A look into the lives of the staff of the County General Emergency Room in Chicago spotlighting staffers Dr. Mark Greene (who is considering private practice), Dr. Douglas Ross (a pediatrician with a taste for the opposite sex), Dr. Susan Lewis (a genial doctor), Dr. Peter Benton (a hard-nosed surgeon), Nurse Carol Hathaway (head of the nursing department) and John Carter (a medical student new to the ER).
Greene contemplates his decision to stay with the ER or make more money in a practice of his own. Ross tries to discern whether a mother is abusing her child. Lewis lends a delicate touch to a cancer patient. Benton takes on a very precise surgical task. Carter tries to make his way through a hectic first day. Hathway's personal life invades the ER when she attempts to take her own life.
Greene is caught being intimate with his wife in the ER bathroom. Carter experiences the joy of saving a patient's life. Food poisoning cases spill into the ER.
Hathaway returns to an encouraging ER staff after her attempt on her own life. A patient bothers Benton by singing show tunes. Lewis thinks she has to defend herself after a cardiac patient's treatment goes wrong.
Ross deals with a child whose mother hears voices and brings him to the ER because the boy doesn't hear them either. Lewis tries to convince a business man to change his lifestyle to increase his life expectancy. Benton's brother tries to get Benton to spend time with his mother which may interfere with his job.
Greene aids a patient with a bad heart in the hopes that he can hang on to see his family. Ross gives a poor girl the asthma medicine that her family can't afford. Lewis saves the life of a college student who took their partying too far. Carter receives interesting STD test results.
Greene has to balance his doctorly duties in the ER with watching over his daughter Rachel when his babysitter bails on him. Benton and Langworthy work on a young gunshot victim. Greene and Ross try to save a young girl who swallowed cocaine. A pizza delivery car drives into the ER. Chloe steals from Lewis. Hathaway punches Ross when he steps out of line.
Carter performs his first spinal tap. Ross and Hathaway kiss. Greene receives a brief visit from his wife when she is called back out of state. Chloe's drunken tirade casts a gloom on Lewis's surprise birthday party.
Ross heads up the ER as Greene spends time with his wife. Benton thinks he's second banana to Langworthy in the race for the Starze Fellowship. Carter crushes on Lewis.
A suicidal transvestite ends their life at the hospital. Upset, Carter vents at Benton, but is still invited into Benton's home for Thanksgiving. Ross vacations in Jamaica. Chloe announces her pregnancy.
The ennui created by a severe Chicago blizzard is interrupted when a huge car accident requires the need for additional help in the ER.
Ross decides that Hathaway's engagement party is the perfect platform for him to declare his love. A young child nearly dies from an ice fishing accident, a busload of children need treatment after a small accident and a boy eats a poisonous Poinsetta leaf.
Benton finally relents and lets Carter observe in the operating room. On the family side of his life, Benton has to come to arrangements for the care of his sick mother with his sister. Lewis questions Kayson's judgment and is then sued by a patient's family. Chloe says she's going to move to Texas.
Carter struts his stuff for a new medical student. Hathaway faces down a contentious student patient. Benton has to chase down his sick mother after she disappears.
Greene learns that a woman is being abused by her daughter. Benton hires Jeanie Boulet to watch over his mother. The stress of the malpractice suit cracks Kayson and Lewis has to tend to him when he has a heart attack. Ross tends to a young boy with cancer and a teen with HIV.
Benton gets an earful from Jeanie, Halah and Hathaway regarding his attitude. Morgenstern offers Greene an assignment which causes a rift between Greene and his wife. A dying patient requests euthanasia. A dangerous snake slithers around the ER.
While treating three girls who accidentally ingested LSD-laced Valentine's Day candy, Chen also unknowingly eats a piece. Kayson makes a move on Lewis. Grabarsky asks the doctors to help a dog he injured.
Work keeps Greene and Benton away from, respectively, their daughter and mother's birthdays. Carter mistakenly organizes a suprise birthday party for Benton. Ross takes on an abusive parent. Hathaway wants to adopt a young AIDS stricken girl left in the ER.
Trying to make up for lost work hours, Benton pushes himself, and Carter, when he works for two straight days. Jennifer tells Greene about her unhappiness with their marriage. Hathaway's attempt on her life disqualifies her from adoption.
Greene tries to save a pregnant woman and her child. A teen comes to the ER when she is accidentally poisoned.
Carter and Chen discover the oddness that overtakes the ER during a full moon. The dissolution of his marriage overtakes Greene and Lewis covers by taking charge of the ER.
Chloe comes back to town, very pregnant and with no place else to go. Ross and Diane continue to see each other. Benton's mother is placed in a nursing home for her safety.
Greene endangers his job and upsets his new superior Swift, when he opts to see Jennifer over working late. Ross is forced into seeing a psychologist over an incident with an abusive parent that got physical. Frustrated by the fact that he can do nothing to help his mother, Benton seeks to balance things by saving everyone he comes across in the ER.
Things get bumpy on the road to their wedding for Hathaway and Taglieri. Greene relocates to Milwaukee to be with his wife and try to patch things up between them, but where things don't go well there, he also brings about bad feelings from Swift. Carter's pursuit of a surgical internship position forces him to reveal his family's affluence. Benton feels a connection growing between him and Jeanie.
Lewis delivers Chloe's baby and wonders what she'll do when their mother refuses to help out. Carter finds himself caught when he's turned down for his surgical internship and has already denied his ER internship, hopeful that the former would come through. When things appear to get serious with Diane, Ross is spooked and seeks female companionship elsewhere. Benton's mother dies and he finds a friendly shoulder to cry on in Jeanie.
Greene is sued for the death of the pregnant woman that died under his care. Carter, thinking that he is not long for the ER, says bad things about Benton, only to find out that he will get the surgical internship and that Benton is a main reason why. Hathaway and Taglieri call off their wedding when they realize that she doesn't want it like he does.