How often are medicine checks allowed? The book, I believe, states once per encounter per character. What is considered an encounter? I feel like even at rest, there should be some time allowed for recovery, especially if a character was immobilized during combat.

Any ideas on using decreased health as a compelling narrative tool without making your doctor angry?

I'm away from the book right now, but an "Encounter" is defined specifically as a place where you go from "narrative gameplay" into "structured gameplay", that is, time with a turn order based on Initiative.

Typically, an encounter can be considered over when the combat ends. There are other ways to be in "structured gameplay" but combat is the main one.

So the Medicine check 'counter' resets at the end of a combat, generally.

Progressions' definition is good. I like to expand my definition of encounter to the following:

An encounter is just a chunk of action. It's enough space of time for a plot point to happen. Some times it's a fight, some times it's talking to a club owner to shake some information.

To up the tension for badly wounded PCs you can reduce the chance for healing by giving the PCs a time limit where they can't really stop for a rest. Make healing sources hard to come by.

Ultimately your best way to put pressure on the PCs with a "low on HP" mechanic is to apply a few critical injuries. Critical injuries can be difficult to get rid of and the more you get the more in danger you are of getting that 141+ critical injury. Your players are going to want to avoid dangerous situations once they realize that one of their own could drop in the next fight.

You could consider introducing a poison or something that lowers the PC's wound threshold for a given length of time. that might up the pressure and make them more cautious.

It's true that 1/enc/PC is the rule. As the book states, first aid can only do so much. If you are running a published adventure, an encounter is basically each "scene." To use "Under a Black Sun" as an example (available in the Support section of the EotE page for free DL): Opening scene is the speeder chase through Coruscant. The party may heal once each during or just after that encounter concludes. Then their is the interlude at Chopper's shop, where during or just after that, the PCs may repeat these medicine checks, once apiece as per RAW.

From there, each scene is an encounter unto itself. The Umbra Club, The Spyder, Zelcomm Tower, etc... Whether there is combat is irrelevant, only that each instance of the adventure garners the PCs another opportunity to heal.

For mass healing, FFG is encouraging time and professional attention as the deciding factor. First aid pales in comparison to rest and recuperation. The opportunities for these are found in hyperspace travel, but also in time.

Don't let your PCs move from one adventure to the next day by day. Give the party a "month" off to live their more mundane lives. They could start a shipping business or go and relax on Bespin or the Wheel. The benefit of this is the full recovery of their wounds, and then come up with a result based on their actions. You could have a PC who chooses to go to a resort environment reduce his credits by half for the cost of the vacation.

I digress, but you get the picture. I have found in my group, that because of the one heal/encounter rule, they are fighting smarter and making each risk one worth taking. It didn't take them long to learn that lesson. It reminded me of 2E AD&D, where for your first four or five levels, each hit point counted. However, I do feel that this system doesn't make you feel quite so at risk of imminent doom the way D&D did in those days. There is risk and the fear of PC death, but in the fun cinematic-action movie kind of way, where you takes your lickins and squares yer jaw.

Also, if they are at a stage where they can "sleep on it," give everybody back a wound. As long as it doesn't become a go to crutch. "yay, we finished off the minion baddies who tried to mug us on our way to the plot advancing encounter. Let's celebrate by taking a 24 hour nap, and THEN get on with the story."

With a Doctor or at least someone with high Intellect and a good Medicine skill, Critical Hits are not very scary. Most of them can be removed immediately after a combat. If you fail that roll, you'll have to wait a week to try again, but a Triumph on a Medicine check in the meantime can still heal it, so that's rarely an issue.

We also run an interpretation of the rules that you only get one healing attempt per wound. This is using hte understanding that "wounds" in the game are just the cuts and scrapes one gets on the way to a real injury (critical). You can only stitch/bandage the wound once.