Lisa Cuddy becomes dean of medicine at Princeton-Plainsboro in House M.D. She is played by Lisa Edelstein and serves as one of the hospital’s senior leaders for most of the series.
Cuddy supervises House, manages hospital operations, and repeatedly tries to balance his exceptional diagnostic results against his rule-breaking behavior. Her administrative position gives her authority over House, although their professional conflict is complicated by mutual attraction and a romantic relationship later in the series.
Cuddy is a physician as well as an administrator, and her leadership responsibilities distinguish her from House’s diagnostic fellows. She is also involved in major institutional decisions, including staffing and budget issues. Edelstein left the regular cast after the seventh season, so Cuddy is absent from the eighth season. The character’s surname is Cuddy, not “Cuddy House,” a confusion sometimes caused by the show’s focus on her relationship with House.