‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Season 18 Episode 14: Grey Sloan in Trouble (RECAP)
Pick Us, Choose Us, Love Us!
For exclusive news and updates, subscribe to our Grey's Anatomy Newsletter:
It’s not just patients getting assessed in Grey’s Anatomy Season 18, Episode 14, March 31’s “Road Trippin.’” The hospital itself is also under scrutiny, as we learn when a rep from the medical accreditation council shows up, asking questions…
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Grey’s Anatomy Season 18, Episode 14, “Road Trippin.’”]
But more on that later! The main storyline this week is that of “Fierce Fernanda,” a 13-year-old whose congenital aortic valve disease has developed into aortic stenosis. Fernanda’s medical journey so far has made her a social-media star, and so countless fans are watching on as she and her family road-trip across from Boston to Seattle for her surgery. (She can’t fly, due to her condition.) That operation is a Ross Procedure, wherein Maggie (Kelly McCreary) and Winston (Anthony Hill) will take Fernanda’s pulmonary valve and fashion it into a new aortic valve for her.
Lilane Lathan/ABC
But when Fernanda’s RV pulls up to the ambulance bay, she’s dizzy and weak, and she passes out just as Maggie and Winston arrive. In fact, Fernanda’s whole family has been running ragged: Fernanda’s father has back injuries from all the driving, her mother hasn’t been sleeping, and her brother is suffering panic attacks. Winston soon realizes that saving Fernanda would save the whole family.
The family took a couple of days to do be tourists on their way to Seattle, and even though the sightseeing buoyed their spirits, it means that Fernanda’s heart is no longer suitable for the Ross Procedure. Winston blames the family for dilly-dallying, calling them “selfish” for not booking it to the hospital.
Lilane Lathan/ABC
But Winston is also not impartial at the moment. His brother, Wendell (Rome Flynn), has just arrived at the hospital, surprising him and Maggie. (This is Maggie’s first time meeting Wendell, since he was a no-show at her and Winston’s wedding.) But it’s not just a social call: Wendell has a new job as a medical sales representative, which he landed after name-dropping Winston, much to the latter’s dismay. Now Wendell is at the hospital to pitch a drone-delivered defibrillator device.
And as Winston and Maggie run tests on Fernanda, Winston tells Maggie why he and Wendell aren’t on the best of terms. When Winston’s late mom had cancer, both Wendell and their father acted out. Wendell got into fights, while the father drank and wasted the family’s money. And the mom spent money and energy that she could have devoted to her own recovery to get both Wendell and the father out of trouble. All the while, the family drama distracted Winston from his medical education. “Now I have this amazing thing here, and I think I got scared that Wendell’s somehow just gonna do it all over again,” he tells Maggie.
Liliane Lathan/ABC
Given the deterioration of Fernanda’s heart, Maggie and Winston opt for a variation on the Ross Procedure called the Ross-Konno Procedure, which involves splitting the heart in two. It’s a riskier option, for sure, but the married surgeons rock the surgery, and by the end, it seems like the outlook is bright for Fernanda and her family.
After the operation, Winston meets up with Wendell and confesses that he still blames him for their mother’s death. But he’s committed to improving their relationship and not letting past trouble ruin the future of the Nudge family. “She would be so angry if she knew that we let it take us away from each other,” Winston says.
In other news, Jo (Camilla Luddington) scrubs in with Teddy (Kim Raver) on Laura’s (Tessa Slovis) transcatheter mitral valve repair, which we saw rescheduled in last week’s episode. That means that Jo gets more face time with Todd (Skylar Astin), Laura’s brother, who’s totally crushing on her. And she seems to be reciprocating his feelings. She even assumes that the fruit arrangement that he got Laura is for her.
By the end of the episode, though — after Jo and Teddy successfully operate on Laura — Todd bring roses and study snacks, and this time the gifts are actually meant for Jo. (Why study snacks? Jo is cramming for her OB-GYN exam.)
Oh, and Teddy finds out about Jo and Todd’s flirtation, but she’s hardly one to judge. “I married a patient once,” she confides. (That would Henry Burton, played by Scott Foley, for any of you who didn’t watch Season 7.)
Meredith (Ellen Pompeo), meanwhile, spends the episode at home with Zola (Aniela Gumbs). They’re both sick with a cough, but they’re enjoying quality mother-daughter time. Zola does, however, notice that Mer’s been ignoring calls from David and Nick. Mer tells Zola that David offered her a job and asks Zola how she’d feel about moving to Minnesota. Zola asks if Mer would save lives in the new job — and whether Mer would get to see Nick more. She just wants her mom to be happy, she says. Mer tells her that Zola and her siblings make her happy. But Zola says, “We would follow you anywhere.”
Lilane Lathan/ABC
OK, so why is Grey Sloan in trouble? Owen (Kevin McKidd) finds out after he becomes Chief of Surgery for the day. Bailey (Chandra Wilson) gives him the temporary job so that she can scrub in on surgeries, now that Mer is out sick and Richard (James Pickens Jr.) is feeling scalpel-shy. (If you’ll recall from last week, he wants a full assessment of his surgical abilities before he returns to the OR.)
So it’s Owen that the rep from the medical accreditation council gives a talking-to. She reports that the council has received 15 complaints about Grey Sloan’s residency program, including gripes about 80-plus-hour work week.
At the end of the day, Bailey’s feeling rejuvenated, having scrubbed in on more surgeries in one day than she’s had since her days as a resident. But her good feelings don’t last long. When she checks in with Owen, he tells her that the council wants to shut the residency program down.
Grey’s Anatomy, Thursdays, 9/8c, ABC
Watchlist Easy access to only the shows you care about — all in one simple place
Alerts Only important notifications — when a show is returning, when it becomes available to stream, and more.
Special Offers Exclusive products we release related to your favorite shows and streaming services