What was the MOST ridiculous thing a patient came to the ER for?

Specialties Emergency Nursing Q/A

And did you have to treat them?

I am just curious. Your stories always seem to either crack me up or shake my head in amazement.

Thanks for sharing ?

Someone ought to get "some guy" off the streets!! In one ER I worked it was "some dude" -always punching/hitting/stabbing people for NO REASON!! (he really gets around apparently!!) :rotfl:

A few weeks ago, we had a young guy walk into triage at 0300 stating that he just left another nearby hospital because he was waiting 4 hours, and that he was "severely injured" and needed to be seen right away. This guy proceedes to tell the triage nurse that he was walking down the street after leaving a restaraunt with his girlfriend and "some guy" just walked up to him and punched him in the face. He says "I fell down so, according to my girlfriend who is a med student, I must have a subdural hematoma". (Guy denies even hitting his head, but says "I must have a brain bleed if I got punched and lost my balance"!) This guy had absolutely NOTHING on his face or his head, nor had any scratches on him at all. Not even a hair out of place. This guy just kept rambling on and on about "the bleed in his brain" ect, when the triage nurse went to our "No BS" attending and told him to quickly see this guy so we dont have to fully triage and treat him. This guy then starts to tell the attending the story, when the attending cuts him off and asks his only question he needs to know: "why did you get punched out?". The guy becomes insulted and then starts to yell, when the attending then says "now I see why you got punched out". Takes a quick look at the back of the guys head, sees that there is nothing there and tells him to get the hell out of his ER. :rotfl:

When I heard all of this happen, I swear, I almost peed my pants!!!

Specializes in ER, HH, CTICU, corrections, cardiology, hospice.
Arrived via ambulance, Mild Headache 3 hour duration, hadnt tried any otc drugs. Bet he had a real headache when he got the er and ambulance bill :chuckle

Same scenario only headache pain 4/10. After fiddle farting around and treating only the pain, come to find out homey had a sub-dural bleed, transfered PDQ after that. You just never know for sure. :rolleyes: :uhoh3:

Loss of feeling in LLE s/t salami strapped to inner thigh and pants too tight to get off.

Tx: cut pants off and unstrapped salami.

Loss of feeling in LLE s/t salami strapped to inner thigh and pants too tight to get off.

Tx: cut pants off and unstrapped salami.

:rotfl: NNUUHHH-UUHHHH!!!!!!!!! :rotfl:

My own personal story..

Last night took my son to the local "after hours doc in the box" with a temp of 105.4 rectal "he is 2". Temp has been going on for a couple days but couldn't get it down last night.

Well at the minor emergency clinic we look him over for 2 hours can't find anything wrong with him. No UTI, red throat, cough, runny nose just really high fever. So Dr. tells me to have him to the local ER "just in case". I take him in and the nurse is rolling her eyes at me and seems bothered that I even was in the ER. I told her everything that the other Doc had done and said and she said "I guess he didn't think of a viral infection" and rolled her eyes again. So after 5 1/2 hours half a bag of fluids "he wouldn't eat or drink", blood culture, CBC, chest X-ray, the Dx is Pneumonia. Shot of Rocephin and a Rx for more antibiotics and we were on our way.

So in your opinion was this a ridiculous thing to bring him in for? I didn't get a chance to talk to the first nurse again to see if her attitude changed any.

I am still going my pre-nursing classes, so I don't know if pneumonia is a serious enough thing for ER. :imbar

Thanks you all!! :imbar

My own personal story..

Last night took my son to the local "after hours doc in the box" with a temp of 105.4 rectal "he is 2". Temp has been going on for a couple days but couldn't get it down last night.

Well at the minor emergency clinic we look him over for 2 hours can't find anything wrong with him. No UTI, red throat, cough, runny nose just really high fever. So Dr. tells me to have him to the local ER "just in case". I take him in and the nurse is rolling her eyes at me and seems bothered that I even was in the ER. I told her everything that the other Doc had done and said and she said "I guess he didn't think of a viral infection" and rolled her eyes again. So after 5 1/2 hours half a bag of fluids "he wouldn't eat or drink", blood culture, CBC, chest X-ray, the Dx is Pneumonia. Shot of Rocephin and a Rx for more antibiotics and we were on our way.

So in your opinion was this a ridiculous thing to bring him in for? I didn't get a chance to talk to the first nurse again to see if her attitude changed any.

I am still going my pre-nursing classes, so I don't know if pneumonia is a serious enough thing for ER. :imbar

Thanks you all!! :imbar

No, Maam, it was NOT a ridiculous thing to take your baby in for a temp over 105.

And that ridiculous nurse with the eye rolling problem needs to be taken down about 3 notches. I would report her in a New York minute.

How rude, for her to be rolling her eyes at you.

That is a pet peeve of mine...people who :uhoh3: their eyes. ESPECIALLY nurses who do it like in your situation or nurses who do it at other nurses.

It is very childish and immature in my not so humble opinion.

:angryfire

{Calming down now.}

Gerilynn

If you want to scare yourself to death look up the signs and synptoms of spinal meningitis. A pediatric emergency medicine specialist I spoke to some years ago sited the incidence as 1:100 of cases of "fever of undetermined origen" in preschool age children. He may have been overstating the case. I never verified his claim, but he was an MD speaking in his area of specialty.

I saw one of these first hand. The parents noted that their one to two year old was fussy and had a low grade temp. That evening as they put him to bed he had a few spots. When they checked him early in the morning he had purple blotches and a high temp. By 5:30am the child was in our ER. We transfered the child directly to pediatric intensive care. He was dead before noon.

No you did not over react.

the most ridiculous thing was a married man from the age of 42 that walked into the Er and said he had a stomache after starting the normal questions he started to get a bit nervous and asked the MD if he could talk in privat with him so we left the room a few minutes later our MD came out of the examination room and had a smile on his face what was not normal the only thing he said was get this man an Xray from the abdomen. As the Pat. was getting his Xray made ,the MD told us the story:

The Man was a non outed Homosexual he was playing aroud with his friend and tuck a cut of baseball bat from the lenght of my underarm an placed it in his .....

from there they were unable to remove it. They have tried everything I mean really evering including to insert a hook into the bat to get it pull out

He was so embarrassed the poor guy but he had to bring him into the OR under Anesthesia we tryed to pull it out no chance then we tryed a suction delivery but this wouldent work the poor Guy had to get Labratomie

The team from the OR made picture of it it was 12 inches long

We have to medically clear any juvenille arrested in DC if they have any kind of complaint before they can go to lock-up. MPD recently implemented this policy, and we've seen some really ill :rolleyes: patients. My two favorites:

1. My wrists hurt. Me-Can you show me where they hurt? Him-where the handcuffs are. Me-Officer, can you loosen those a notch? (Officer loosens cuffs) Him-That's much better.

2. Me-Why are you here? Him-Back pain. Me-Can you rate your pain on a 1-10 scale? Him-It doesn't hurt now. Me-When did it hurt? Him-When the cop had his knee in my back. Me-Let me get this straight. Your back hurt when the officer had you pinned to the ground with his knee, but stopped as soon as he removed the knee? Him-Yeah.

I also like it when you ask the officer what is wrong with the patient and get the response "nothing." Then why did you bring him here?

I know they are only following their policies, but it is so annoying, especially when the ED is full. It's not like we can bring the handcuffed patients out into a pediatric waiting room!

I know they are only following their policies, but it is so annoying, especially when the ED is full. It's not like we can bring the handcuffed patients out into a pediatric waiting room!

but why not? this seems like a great way to clear the waiting room

:p

:chuckle

We have to medically clear any juvenille arrested in DC if they have any kind of complaint before they can go to lock-up. MPD recently implemented this policy, and we've seen some really ill :rolleyes: patients. My two favorites:

1. My wrists hurt. Me-Can you show me where they hurt? Him-where the handcuffs are. Me-Officer, can you loosen those a notch? (Officer loosens cuffs) Him-That's much better.

2. Me-Why are you here? Him-Back pain. Me-Can you rate your pain on a 1-10 scale? Him-It doesn't hurt now. Me-When did it hurt? Him-When the cop had his knee in my back. Me-Let me get this straight. Your back hurt when the officer had you pinned to the ground with his knee, but stopped as soon as he removed the knee? Him-Yeah.

I also like it when you ask the officer what is wrong with the patient and get the response "nothing." Then why did you bring him here?

I know they are only following their policies, but it is so annoying, especially when the ED is full. It's not like we can bring the handcuffed patients out into a pediatric waiting room!

Don't go there! I don't know you PedsERRN so I'll give you that one. We're all brothers in arms out there. They watch our backs we watch theirs. They have guns pointed at them we have Menengitis pointed at us. When your working the ER and gun or knife gets pointed at you there's nothing more sweeter sounding in the world then the sound of those sirens. The boys will be there in a heart beat. And, when the gun and knife come back to finish what they started. Until your ready to kick down that door and take what's on the other side not knowing what's on the other side so I can go home tonight - Baby you stand over there I'm hanging with my friends in blue. So leave them alone to do their jobs. So spend some time going those stupid policies and produres that we have to follow and weed out 99% of them before you knock on somebody elses door.

Try this one on for size. Mom comes in with baby in arms and 2 kids beside her. CC "I want a rx for motrin for the baby" when asked why "because the baby was crying earlier" baby is now sleeping sweetly.No n/v/d no temp, vss. when I explained that she did not need a rx for motrin mom got angry and somped off. 5min later my co worker came in and told me she just got through triaging the mom. Mom checked in because she and her husband were having sex about 3 hours earlier and now she was sore. no more mention of baby crying. seen by ER doctor any told to go to the store for ....motrin. Its the stupid people that make the job funny.

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