What Diagnosis Did your First Patient in Clinicals Have?

[FranEMTnurse]

Mine was a woman with a severe case of cellulitis in her good leg. It was ulcerated, and wet to dry dressings were applied. The reason I say; "Her good leg," is because her bad leg was one with skin stretched over bone. I asked her how it got that way, and she said when she was an 11 yo, she was hit by a car, and her mom pulled her free before it ran over her entire body, removing the skin from the bone. The skin and the fatty tissue never grew back.

[bigsyis]

Psssttttt I thought it was spelt anasarca??

It is.

[melsman1904]

My 1st pt. had fever of unknown origin and altered mental status. He was so patient with me.

[RNAnnjeh, MSN, CNS]

My very first patient was an elderly man w/dementia. I had to feed him breakfast. He had no teeth, and no dentures. I spent an hour trying to get him to eat breakfast....I'd feed him a mouthful of scrambled eggs and he'd spit them at me. After an hour, the CNA told me that he didn't even like eggs and to just give him his Boost!

I'll never forget that day! Went home and cried!! LOL...too funny now.

The next day I had a different patient....little eldery lady who thought she was a spy. She'd roam around the unit in her w/c saying: "take me to 28". I had no clue what 28 was, so I followed her for an hour or so trying to redirect her. She just kept going all over the place. Finally I figured out what "28" was......the number on the back of the w/c of another patient that she was chasing!

Never a dull moment......now do you wonder why I work with kids???? LOL:roll:chuckle

[Sabby_NC]

Thanks all for clearing these up for me, and Sabby, I spelled it right. Look at the whole word again. I spelled anascera. It's just the a is in bold lettering.

:trout::trout::trout: See I should ensure I have at least 2 large cups of java before posting LOL

Oiiiii I just googled the word and guess what it can be spelt ANASCARA or ANASARCA... Go figure that eh?

[CaseManager1947]

A woman with advanced pancreatic adenocarcinoma... I walked in and this poor woman was so jaundiced and had horrible ascites, I wasn't prepared adequately for what I might see. I wondered then, and still do, if my face betrayed my feelings inside about how she looked.

[SaraO'Hara]

First:

Man in his late 70s... status post L4-5 fusion, had a foley but incontinent of bowel. He'd been in the hospital a month, after becoming septic post-surgery... this was in CVICU. I saw his name still on the tele monitor two weeks later... went to visit... he'd had a colostomy constructed in the meantime. I wonder if he's still alive (two months later).

[DebRN06]

Acute renal failure. He was such a jerk. He threw his filled texas catheter at the RN I was with. It did miss her, but splashed everywhere. At one point, early in the day, he said to me, "my mom dropped me on my head when I was a baby." I replied, "Not hard enough." At that point he laughed and told me he liked me a lot and treated me great the rest of the day. Even "raved' about my care to instructor.

Unfortuately he was still just horrible to the RN. I felt bad leaving her that day because once he decided he really liked me, I was able to distract him and keep him from harrassing her as he had been.

I learned a very valuable lesson that first day...sometimes you have to give it right back to get respected!!

[pickledpepperRN]

My first evening as a student nursing assistant had pneumonia. She asked me to clean her and get a clean Chux to sit on saying, "Every time I cough I s**t."

I was so embarrassed to hear that word from a sweet little lady.

Later I worked at the VA and those sailors... well you know!