Chicago Med season 5, episode 11 recap: The Ground Shifts Beneath Us

The twist with Dr. Abrams

While April treated the young mother, another victim was identified. The EMT pulled his identification tag, and the name read “Dr. Abrams.” The staff insisted that it couldn’t possibly be the same Dr. Sam Abrams (Brennan Brown) that they knew. Maggie got to the bottom of it, and asked Dr. Daniel Charles (Oliver Platt) where Sam’s flight was coming from. He told her that Sam was on a flight back from Honolulu, after he attended a medical conference.

With as much certainty as they could, they proceeded to perform life-saving measures on Dr. Abrams. His young wife Michelle was by his side, of course, and Ethan mistook her for his daughter, Lucy. Talk about getting off on the wrong foot.

While Sam was not brain dead, he would be dependent on others for the rest of his life. Dr. Marcel and Dr. Choi were optimistic that he would wake up once the swelling in his brain went down. But, Michelle decided that she wanted Sam taken off life support. Ethan was hesitant, but she insisted, as he would not want to live that way. Ethan thought that Sam’s daughter Lucy should be the one to make the call.

Ethan investigated Michelle, who stood to gain millions in life insurance if Sam were to die. She was the one who rushed into marriage, and Ethan wasn’t comfortable not giving Lucy a chance to speak for her father. Dr. Marcel said that they should rule in favor of Michelle.

Ethan took it to the ethics committee, who also ruled in Michelle’s favor. When he took a minute outside, who walked up but Dr. Abrams. Yes, that’s right. Dr. Abrams was alive and well. If that was true, then who was in their ER with Michelle ready to pull the plug?

Ethan didn’t know, but that didn’t stop him from bagging the patient, and he saving that man’s life – whoever he was. As we later found out, the man was a medical sales rep. Ethan still wouldn’t let his thoughts on Michelle go, though, and he decided to tell Sam the truth about his new bride.

Sam repeated what Michelle had told Ethan: he wouldn’t have wanted his daughter to see him like that. Oh, and Michelle wasn’t in it for the money. She was the rich one, as she invented a best-selling protein shake formula. Guess Ethan stepped in that one.

Towards the end of the episode, Ethan apologized to Dr. Marcel, and the two called a truce. The two shared another look before he walked away. He left April and Ethan together, and April told him she wanted to give IVF a shot. “The chance that it could…seems like it’s worth the risk.”