Anaesthesia: Netflix Debuts Its First Polish Medical Drama
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The Polish series arrives this Wednesday with eight episodes and Leszek Lichota as a neurosurgeon who trades a prestigious clinic for a small-town hospital.
Netflix released “Anaesthesia” (Znieczulenie) this Wednesday (4), its first Polish medical drama. All eight episodes of the first season arrived at once, with the original Polish audio and dubs in English, German, Spanish and French. At the center of the story is Dawid Łazarz, a brilliant and thoroughly immodest neurosurgeon who loses his post at an elite clinic after a bold but unsuccessful operation and accepts a job at a provincial hospital. Leszek Lichota, seen in the film “Forgotten Love” (2023) and the series “The Border”, plays the lead. Łukasz Ostalski directed every episode, and the writing team includes Dana Łukasińska, Bartosz Janiszewski, Marcin Ciastoń and Beata Halastra. In Spanish, the show is titled “Anestesia”.
A closed season, eight episodes and an opening triage
“Anaesthesia” does not go for a weekly rollout. Netflix released every chapter on premiere day, a Wednesday, with running times between 45 and 53 minutes. The rating is TV-MA, and the production mixes surgical scenes, emergency-room cases and debates over medical ethics.
The first episode wastes no time on introductions. The loss of a young patient puts Dawid's career at risk, and a large-scale accident pulls him back into high-stakes medicine. The opening sequence follows the triage of the injured — the quick sorting of those who need immediate care from those who can wait a few minutes. From that chaos onward, the series establishes its territory: the hospital corridor, the operating room and decisions made under pressure.
“After a bold but unsuccessful surgery, a talented doctor swaps a prestigious clinic for a local hospital as he tries to get his life back on track.”
From neurosurgery star to small-town “exile”
Dawid Łazarz is introduced as one of the country's finest neurosurgeons — and someone who knows it. He works at a major center, where he takes on procedures other doctors avoid. When one of those operations goes wrong, he is forced to leave his original hospital and take a position at the Suwałki Specialist Hospital in northeastern Poland. He sees the move as a punishment.
At his new address, he finds a tight-knit community and a medical staff that has operated for years under its own rules, many of them unwritten. Łazarz's willingness to bend protocols in the name of saving lives earns admiration from part of the team and suspicion from another. The self-confidence that makes him an exceptional surgeon also puts him on a collision course with the administration, with medical ethics and with prosecutors. His professional troubles quickly spill into his family life.
The series sums up that conflict in a tagline used in the campaign:
“Sometimes you have to break the rules to beat death.”
The script's strength, at least in the way the characters are drawn, is that it does not turn the protagonist into an infallible hero. Łazarz is right, wrong and forced to deal with the legal and emotional consequences of what he does. His wife, Basia, and the psychiatrist Jagoda play central roles in that balance: one demands his presence at home, the other questions the shortcuts he takes at work.
Lichota leads a cast of familiar Polish TV names
Leszek Lichota is one of the most popular faces in recent Polish film and television. After playing Professor Rafał Wilczur in the remake of “Forgotten Love” and border guard Wiktor Rebrow in “The Border”, he returns to the hospital world in a role that demands both authority and vulnerability. Netflix presented his casting as the production's main asset.
Beside him, Karolina Gruszka plays Basia Łazarz, while Aleksandra Popławska brings psychiatrist Jagoda to life — she and Lichota had already worked together on “The Border”. Masza Wągrocka, known for “The Mothers of Penguins”, appears as a paramedic. Dorota Kolak and Krzysztof Stelmaszyk form a pair of veteran doctors, and Mariusz Bonaszewski plays a department head who is not fond of competition.
The cast is rounded out by Filip Kowalewicz, Gamou Fall, Hugo Tarres, Zbigniew Suszyński, Arkadiusz Brykalski, Marcin Czarnik, Karol Biskup, Magdalena Koleśnik, Joanna Balasz, Vasyl Vasylyk and Joanna Gonschorek. The mix of ages and accents helps build the routine of a provincial hospital, far from the glamour of major institutions.
Neal Baer and the machinery of medical realism
To lend credibility to the hospital setting, the production hired medical consultants and worked with Neal Baer, a trained physician who began his career as a writer on “ER” (1994-2009) and later served as executive producer of “Law & Order: SVU”. He helped shape the storylines and prepare the cast, according to Netflix.
Baer's presence does not turn “Anaesthesia” into a medical lecture. What the consultant contributes is the dramatic logic of the emergency: hospital hierarchy, the timing of each procedure, technical vocabulary and the weight of decisions that cannot be postponed. The series was written by Dana Łukasińska, Bartosz Janiszewski, Marcin Ciastoń and Beata Halastra, professionals with credits in Polish crime and medical dramas, and directed entirely by Łukasz Ostalski.
The result aims for a middle ground between medical thriller and family drama. There are no monsters or international conspiracies: the adversary is the health system, bureaucracy and the protagonist's own ego. That choice brings the show close to references such as “The Pitt” and “ER”, but also to the hospital serials that have dominated Polish free-to-air television for decades.
Where “Anaesthesia” fits in Poland's hospital-TV tradition
Poland has a long relationship with hospital dramas. In the 1980s, the Czechoslovak series “Hospital at the End of the City” became a ratings phenomenon in the country. In 1999, TVP2 launched “Na dobre i na złe” (“For Better and for Worse”), set in the fictional Leśna Góra hospital and still on the air today — one of the longest-running programs in Polish television. Since 2014, the same broadcaster has aired “Na sygnale” (“On the Signal”), about emergency medical crews.
More recently, the genre gained reinforcements with “SOR”, a TVP production made with Prime Video and set in an emergency department. “Anaesthesia” arrives a few weeks after its competitor and fills a curious gap: although Netflix had already produced crime stories, historical dramas and comedies in Poland, it had never made a local medical drama. The platform is now betting on a genre with a loyal audience, popular appeal and little risk of saturation.
The timing also helps explain the strategy. Netflix has been expanding its Polish production slate and turning the country into a shooting hub for titles that travel well beyond Central Europe. “Anaesthesia” follows the same path: a local cast, a universal premise and international distribution on premiere day.
What to expect from the eight episodes — and where to watch
The first season was structured as a self-contained story, but with enough hooks for a possible second batch. The eight chapters follow Dawid's adjustment to the Suwałki hospital, his rivalry with colleague Kacper, the strain at home and the legal fallout from his choices.
| Episode | Running time | Main thread |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 53 min | The loss of a young patient puts Dawid's career at risk; a mass-casualty accident pulls him back into high-stakes medicine. |
| 2 | 48 min | The neurosurgeon starts at the Suwałki Specialist Hospital and makes fast friends — but not everyone appreciates his methods. |
| 3 | 50 min | Kept out of the operating room, Dawid clashes with Kacper and warns that their rivalry is hurting patients. |
| 4 | 48 min | After his arrest, he faces a media storm and follows Jagoda's unorthodox advice; Oleg cracks a difficult case. |
| 5 | 45 min | His dedication to work fractures his family life; Jagoda gets good news about her brother that does not last. |
| 6 | 46 min | A high-profile patient puts the hospital on edge; Basia tells Dawid the truth; Leszek hides his worsening eyesight. |
| 7 | 48 min | Kacper puts his fate in Dawid's hands; Jagoda tries to save her department; Oleg is caught and reveals his past. |
| 8 | 52 min | Jagoda's decisions bring consequences; at a hearing, Dawid goes off script and has a change of heart. |
Because the series premiered this Wednesday, there is no critical consensus on the season yet. What can be said is that “Anaesthesia” arrives with a clear proposition: use the medical procedure as an engine of conflict and ask how far a professional can go when the rule gets in the patient's way. For viewers outside Poland, the show also works as an introduction to a less familiar cast — and to a school of hospital drama that Polish television has practiced for more than two decades.
All eight episodes of “Anaesthesia” are available on the show's official Netflix page. The production was first reported by the Polish outlet Serialomaniak, and cast and behind-the-scenes details were confirmed in Polish press reports. Readers following the streaming slate may want to compare it with The Lincoln Lawyer, another title the platform recently renewed. More news on TV and series and pop culture is available on the site.
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