Geiger second-guess Austin's choice of a non-surgical treatment for a heart patient. Grad gets a surprise visit from an old beau. Hancock asks for Camille's help in coordinating a new home health care program.

Aaron proceeds with Eric Dipretto's psychosurgery while Austin campaigns for the position of chief of surgery and Bix continues to lose control. Kronk is determined to perform a controversial intestinal bypass on Nyland's former boss and good friend, a restauranteur who just wants to enjoy a good meal again.

Grad and Kronk reluctantly team up to counsel an inexperienced couple on sexual techniques. Dr. Sutton finds himself unnerved by a sexually precocious young woman at Dr. Hancock's clinic. Aaron tries befriending a resident, but finds himself misinterpretted.

Kate loses her control and her compassion when her father is admitted with an operable surgical condition but refuses it on religious grounds. Geiger turns up again at the hospital, this time as part of a clown troop there to entertain the patients. Sutton delivers a baby with ambigous genitalia whose parents are equally ambigious about they feel about their offspring.

Austin's cystic-fibrosis patient is just one of four patients needing transplants who have to wait in fear and hope when a potential donor appears but is prematurely pronounces dead and entered into the donor system by the inexperienced Eggert.

Aaron and Phillip announce that they are buying the hospital from Wilmette, although their plans for keping the solvent do not please any of their colleagues. An HMO lawyer obsessed with ""patient responsibilty"" holds the reins on some lucrative coronary-bypass business. A patient with private insurance receives test after test for all of his petty complaints.

Word of Billy's and Diane's engagement receives a mixed reception at the hospital; Jack returns from vacation with a windfall and a feverish belief he's on a winning streak; Kate alienates some colleagues when a reporter follows her around the hospital; Jack takes on the delicate job of operating on an infant with an exposed spinal cord.