Dr. Kildare's Crisis is actually one suffered by his fiancee, nurse Mary Lamont (Laraine Day). Mary's financier brother Douglas Lamont (Robert Young) is subject to unpredictable seizures, and for a while it seems that he is suffering from hereditary epilepsy. This being 1940, Douglas' affliction carries an onus which seriously threatens the impending marriage between Mary and Jim Kildare (Lew Ayres); after all, who knows how their children will turn out? But by using an unorthodox therapeutic method, Dr. Kildare proves that Douglas' medical condition was borne of an accident rather than a genetic disorder. The final diagnosis is rendered by crusty Dr. Gillespie (Lionel Barrymore), who thereby manages to justify his appearance in the film in the very last reel.
