good.
Now usually I'm really fond of Geiger, but this episode is something of an exception. First of all, I didn't find his acting to be particularly magnificent, and secondly, his singing in Yiddish made me think that he's just trying to promote his Yiddish album.
So, all in all, the episode was alright, but certainly nothing worth getting excited about. Chicago Hope is just disappointing me lately. It needs a new edge or something else to revive it to the quality that it once had. Hopefully this is still possible for this year.