| “ | Photons and force fields, flesh and blood, why quibble over details? I'm just as real as any of you. | „ |
| ~ The Doctor |
| “ | Please state the nature of the medical emergency. | „ |
| ~ The Doctor's activation greeting. |
The EMH programme A K one diagnostic and surgical subroutine omega three two three, better known as the Emergency Medical Hologram, or simply the Doctor, was a Mark I Emergency Medical Holographic program featured on Star Trek: Voyager.
He was portrayed by Robert Picardo, who also played the Mark I EMH that had been installed on the Enterprise for several years.
The Doctor was created by Doctor Lewis Zimmerman, an expert in holographic programming. He was installed on USS Voyager during her construction. The Doctor was activated for the first time during an inspection of the USS Voyager by its new Captain while in spacedock over Utopia Planitia then again after the Voyager was pulled into the Delta Quadrant.
At first the Doctor was little more than a short term computer program meant to take over if the regular medical personnel were incapacitated or unavailable. The Doctor was forced to become the chief medical officer on the ship after all the regular medical personnel were killed when the ship was pulled in to the Delta Quadrant.
Because his inventor Louis Zimmerman had used his own personality as a template to program the Doctor, all of the personality flaws that Zimmerman had wound up getting programmed into the Doctor's personality matrix. The Doctor was rude and arrogant at first, resulting in a number of complaints from the crew. Captain Kathryn Janeway considered having the Doctor reprogrammed, but Kes made her realize that the reason the Doctor was so rude was because none of his needs were being met. As a first step she arranged for the Doctor to be able to deactivate himself when he wanted, and prevent others from deactivating him if it wasn't convenient. This marked a first step in the evolution of the Doctor into a person.
The Doctor evolved considerably during Voyager's return trip to the Alpha Quadrant, becoming a sentient being in his own right. His Voyager crewmates stopped seeing him as a tool and started seeing him as a friend and full member of the crew. They encouraged his growth and development into a full fledged individual.
Upon his return to the Alpha Quadrant, the Doctor continued to fight for equality for artificial life forms. Starfleet had him engage in several research projects, and eventually commissioned the Doctor as a Lieutenant Commander in 2395. A backup copy of the Doctor survived into the third millennium.
Skills/Powers[]
The Doctor is one of the most sophisticated medical programs ever created with his body being made of Photons and Force Fields thus granting him Intangibility or almost infinite durability by altering the fields that allow his body to physically interact with his environment. He is immune to radiation, chemicals, viruses, bacteria and can survive in almost any habitat even in space as long as he is within the proximity of a Holo Emitter or wearing his Mobile Emitter. He is immune to physical or projectile weapons although energy weapons may disrupt his holographic matrix if properly tuned.
The Doctor is able to used Medical equipment with skill as his hands don't jitter and due to having no biological body his visual scanners can be altered in multiple ways to detect imperfections in material, using infrared vision or locating items out of phase or cloaked.
The Doctor holds the entire Starfleet Medical Database, over five million medical protocols, the collective medical knowledge of over three thousand cultures (including every Federation world), and further possessed information from two thousand medical reference sources, and the experience of 47 individual medical officers.
The Doctor had an integrated Universal Translator allowing him to understand and speak the language of almost any sentient species and can act as a Counsellor if none is available. The Doctor has many safeguard to prevent his program from being deactivated or altered without his consent, although those with sufficient technical expertise can change or delete his memory files, disable his ethical subroutines or delete him.
During an emergency the captain can activate the ECH, this Emergency Command Hologram is an extension of the EMH used in rare occasions such as if the entire crew is incapacitated. Designed to be a 'backup captain' which possessed information from all major Starfleet strategic and tactical databases. The ECH could incorporate the data into its plans for controlling the ship. It also had basic engineering skills in order to assess damage when necessary. The ECH could interact with the computer or use any console manually if desired as the captain would.
During a Combat Situation the ECH could also be a highly effective combatant as seen in the later Training Hologram based on Captain Janeway, this hologram could disappear and reappear anywhere with active holo emitters allowing them to dodge attacks and quickly reach an advantages position as well as being invulnerable to physical and energy damage, The ECH has no need for food and essentially infinite stamina as well as knowlage of various species biology granting them the expertise to quickly dispach targets, it would also be a skilled marksman due to having steady hands and be able to critically injure enemies if the safety protocalls are disabled.
As seen with the USS Equinox EMH and an accidental alternate personality if the Doctors ethical subroutines were disabled he could become a sadistic torturer and interrogator, having access to biological knowledge allowing him to detect if people are lying and the best harmful ways to convince them of telling the truth.
Quotes[]
| “ | Doesn't anyone know how to turn off the program when they leave?!? | „ |
| ~ The Doctor, getting annoyed that people forget to turn off his program. |
| “ | It seems I've found myself on the Voyage of the Damned. | „ |
| ~ The Doctor, on learning that the captain is "missing" when attempting to contact her. |
| “ | 'Who would have thought that this eclectic group of voyagers could actually become a family? Starfleet, Maquis, Klingon, Talaxian, Hologram, Borg, even Mr. Paris...' | „ |
| “ | Sticks and stones won't break my bones, so you can imagine how I feel about being called names. | „ |
| “ | Interesting sensation blowing one's nose; it's my first time. | „ |
Videos[]
Trivia[]
- "Deadlock" is the only episode where the Doctor's sleeves of his Voyager-style uniform are rolled up (similar to Miles O'Brien's in the first five seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as well as William Riker's in Star Trek Generations).
- He is the only member of the Voyager crew to be a hologram as Voyager's real doctor is killed after the ship is whisked away 70 thousand light years into the Delta Quadrant.
