Set in apartheid South Africa in 1968, A Mostly White Year in a Black Hospital follows the lives of a group of mostly White newly qualified doctors in a Blacks only hospital. The hospital is a huge sprawling chaotic institution. Thousands of people pass through its doors every day. As many of the patients present late, the pathology is very advanced and the facilities are often limited. For the newly qualified doctors it is time to change from being a student with no responsibility, to being a professional making life and death decisions affecting other people's lives. In spite of this clinical situations arise that are bizarre or ghastly or nail biting and even comic at times. The first six months are in a medical ward and the second six months are in a surgical ward.