103: Occam's Razor

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"OCCAM'S RAZOR"

House Episode Number: 103

House Season: 1

Original Air Date: November 30, 2004

Writer: David Shore

Director: Bryan Singer

Special Guest(s): Marco Pelaez (Hospital Pharmacist) , Kevin Zegers (Brandon Merrell), Faith Prince (Becky Merrell), Alexis Thorpe (Mindy), Lauren Cohn (Jodi Matthews), Jason Stuart (Adam Brown), Ben Campbell (Jerry Morris), John Kelly (Robert Marrell), Joshua Wolf Coleman (Suburban Pharmacist), Beth Hall (Shelby Lever)

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Brandon Merrell, a college student, loses consciousness after having sex with his girlfriend. That, along with a rash and severe cough, lands him in the emergency room. Dr. Wilson brings the case to House, who tries several theories and treatments, all of which seem to make Brandon worse. As symptoms pile up and his white blood count drops, Brandon is quarantined while the team works to diagnose him. When the pharmacy gives House the wrong pills for a prescription, House looks into whether Brandon also may have taken the wrong meds for a cough. This is not the case, but along with pain in Brandon's fingers, it gives House a clue that he may have colchicine poisoning; it's a gout medication but is also used to cut ecstasy, which is what Brandon admits he has taken. And the case is solved ... with one final change that house makes in Brandon's cough medication.

When will Chase and Cameron succumb to their attraction for one another?

What new ways will Cuddy and House find to torture one another?

How many drugs really do have colchicine in them?

HOUSE EPISODE'S MEDICAL MYSTERY: PATIENT OF THE WEEK (POTW)

Location of incident:	Brandon's bedroom
Name / occupation / age / sex of POTW:	Brandon / College Student / 22 / Male
POTW symptom(s):	Collapsed Cough Rash Blood pressure not responding to the IV fluid Severe abdominal pain Nausea Fever Low blood pressure Low white blood count
Team mis-diagnoses:	Sinus infection and hypothyroidism together
House team's rule violation(s) / ethical breaches:	None
House's "Aha!" moment:	House takes the wrong prescription bottle from the hospital pharmacy
POTW final diagnosis:	colchicine poisoning from the ecstasy he had used twice which was cut with colchicine. Also the cough that got worse after taking the gout medication.
Other / clinic patient(s):	A woman being fired who is trying to get the most out of her health insurance before she loses her job. A man with a soar throat, for which House calls Cuddy out of a board meeting to do a consult. A boy who had an MP3-player stuck in his body, whom House leaves for cuddy to deal with.

Best Episode Moments

The sexual innuendos fly between Chase and Cameron!

House begins to antagonize Cuddy in earnest. In this episode, he calls her for consults on simple cases, and then he leaves her to deal with the patient who has an MP3 player embedded inside him!

House Episode Trivia

Occam's razor (or Ockham's razor) is a principal that states that complexity should not be added without necessity; in other words, the simplest solution is usually the most effective. (attributed to English logician and friar William of Ockham, 14th c.)

"One is the Loneliest Number" by Three Dog Night is the song played during the closing scenes.

When house plays with the Gameboy, the game shown on the screen is "Metroid: Zero Mission," but the sound effects have been changed.

HOUSE Quotes

Dr. Chase: (about House) "He thinks outside the box. Is that so evil?"
Dr. Foreman: "He has no idea where the box is."

Dr. Cameron: "So, a woman can't express her interest in sex without it being some professional power play?"
House: "No. If you look the way you do and you say what you said, you have to be aware of the effect that it's going to have on men."

House: Occam's Razor. The simplest explanation is almost always that somebody screwed up.
(House is playing on a Gameboy)
Patient: What are you doing?
House: Level four.

House: Hello, sick people and their loved ones! In the interest of saving time and avoiding a lot of boring chitchat later, I'm Doctor Gregory House; you can call me "Greg." I'm one of three doctors staffing this clinic this morning.
Cuddy: Short, sweet, grab a file.
House: This ray of sunshine is Doctor Lisa Cuddy. Doctor Cuddy runs this whole hospital, so unfortunately she's much too busy to deal with you. I am a board ... certified diagnostician with a double specialty of infectious disease and nephrology. I am also the only doctor currently employed at this hospital who is forced to be here against his will. (to Cuddy) That is true, isn't it?
But not to worry, because for most of you, this job could be done by a monkey with a bottle of Motrin. Speaking of which, if you're particularly annoying, you may see me reach for this: this is Vicodin. It's mine! You can't have any! And no, I do not have a pain management problem, I have a pain problem ... but who knows? Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm too stoned to tell. So, who wants me?

Cameron: Sex could kill you. Do you know what the human body goes through when you have sex? Pupils dilate, arteries constrict, core temperature rises, heart races, blood pressure skyrockets, respiration becomes rapid and shallow, the brain fires bursts of electrical impulses from nowhere to nowhere, and secretions spit out of every gland, and the muscles tense and spasm like you're lifting three times your body weight. It's violent, it's ugly and it's messy, and if God hadn't made it unbelievably fun, the human race would have died out eons ago.

Boy in clinic: It's an MP3-player.
House: Mm. Is it ... is it because of the shape, or the size, or is it the pounding bass line?

HOUSE EPISODE PICTURES & VIDEOS

	Chase scans Brandon's chest
Brandon is placed in a clean room	House discovers that his theory about the cochicine in medicine that Brandon was taking was correct