MTV to re-edit ‘Scrubbing In’ with more nursing footage, less debauchery

The backlash for MTV’s Scrubbing In, a show about travel nurses both in and out of the hospital, began before the show even premiered! The criticism of the show continued after regular episodes of the show started airing, with the American Nurses Association complaining the show’s “negative images reinforce sexist and inaccurate nurse stereotypes.”

Now it appears MTV has taken heed of the strong words against the show, and will re-edit future episodes to focus more on clinical scenes and highlight nursing skills, according to Variety. The network also will move the series from its previous 10 PM time slot to midnight, will publish a blog post detailing the nursing profession and plans to promote a web feature called “A Day in the Life of a Nurse.”

In addition to the nursing organizations that spoke out against the show, more than 30,000 signatures have been gathered so far on a change.org petition asking MTV to cancel the show altogether.

The first three episodes of Scrubbing In focused more on the lives of the nurses on the show outside of the workplace. Being MTV, this often included partying, drinking and a good deal of drama.

Our question: is this too little, too late? Did you watch the show–should it be canceled altogether, or has the issue been blown out of proportion? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.