House - Family Practice

Candice Bergen returns to House as Cuddy's Mother, Arlene who is gravely ill.  House suspects she is a hypochondriac, then thinks she is an alcoholic, etc, etc.  Once again the storyline has them thinking it's one thing and it's not, then thinking it's something else and it's not that either.  This format is getting very, very repetitive.
Anyway, Arlene doe snot want House as her doctor, but Cuddy insists on him staying on in the background.  He tries a number of treatments which end up bringing her closer to death.  Masters wants to confess (as usual) that they are changing her meds without her knowledge but House threatens to fire her and sets her up so he has something over her.  Of course, she tells and Arlene wants to move hospitals.
House forces Cuddy to keep her mother in their hospital because he believes he can cure her but if she goes elswhere she will die and Cuddy will blame him.  This is an interesting level to his thought process about their relationship.
While this is going on Taub is given a job by his ex-brother-in-law, who broke his nose in the past due to Taub's cheating on his sister.  The ex-BIL is a lawyer who is trying to settle a case for a family and Taub thinks he sees a micro-brain bleed in an x-ray.  He is told to leave it alone or else.
What is it with the characters on this show who want to self-destuct, like Masters and Taub?  They want to do the right thing even though they know it could end badly for them.  Is it noble or stupid?
Not a bad episode but I wish they would change the format for the stories.