LIKE a lot of viewers, I have absorbed enough information from watching medical dramas down the years to be fairly useful in an emergency. Not saying I could perform a triple heart bypass, but in the aftermath of a nuclear strike a shift in A&E without killing a double digit number of people might be possible. The offer is there.

So it was that I was able to put my finger on what ailed the drama Trust Me (BBC1, Tuesday, 9pm). The tale of a Glasgow hospital in which patients were dropping like flies was a textbook case of chronic hamminess.

John Hannah had a blast as the creepy consultant who dismissed all claims that there was a “killer on the loose” with a sly smirk and a bad joke. Most of the claims came from Corporal Jamie McCain (Alfred Enoch) who had the bad luck to rock up at the fictional North Glasgow Infirmary after taking a bullet in the back in Iraq.

Refusing to be felled by such a serious injury, Jamie turned Scooby Doo-style detective to solve the mystery of the ward’s unnaturally high death rate. Was it the work of the head honcho, the screwy junior doctor, the moody nurse, or Ashley Jensen, the physio with all the sensitivity of a brick (joking to Jamie, in a wheelchair, “You can run but you can’t hide!”) There were so many holes in the plot you could have caught fish in it. No twist was too far-fetched. As one character summed up helpfully in the final episode, “You do know absolutely none of this makes sense?” Way ahead of you, mate.

What's the prognosis?

The odd moment when it flirted with serious issues such as PTSD and war crimes apart, the second Trust Me’s dedication to being the most bonkers medical drama since the first Trust Me was total. One has to believe the high camp, so-bad-it’s-good, approach was intentional because the alternative doesn’t bear thinking about.

Roll on Trust Me 3, in which the local health board cuts costs by replacing nurses with Shetland ponies.

A more realistic portrayal of the NHS was to be found in 24 Hours in A&E (Channel 4, Tuesday, 9pm). Back for an 18th series, the routinely brilliant fly on the wall documentary shows no signs of flagging. The 24 hours covered in the first episode took place on the day of Harry and Meghan’s wedding. That gave the producer a hook – relationships – but in truth every episode in 24 Hours is about the bond between humans. We met Lynda, whose partner, 74, had fallen off a ladder while cleaning windows. Minnie, 98 (“Is it 98 or 89?”) came in with a clot in her leg, while John, 92, married to Maggie for 66 years, had taken a tumble off a stairlift.

24 Hours has its routine down to a T, from the interviews that get the best out of people to the choice of incidental music. It is rather naughty in that it makes you wait till the end to find out people’s fates, but I’ll forgive it pretty much anything for the way it shows the NHS at its best.

The Singer Story: Made in Clydebank (BBC1, Wednesday, 9pm) featured more people with proper jobs. Honestly, when is someone going to make a documentary about TV critics and the perils we face every day?

In this case, with the Singer factory having shut up shop in 1980, we heard from former workers who made the globally famous sewing machines, plus historians and current Singer owners. At the height of the brand’s fame, one in five homes in the world had a Singer.

This was a fascinating film, economic history brought to life. Like 24 Hours, it was fundamentally about relationships, the friendships and marriages made, the camaraderie of it all.

It is just a pity the workers’ loyalty to the firm did not go both ways. In one scene, a group of ex-staff reminisced about the loss of the beautiful Singer clock, which could be seen from miles around. It was demolished with the rest of the factory. One man had written a poem. “Now I sit and daydream, help me put him in the dock, the empty-headed bampot who gave away our clock.” The camera returned to his face to find him in tears.

The film ended on a deserved high with a look at a charity that refurbishes Singers and sends them to Ghana, where they are used by young women to start their own businesses and lift themselves out of poverty. Clydebank, not for the first time, take a bow.

The South Bank Show (Sky Arts, Sunday, 10.30pm) had dramatist of the moment Jed Mercurio, Line of Duty creator, as its subject. He was as eloquent about his craft as one might expect.

We also heard from Martin Compston, everyone’s favourite Scottish-Essex lad, who said he used to find the “Beeeeeeeeep” of the recording machine annoying, then he realised something: when this sounded it was like the adrenaline-inducing ringing of the bell in a boxing match. Haste ye back, Mr Mercurio.