The New Healers was a one-hour pilot film for the unsold series Med-Ex. The pilot aired on March 27, 1972 as the second feature in a twin-bill presentation on "The ABC Monday Night Movie" airing on the ABC Television Network. The first feature was "Wheeler and Murdoch," a detective drama.

The "crusty head physician" assignment was given to Leif Erickson, playing the supervisor of a small rural California hospital. Erickson's son, who'd done a tour of duty as a Vietnam medic (and thus is the "sensitive" character in this concept), is played by Robert Foxworth.

Other staff members are Kate Jackson, playing  Michelle Johnson, an ex-nurse just before her longer stint as a "woman in white" on The Rookies, and priggish administrator Jonathan Lippe. The three join forces to help Dr. Simmons, an aging physician, care for the people of Hope, a rural community in California.

The plot involves the staff trying to gain the confidence of the local farmers and merchants. Expanded from 60 to 75 minutes in syndication, The New Healers never gets around to explaining who the "old" healers were.