TNT orders new medical drama from David E. Kelley

US cable net TNT has ordered a pilot of Chelsea General, a new medical drama from Ally McBeal and Chicago Hope creator David E. Kelley.

The series is co-created by CNN’s chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta and based on his novel Monday Mornings, which will be published in March 2012. Gupta will executive produce the series alongside Kelley, who penned the script for the pilot.

The series follows the lives of five surgeons who meet, every Monday, at a ‘morbidity and mortality’ conference at which they review complications and errors in patient care.

“Chelsea General promises to be a smart, witty and extremely powerful medical drama, the kind of series David E. Kelley is renowned for making,” said Michael Wright, executive vice president, head of programming for TNT, TBS and Turner Classic Movies (TCM).

The medical drama is one of three recent pilot orders from TNT.

Gateway, from Warner Horizon Television, is a Western saga revolving around three brothers who step in to save their town when their father, the town sheriff, is murdered. Scent of the Missing from CBS Television Studios, is based on Susannah Charleson’s book about an adrenaline junkie who leads a canine search-and-rescue team.