TV celebs see what hospital workers deal with daily

There was a time in the early 2000s when Bloom was hot property on the back of movies like The Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Caribbean.

But looking at his filmography for the last 10 years, there are a lot of films that were a long way short of setting the world on fire.

Maybe instead of making good movies he's devoted his time to extreme sports, for this is what the three-part series To The Edge is all about.

Each episode sees him tackle a new sport - skydiving with a wingsuit, free diving and rock climbing - with the training being as quick as possible.

On the one hand, the series does seem like a way for Bloom to try out all these activities for free, while also getting paid to make a TV series.

But on the other hand, as someone with a fear of heights, I found parts of the first episode (which involves the wingsuit - think of a human-sized sugar glider) mildly frightening.

While there are a few hairy moments for Bloom he comes out unscathed. Which isn't a plot spoiler; if he'd crashed to the ground while skydiving you would have heard about it on the news.

Even if he is a bit of a hasbeen as far as movie-making goes.

At first glance Samuel Johnson, Melissa Leong and Costa Georgiadis seemed an odd choice for a series that sees them working as volunteers at Sydney's St Vincent's Hospital.

A TV actor, a food critic and a gardening show host didn't seem the right fit for a show designed to show the reality of working in a hospital.

Surely a journalist with direct knowledge of the health sector may have been a better option; they would be able to bring out some information that wasn't immediately apparent.

But then all was explained in this first episode. They have all had some connection with hospitals - Johnson both when he was hit by a car and, earlier, when being treated for drug and alcohol issues.

Leong's mother spent decades working as a nurse in an emergency ward, while Georgiadis had been looking after his ageing father until moving him into St Vincent's palliative care section.

So broadly speaking they have enough familiarity with the hospital system but not so much that they already know everything going in.

In the first episode Leong experiences the intensity of the emergency room, Johnson sees what has changed in drug and alcohol counselling while Georgiadis discovers the hospital's homeless outreach programs.

St Vincent's is a public hospital and so one would assume they needed to get government permission to film there.

While that does raise the spectre of government interference in the story there is enough focus on the problems with our health system to suggest that The Hospital: In The Deep End isn't a puff piece.

For those of us whose hospital experience is limited to being patients, this series offers a real look at the other side of the equation - that of the nurses and doctors working in hospitals.