What was the WORST thing a patient has been brought to ER for?

Bikechicky · Aug 13, 2006

I have many, but the best I think is this: a guy was driving his car with the drivers window down, and his arm resting on the car window sill. His car was sideswiped by another car. He came into the trauma room with a badly fractured arm, open fracture......... well the X-rays came back with a large portion of the humerus was missing, gone, not there! So sent EMS back to the scene to look for it. Found the missing bone under the hood of the other car. It was dieivered back into my hands, it was so cool, a perfect section of humerus, no blood and guts attached, just a 3 or 4" section of bone, I was impressed by how heavy it was. We sent it up to the OR, the plans were to sterilize it and re-implant it, I never heard how it turned out.

mamao4 · Aug 14, 2006

This one is from the view of an EMT...0300 and dispatched for lac to arm. We are thinking it is probably just a papercut. Someone that resembled Sissy Spacek (sp?) in Carrie with blood all over her, is flagging us down. It looks like Texas Chainsaw Massacre in the living room. About 7 people standing around crying/screaming and drunk/high. 20yo lying on the floor and claiming that he punched the window. No lacs on him except for the one that was going straight across his bicep and sliced through his brachial artery. Muscle hanging out of his arm. :uhoh3: Finally got him loaded, and he was afraid to get an IV. His arm is almost severed and he is about to bleed out, but he is afraid of a needle stick! Ended up biting through the IV tubing on the way to the hospital...mom begged us to take him to a different hosptial than we thought he should go to because she didn't like the hsopital of our choice. She even offered to pay extra...lol. Did I mention she was three sheets to the wind? Ended up kid's LOC kept declining and he was going into shock. Took him to the hospital of mom's choice and they couldn't do anything for him but stabilize him and call for flight to take him to the hospital we wanted to take him to in the first place! But don't take our advice! Girlfriend in the ambulance was screaming the whole way to the hospital wondering if he would lose his arm....nevermind his arm! What about his life? Never did find out what happened to him after flight...all I know is that it took about an hour to decon the ambulance!:barf01:

mom23RN · Aug 15, 2006

Mine both involve fireworks. One was a young teen who had lit an M80 in the house and then decided that was a dumb idea and tried to run it out. Needless to say it literally blew his fingers off. They actually looked like those fuzzy paper things you put on the end of turkey legs at Thanksgiving? His mom was screaming the entire time for us to transfer him to the university hospital so they could "sew them back on". Numerous people tried to point out to her that there was NOTHING LEFT TO SEW BACK ON. :trout: I think she was drunk as well.

The other was another guy who was drunk who lit off another M80 and somehow forgot to let go of it. :uhoh3: He blew a wonderful hole in the palm of his hand with fingers and wrist still intact (even his thumb). There wasn't much bleeding either as he seemed to have cauterized most of the vessles with the blast? It was amazing! Sadly, he had to have the hand amputated as there was nothing left to work with.

goats'r'us, ASN, RN · Aug 15, 2006

i haven't any stories of my own, as i've led a short and sheltered nursing life, but we have this show called Medical Incredible and tonight there was this wicked one where a kid was in a car accident and ended up impaled on a 4x4 fence post. it seriously went right through his abdomen without hitting anything vital. they said it entered his right flank, mashed his kidney, shattered three lumbar vertibrae and exited his left abdo.

he's now playing tennis, and the only after-effect they mentioned was that one foot doesn't do much anymore.

JessicRN · Aug 16, 2006

Had many but the one that I will remember the most I was a new orientee in a trauma one ER. The patientwas a 15 year old girl. She was one of 5 who came in to the ER from the same accident, a head on collision at high speed. The other 4 were in critical condition so they were placed at the top for CT and Xrays. My little girl all the injury you could see was a tiny laceration at the top of her nose so she was placed last of the 5. She did have what looked like a fractured nose and orbits but not sure. Primary and secondary survey was normal but she was boarded and collared and could not open her mouth to examine inside but she said she was swallowing blood. I spent the next hour suctioning the inside of her mouth. There was some discussion to place an NG tube orally to protect her airway since she was lying flat but it was decided to tip the board a bit. When we finally got her in for Xray they removed the collar and opened her mouth. Not only did she have lefort 3 Facture her palette was split all the way down the back of her throat. I was told had I suctioned her wrong I could have suctioned her brain not to mention the fact that the NG tube might have also ended up curled in her brain. She was completely neurologically intact otherwise. Freaked the doctors out though. Hard thing was I had to call her parents who thought she was home in bed.

UtErRnEmt · Aug 16, 2006

I've had several but this one sticks out in my head. i was doing charge one night around 3 am and we got a call on the ems radio. there were 13 victims of a gang fight on their way. needless to say it was very hectic in our trauma area. we ended up sending 9 of them to the or. all for bowel eviscerations from a machete. and none of the pts spoke english

texas_lvn · Aug 16, 2006

Wow, some amazing stuff. I just wanted to subscribe to this board. Thanks to all of you.

andhow5, BSN, RN · Aug 17, 2006

we ended up sending 9 of them to the or. all for bowel eviscerations from a machete. and none of the pts spoke english

LOL! Sorry, I can't help but to laugh, because that always seems to happen to me. I get the ones that "speak no english". Are you sure you're not my long lost twin?

cari rn · Nov 15, 2006

This isn't meant to make people feel sad or freaked out or anything (!!!), but I know we all have very memorable events that stick in our minds.

One in particular I remember is the 13 month old little girl, rushed in because she injested the ecxtasy (sp??) pill her father "accidentally" left on the floor. Way to go, dad. Amazingly, she went home 2 days later!

Jen2 · Nov 15, 2006

A patient that hadn't been to the doctor in 15 years was setting up and talking to me while I was putting in his I.V. with CC: of S.O.B.. He looked at me and told me he didn't feel good, 5 seconds later I was bag valve mask bagging him while the CA was doing chest compressions. We stabilized him in the ED and he died 4 days later in the unit.

A little bot that appeared to be about 5, but was actually 8 years old. His parents had kept him locked in a closet since birth and he did not speak, nor communicate with us at all.

Twins who's father sliced their tongues in half because he thought that it would stop them from crying.

An 18 year old girl who's legs were amputated by the dash board. The medics put the legs on the nurses counter.

A drunk driver that had a 4cm lac to the bridge of his nose, and he killed a woman that was 9 months pregnant with her first child. I later found out that she was driving to the hospital because she was in labor. Neither one survived.

I could go on for hours there are so so many that stick in my head that did not make it, and so many more that I pray will have some what of a functional life some day. All in a days work!

z's playa · Nov 15, 2006

A patient that hadn't been to the doctor in 15 years was setting up and talking to me while I was putting in his I.V. with CC: of S.O.B.. He looked at me and told me he didn't feel good, 5 seconds later I was bag valve mask bagging him while the CA was doing chest compressions. We stabilized him in the ED and he died 4 days later in the unit.
A little bot that appeared to be about 5, but was actually 8 years old. His parents had kept him locked in a closet since birth and he did not speak, nor communicate with us at all.
Twins who's father sliced their tongues in half because he thought that it would stop them from crying.
An 18 year old girl who's legs were amputated by the dash board. The medics put the legs on the nurses counter.
A drunk driver that had a 4cm lac to the bridge of his nose, and he killed a woman that was 9 months pregnant with her first child. I later found out that she was driving to the hospital because she was in labor. Neither one survived.
I could go on for hours there are so so many that stick in my head that did not make it, and so many more that I pray will have some what of a functional life some day. All in a days work!

Gonna puke...... :bluecry1:

My Gosh life is hard for an ER nurse......

Z

tiggerforhim · Nov 15, 2006

check out the "things my patients have taught me NOT to do" thread in humor - it's full of stuff like this!