Television may be blamed for a litany of modern plagues but for one local woman it saved her life.

Early this year, Patrice Broussard of Antelope was suffering from a mysterious ailment. Ping-ponging between doctors' appointments, she was losing hope with every physician's "I don't know what's wrong."

As the mother of three sat on the couch one afternoon last January, she scanned TV channels, almost mindlessly. For weeks Broussard had been so exhausted that she dreaded getting up from her desk at the Legislature. The condition had dampened the spirits of the normally talkative and energetic 33-year-old. It even left her forgetful and sometimes confused.

Broussard flipped to "Mystery Diagnosis," a Discovery Health program that profiles real-life people with rare diseases.

She listened as the show ran through a patient's symptoms.

"Bloated stomach? That sounds like me. I have that, I have that, and I have that," she said, recalling her moment of clarity.

The only symptom she did not have was yellow eyes, and she decided she would bring it up at her next doctor's appointment.

By her next appointment, Broussard's eyes indeed had become yellow. A liver biopsy confirmed she had Wilson's disease, a rare genetic disorder that prevents the body from ridding itself of extra copper.

Broussard immediately was transferred to the UC San Francisco Medical Center. Within hours she had crashed and was placed as first priority on the liver transplant waiting list.

"I'm so lucky I found out I had the disease when I did because everything after that is hazy," Broussard said. "When I woke up a few days later I had a new liver."

Wilson's disease is an example of a rare, or orphan, disease. Orphan diseases are those that occur in less than 1 person in 1,500. Wilson's disease is so rare that it occurs in 1 in 100,000.

According to "Mystery Diagnosis" executive producer Alon Orstein, it's important to bring attention to rare diseases because, strung together across the nation, some 25 million Americans have them.

"While some of these diseases might be very rare, in the aggregate it's a lot of folks and a major public health concern," he said. A handful of people have called to say the show helped them find a diagnosis, Orstein said.

While a program such as "Mystery Diagnosis" may do good, many medical TV shows are actually a disservice, said Dr. Michael Wilkes, a UC Davis internal medicine professor who has researched media and health attitudes.

"People hear about things and get all freaked out and don't have enough information," he said. "It generates a lot of unnecessary medical tests and office visits."

Moreover, fictional dramas such as "Grey's Anatomy" or "House" may give viewers false information, because TV producers value provocative story lines more than factual accuracy. A 1996 New England Journal of Medicine review of medical dramas found that 75 percent of TV patients survived cardiac arrest. In real life, just 2 percent to 30 percent survive.

Nine months later, Broussard is back to work and back to motherhood. Life is normal, she says, except for 20 daily pills and a scar that crosses her body.

She's now an ambassador for Golden State Donor Services, a nonprofit agency facilitating organ donations in Sacramento.

"There's all these weird myths about organ donation, like that paramedics won't save your life," she said. "But a donor saved my life. One donor can save eight lives."

Well, television helped, too.

"It's so crazy," she said of her experience. "Things just don't happen that way."

Call The Bee's Anna Tong, (916) 321-1045.