This is How We Do It

"Renegades. Rule breakers. Gangsters with scalpels. This is the way we like to think of ourselves. It makes us feel badass, sexy. Problem is, it's not exactly true. At heart, we're rule followers, sheep. We don't break protocol. We follow it to a T. Because if we don't follow protocol, our patients die. And then we're no longer badass. We're just bad. It's every doctor's dilemma. Do you play it safe and follow protocol or take a risk and invent a new one? There can be reward in risk. There can also be fallout. Still, you need to buck the system every once in a while. Bet big. And when you get the results you want, there's no better feeling in the world. But when you don't?"

- Meredith Grey

 is the seventeenth episode of the seventh season and the 143rd overall episode of Grey's Anatomy.

Short Summary
Richard is desperate for Derek and Meredith to accept Adele into their Alzheimer's trial, but will Adele stand in her own way? Meanwhile Mark and Arizona have conflicting ideas of the kind of baby shower Callie wants, Teddy is freaked out when Henry has another health complication -- leaving them both a little exposed -- and the competitiveness amongst the residents for the Chief Resident position is amplified when Richard receives the green light for his diabetes clinical trial.

Full Summary
Lexie and Avery are getting hot and heavy in the laundry room when April walks in and asks if there's anywhere they don't do it.

In the hospital parking lot, Alex's trailer is in Bailey's parking spot. He's trying to make sure he's in surgeries first while in the running for chief resident. Inside, Derek is examining Adele. She's been showing signs of early onset Alzheimer's. She's certain she doesn't have it, but the chief wants Derek to put Adele into his clinical trial.

Callie's ultrasound looks good, but her blood pressure is borderline high. She's excited about her baby shower in the doctor's lounge that afternoon. Mark wants to the know the sex of the baby, but they've already voted and he lost 2-1.

The residents are waiting for the chief to come out of the restroom to be the first to ask if they can get on his trial. Cristina instead asks Hunt to put in a good word, but he says he's staying out of it.

Derek's clinical trial patient, Sonia, asks him to try to shave as little off her head as possible. Her son is in from London. Meredith starts asking some of the preliminary questions and her asks where she was last Thanksgiving and she says she was in London visiting her son and his partner, but her son says that was three years earlier, before he and his partner broke up. She says her son should call his ex.

Avery is helping Bailey with a diabetic patient who had a tumor removed, but her husband doesn't want to hear "from the kid" and asks Bailey to talk. She starts to explain the situation, but Nurse Eli has the encouraging words that calm him down.

Alex goes to talk to Stark, but Stark still doesn't like him. April bounds in and is assigned to some of his cases, then they confirm their dinner date that night. Alex mocks her, but she says they're not dating, just "hanging out, as friends."

Teddy walks into an ER room to see Cristina working on Henry, whose heart has stopped. He had chest pain and went for a jog. He has scrapes on his shoulder. Teddy is upset with him.

Bailey asks the chief if her diabetic patient could be included in his trial. Avery presses the chief to try to get a waiver on the trial for the patient, and he agrees.

Sloan is prepping for the baby shower and he and Arizona quickly butt heads about the activities that are planned. Callie is excited about Mark's ideas.

Meredith talks to Sonia's son because she's worried he might want to move back to London to reunite with his ex. The trial requires that the caretaker live in the state of Washington. He says that his mother stayed by his side when he came out of the closet and being with her now is the least he can do.

Bailey explained to her patient how the chief's procedure works. She and her husband seem relieved, but Nurse Eli chimes in asking about the risks and why the FDA hasn't already approved the procedure. Bailey explains them and says it's the best option. She then pulls Eli aside as they leave the room. Eli says he was asking a question the patient may not have thought to ask, but Bailey thinks he made it look like she was hiding something. Bailey tells him to follow the hospital's "doctor-nurse protocol," and he says, "Not if it hurts the patient."

April tells Stark she can't make dinner and he invites her to his place to watch a movie instead. She says she's not sure when she'll be done so Stark asks Alex to help her with his cases.

Cristina explains to Teddy and the chief what Henry's situation is and the chief wonders if Teddy is OK to stay on it. She goes to work on Henry, who seems to have a theory about why Teddy's dates go do badly and he says it's because she's his wife and he's her husband. He tells her he can look into her eyes his whole life. He's heavily medicated, but Teddy seems moved.

The chief hears it all and is concerned, but Teddy tells him she doesn't feel that way even if Henry does. The scans show a mass near his heart and Teddy wants to take it out right away. The chief isn't sure she should operate on Henry and Cristina volunteers. The chief agrees and asks Teddy to supervise.

Arizona and Sloan stand to the side as Callie enjoys her baby shower. Arizona hates baby showers, but plays along because Callie wants her to. Sloan finds Lexie and she says she's happy for him and that she's seeing someone. He says that's good and asks whether he knows the guy. Lexie leaves. Alex, meanwhile, is pocketing food when Fields walks up asks about what he's doing. He says he doesn't have time to shop for his own food. Cristina, Meredith and Alex jointly tease April about her relationship with Stark, and she finally says, a little too loudly, "I am not taking my pants off for Stark!" FInally, Avery pulls Lexie aside to "do a consult" and April shouts that they're not fooling anyone. Sloan sees this.

The chief asks Derek to check with his FDA contact to work the system for his diabetic patient, Clara. Derek then has to tell the chief he can't put Adele into his Alzheimer's trial and that doing so could compromise the whole thing and get them blacklisted by the FDA. Clara has slipped into a hypoglycemic coma. The chief tells Clara's husband for his consent to try the procedure.

Teddy explains to Henry that Cristina has to do the surgery because they're technically married. He tells Teddy he's "a little flattered." After she leaves, he asks Cristina if Teddy is into him.

Fields asks Meredith if she's really friends with Alex and what she's missing. Meredith says she's missing a lot, and gives the rundown of Alex's last couple of seasons (the crazy girlfriend, the wife who left him and being shot). "He's been through a lot," she says.

Bailey asks the chief if he's trying to prove a point to Derek by going forward with the procedure.

Sonia is planning to leave so her son can return to London and be with his ex. When her son tries to tell the doctors she's not lucid, she recites a bunch of facts about herself and tells her son she knows that he only broke up with his ex, Gavin, one week earlier so that he could move to Washington to be with her. She says that made her proud and tells him to go be with Gavin.

Cristina fumbles a bit in Henry's surgery and Teddy panics. Cristina tells her to "shut up, and stop acting like a scared wife." Cristina fixes it and she and Teddy apologize to each other.

The chief tells Derek he just did a trial surgery without FDA approval and he doesn't care if they take his license because he saved a life. Derek tells him someone just dropped out of his trial.

The chief talks to Adele about joining the trial. She's upset. She doesn't want to let Derek drill into her brain for no reason. He tells her she has Alzheimer's and there's no time to wait to treat it. She agrees to take the test, but says she's going to pass and he'll see she's fine and healthy.

Arizona is searching for the gift list after the baby shower. Callie walks in and asks Sloan to leave them alone. Callie gives Arizona a gift -- a brochure to a B&B and she wants to take Arizona for the weekend to make up for how annoying she's being.

Meredith begins asking Adele the standard questions.

April tells Stark about how she and Alex finished up his cases. She refers to him as Robert, then apologizes for being too familiar at work. She gets flustered and says she can't make it to his house that night because she's overworked. She tells him she just thought of him as a friend. He says he doesn't just want to be friends.

Derek tells Adele she can't be in the trial because she had to score a 26 or lower on her test to qualify. She scored a 27. Adele is thrilled, but the chief is not happy because he knows she has Alzheimer's and it just hasn't progressed enough for her to qualify. Meredith then recites the questions Adele answered wrong in the test. Adele gets upset and says it's normal to forget things at her age.

She starts to cry and tells the chief they're finally happy and it's not fair that she has to face this now. She cries and tells him she's "still me" and she's not "damaged goods." She cries in his arms and tells him she's "so scared."

Bailey comes in with good news for the chief about Clara. He's glad, having just heard from the FDA about receiving a waiver.

Bailey tells the chief it's time to pick a chief resident, but suggests he delegate the choice to someone else -- not her.

Teddy tells Henry his surgery went well and he tells her what he said wasn't just the painkillers. He says he meant "all of it, if not more." She mocks him, saying it's a great story that they got married to save his life and they would fall in love. She says it doesn't hurt that he's smart, funny and good looking, and she has thought about it, but "it's not real -- it's just a good story." He asks her what's wrong with a good story. She says she's sorry and leaves.

Derek tells Meredith he hasn't called the next person on the trial's waiting list. He's still torn about Adele because she was only out by one point. Meredith reminds him that one point could ruin the entire trial. Derek picks up the phone.

Eli and Bailey chat in the parking lot. He tells her that outside the hospital he is "the man," and is going to take her to his bed to show her how much of a man he is. He tells her to be at his place in 15 minutes.

Fields visits Alex at his trailer in the parking lot. She teases him about waiting for him in his trailer, then kisses him after saying he was forcing her to make the first move.

April walks into her living room to see Lexie and Avery making out on the couch. She sits down with them and turns on the TV, suggesting they go into a room that locks. They leave and April watches "From Here to Eternity," the movie Stark wanted to watch with her at his house.

Hunt gets home and tells Cristina that the chief just asked him to pick the chief resident. She first thinks it's great news, but then realizes it's terrible news because he can't pick her because of what everyone will say.

Arizona and Callie are driving to their B&B when Callie gets a text from Sloan who has just figured out that Lexie is hooking up with Avery. Arizona tosses Callie's phone into the back seat. Callie undoes her seat belt to get the phone back and tells Arizona she's acting jealous of Sloan and that she needs to get over it. They continue to argue and Callie says she's doing her best to make sure everyone is happy. She asks Arizona what she can do to make her happy. Arizona asks Callie to marry her.

They're staring at each other as Arizona continues to drive. Suddenly, Callie looks ahead and we see her eyes widen. The screen goes white as we hear a crash.

Main Cast

 * Ellen Pompeo as Dr. Meredith Grey
 * Sandra Oh as Dr. Cristina Yang
 * Justin Chambers as Dr. Alex Karev
 * Chandra Wilson as Dr. Miranda Bailey
 * James Pickens, Jr. as Dr. Richard Webber
 * Sara Ramírez as Dr. Callie Torres
 * Eric Dane as Dr. Mark Sloan
 * Chyler Leigh as Dr. Lexie Grey
 * Kevin McKidd as Dr. Owen Hunt
 * Jessica Capshaw as Dr. Arizona Robbins
 * Kim Raver as Dr. Teddy Altman
 * Sarah Drew as Dr. April Kepner
 * Jesse Williams as Dr. Jackson Avery
 * Patrick Dempsey as Dr. Derek Shepherd

Guest Stars

 * Loretta Devine as Adele Webber
 * Peter MacNicol as Dr. Robert Stark
 * Rachael Taylor as Dr. Lucy Fields
 * Daniel Sunjata as Nurse Eli
 * Rick Peters as Sean Greene
 * Pej Vahdat as Tarik Amin
 * Marina Sirtis as Sonya Amin
 * Scott Foley as Henry Burton

Co-Starring

 * Payton Silver as Dr. Knox
 * Colleen McDermott as Clara
 * Denice Sealy as E.R. Nurse
 * Gordon James as Desk Nurse

Notes and Trivia
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 * This episode's title originated from the song This Is How We Do It, originally sung by Montell Jordan.
 * This episode scored 10.28 million viewers.

Quotes

 * Bailey: Stalking a man while he's in the restroom.
 * Jackson: I'd clean the restroom if he'd let me on his trial.
 * Cristina: I'd live in it.


 * Mark: How's the size?