What Freaks You Out?

dawngloves, BSN, RN · Mar 15, 2001

I have a feeling the winner will be mucus. Gagging just thinking about it. I've seen 20 year veterans turn their heads while suctioning a trach! The noise alone! Slurrpp!

dawngloves, BSN, RN · Mar 15, 2001

Originally posted by traumaRUs:
Ok, well, I'm an ER nurse and I don't like teeth things. I don't mind if they are completely gone, but just hanging there makes my skin crawl. judi

I knew a nurse that couldn't handle dentures! She told me it was worse in the old days before gloves and people would just pop 'em out and hand them to ya!

mud · Mar 15, 2001

Funny thing, when growing up, my great grandmother lived in a long term setting. I remember the smell. I used to call it "old people smell". When asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, the only thing I knew for sure, I couldn't be a nurse. My first job as a nurse?........ Nursing home. Funny how things work out....The grossest (is that a word?) thing that I ever encountered in this job? A little old lady who deteriiorated so quickly, it still freaks me out. One day she walked around, catatonic like, the next, bedridden. Despite meticulous skin care....she became covered in large fluid filled blisters, almost overnight. By about week two, there was a cavity around her coccyx area that tunneled in so deep, you could clearly see her spine. The dressing changes were terrible. I left that job shortly after........ mud

Tim-GNP · Mar 15, 2001

I don't believe i'm going to tell these stories, but here goes....

I lost it TWICE in my whole career.... both in nursing school. I HATED ob/gyn & peds [no surprise that I'm a Gerontological nurse]. I BEGGED my teacher to NOT make me watch a live child birth. Of course, she taught me who was boss, and sent me into the delivery room with another classmate, Kelly. I kept telling Kelly, I was going to 'lose it' and she kept telling me: "no you're not, you're fine....now shut up." I backed all the way up [until the wall prevented me from backing up further].... then the baby came out, and so did my lunch. I think the patient was offended, I know her husband was- the Dr.'s & nurses just looked at me with disgust. Kelly was upset all she could say was 'you always embarass us- no matter where we go!'

The second time was during a circumcision of a newborn. All I could remember was the baby's screams echoing in the back of my head, finally, I recall a 'wave' of green cascade over my visual field, and I felt like I was asleep. I heard my teacher yell 'oh my God, there he goes.' She tried to grab me, but dropped me. The next thing I remember was being on a stretcher looking at the stained ceiling tiles.

As you can imagine,when I get together with nursing school friends, the conversation ALWAYS comes around to.... "Do you remember when Tim..." and then I know what's coming next.

Rex · Mar 15, 2001

lets see I do fine with just about what ever is thrown at me with excetion of those nasty gag reflexing luggies that dont come out. But once in our small town ER we had this farmers wife come in with an unable to void problem she was nasty hadnt bathed in years senerio I was working with an agency RN (this was back when I was a Tech) when we went to cath her we found chicken feathers the nurse lost it. and I was traumatized for ever. ewwwyyaaaak

ShannonB25 · Mar 16, 2001

This is a great thread! I must admit that as a student so far one of the worst for me has been the GI bleed pt with the blood that just kept coming and coming! Unbelievable smell- even the guys were shaking their heads over that one. Also, I hate dealing with NG canisters. That just does not seem right. I keep thinking of what it would be like if that stuff slipped out of my hand and hit the floor...

Walk9 · Mar 16, 2001

As a Respiratory Therapist/RN/EMT i have seen it all and i can honestly say i must have an iron stomach!!! Nothing bothers me. I can talk about or even be in a procedure and then go get lunch. All the other nurses on the floor come to get me to suction their patients. Sputum definitely is the one thing that grosses everyone out!!! I'm sure i'll find something to turn my stomach in time.

nursejanedough · Mar 16, 2001

These are all hilarious. I am still laughing over Rex's chicken feathers! Mucus is what freaks me out. Walk9, you Respiratory Therapists are very gifted people. What used to freak me out was when I had to take this elderly lady's glass eye out every night to clean it. You had to stick your finger in the corner of her eye and pop it out. I finally got used to it and it was no big deal. I couldn't wait to train the next nurse to do this.

ShannonB25 · Mar 16, 2001

Oh my, nursejanedough, popping out the glass eyeball- now that is sick!

buffy the vampire nurse · Mar 16, 2001

Well I'm a steel stomached ER nurse and the thing I've done that most grossed me out was when I was looking after a woman who fell ot of a window through a pointy tree and into a garden. She partially scalped herself and I had to peel back the scalp and pick the leaves, dirt and flowers off her skull while she waited to go to theatre. The weirdest thing was taht she was awake and none of thsi was causing her any pain, kinda hard to make small talk was difficult!

hoolahan, ASN, RN · Mar 16, 2001

Bring on the snot, bring on the gross wounds, I can take it. I can handle blood, seen liver clots from upper and lower GI tract - no problem. BUT, don't even TELL me about your period, and PLEASE don't make me help with any kind of lady partsl bleeders. I can do the childbirth thing, I'm talking after the birth, or before the baby, or whenever any woman, no matter the age, hemmorhages from there. I cannot handle it! I get weak in the knees, in the small of my back, and I get a weird sensation in my Achilles tendons, like I am going to go out!

Another thing that grosses me out is colostomies. My aunt has a new ostomy, and she was talking about how she had lost all her modesty in the hospital. Well, she certainly had, as she proceeded to lift up her robe, at home, and emptying the colostomy as I was washing my hands in her BR. Gosh I want to be there for this woman, but the one thing I have such a hard time with, and I can NEVER get them to stay on without leaking, in 20 years as a nurse! When she started doing that in front of me, I thought I would never eat again, and thought surely I may have to think about taking my own life if I ever had to have one myself. Maybe it was just too close to home too.

moonchild20002000 · Mar 16, 2001

The thing that really gets to me is mucus.I had a patient bring me a lugie in a ziplock sandwich bag one day and I almost lost it!I do night/weekend call for my MD's and this patient had called with upper respiratory symptoms.I asked the usual questions and I guess she thought having a productive cough was pretty serious.When she presented for her appt.she presented me with the lugie! It was very hard for me to react in a professional manner.Once the wave of nausea passed, I calmly asked her to put the sandwich bag back in her purse and make sure she let the MD see it!Then I found a quiet place and laughed and laughed!

------------------