Spoilers ahead for Episode 20 of Chicago Med Season 7, called “End of the Day, Anything Can Happen.”
Only two episodes of Chicago Med’s 22-episode order for Season 7 are left until the medical drama heads into another summer hiatus, and the latest episode set up a storyline that could have some major ramifications for one of the hospital’s most talented doctors. Dr. Pamela Blake, played by Suits alum Sarah Rafferty, is the top transplant surgeon at Med, but is experiencing the kind of hand problem that could take a surgeon out of the OR for good.
Pamela agreed to do a risky liver transplant involving a woman who barely met the parameters for donating an organ, and had a hard time securing a clip inside of her. The clip slipped, and she and Crockett had to open her back up, and it quickly became clear that it wasn’t just self-doubt that was preventing her from repairing her own mistake.
She played it off in the OR as not having a good enough angle so that she could pass it off to Crockett, and didn’t open up about her issue until he came to talk to her. Pamela tried to brush off Crockett’s concern with a vague “it’s not you, it’s me” line, but ultimately shared the truth:
The clip didn’t hold because I didn’t engage it tightly enough. I couldn’t engage it. My hand at rest [is] rock steady. But when I pinch my fingers together… there’s something wrong with my hand, Crockett. There’s something really wrong.
It’s not clear just yet what is wrong with her hand, but she definitely looked like she needed that hug from Crockett while facing the possibility that she won’t be able to perform surgery. She has prioritized her job over just about everything else, and became the top transplant surgeon at the hospital because of all her hard work. If this issue is something that can’t be fixed, then Chicago Med may lose one of its most talented doctors from doing her job of transplanting organs before the end of Season 7.
Of course, it’s possible that what Pamela needs is simply to reduce her workload to give her hand a break more often, and that seems like the best-case scenario for her. Crockett seems determined to stay by her side, and hopefully she doesn’t try to keep performing surgeries until she sorts her issues out. She is one of the more cautious doctors at Med due to the delicate nature of transplant work, but I can imagine this turning her world upside down.
Only time will tell whether or not this hand issue is enough to cost the hospital its talented transplant surgeon, and Season 7 is nearly at an end. The penultimate episode airs on Wednesday, May 18 at 8 p.m. ET on NBC, and fans of the three One Chicago shows (including Chicago Fire and Chicago P.D.) know that One Chicago likes to deliver game-changing finales. Whether or not that means Pamela is facing a permanent change in her status as a surgeon remains to be seen. Chicago Med already said goodbye to one doctor this season; could the same happen with Pamela?
For when Chicago Med and more of TV’s biggest shows wrap for the 2021-2022 TV season, be sure to check out our spring TV finale schedule. If you want to revisit earlier episodes of Med, you can find the series streaming with a Peacock subscription, and don’t forget to take a look at our 2022 TV premiere schedule for what shows are on the way in the coming weeks.
