What freaks you out?

I have been reading these and laughing hysterically. I can do trachs, spit, snot, pus, even when the pus (a lovely gray toothpaste like never ending string of it)came from and 8 yr old scrotal cyst that suddenly came to a head when the guy was on abt's for something else and just happened to squeeze it and out it rolled. But the grossest I have to agree is maggots and poop eaters! Once in nsg school a classmate was changing the diaper of a 4mos old who was in with AGE and this student tended to be a mouth breather and the baby shot out a fountain of diarrhea right into my classmates mouth! GROSS!!!!!!!

Oh guys, between the laughing and the gagging I think this is the best I've seen yet. Having been a respiratory therapist you would think secretions are a breeze for me--well they are so long as they don't touch any part of my skin! I had a luggie lunged at me from a trache with me at the foot of the bed and the sprinkles across my face made me want to barf right there and then! I ran to the bathroom as soon as I put the vent back on the patient and scrubbed my face with betadine soap! Next would have to be teeth--dentures! I'm sorry but I tell my patients I don't "do" dentures. I will given them the cup and the essentials but I cannot stand teeth. Nor can I watch someone brush their teeth. The white foam churns my stomach -- I myself rinse my mouth AND toothbrush a dozen times to brush my own teeth. I can't stand that yuky white foamy stuff in my mouth.
And last but not least, would have to be any kind of malodororus hinny. Its bad enough having to hold your breath through a catherterization; I could NEVER be on the other end of the speculum! Yuk! I have no idea how male GYN docs can go home to their women after a heavy day at the clinic!

[This message has been edited by MartyL (edited March 20, 2001).]

I haven't dry heaved in a long time - that is until I heard the dog lapping up mucus post. GROSS! You know its funny...I don't generally have trouble suctioning trachs, but man... I try not to look at the container, don't even like handling the container (holding either lung secretions or gastric secretions). That dog post was freaky. UGH

Jeepers...I've been reading discussions at this site for more than a year now, but this topic finally made me jump in and register! My worst grossout was just this past weekend...while cleaning a blood-covered GI bleeder (upstairs and downstairs) my colleague began cleaning the _huge_ blackheads off his back while I helplessly held the patient over...squeeze, pop, extrude, squeeze....she kept saying, "Just one more, just one more." Aaahhhh!

Great topic!

I've been off the computer for over a week, otherwise I would have told those who mentioned emptying NG containers that that would be a universal precaution breech: throw the whole thing out and get a new one!
Over the years, the worst things to me were the surgery where they took off half of the man's face for cancer surgery and those dressing changes-- I agree with whoever posted that; and the little foreign kid who had a stool in the bedpan and there were these HUGE, long white tapeworms wiggling in the pan....EEEOOOWWW!! The maggots I saw years ago were in the cleanest wounds in the derelicts' hips (the only part of his body that wasn't filthy); we took off so many layers of clothes, then put him in the tub, and he had another set of long johns on once we started scrubbing. His body hair had grown through them!
The only time I had trouble with sputum was when I was pregnant: I would suction, run to the BR and retch, all the while maintaining a sterile glove and catheter; then come back and finish suctioning! Thank goodness that hospital required 2 people to suction vent patients- 1 to bag and 1 to suction!
The absolute worst thing for me is vomit. I warn all of my patients that if they upchuck, so does the nurse; so they better let me know right away if they are nauseated so I can medicate them before they lose it. (When our kids were little, my husband had to clean up any vomit because he knew I'd also barf and only make a bigger mess. Of course, the kid with the weakest stomach was in the upper bunk and that was always fun!)

I've only lost it twice in 23 years of nursing. The first time was when I was 8 weeks pregnant and at the height of my "morning sickness". I was admitting an elderly lady who had a large dressing covering her right breast. She kept telling me, "Oh honey, you don't want to remove that--I take care of it so no one else has to look at it." I told her not to worry and removed the dressing to find a fluid soaked ABD pad, greenish-black, oozing lumps of what had been her breast, and the most unbelievable odor I have ever smelled in my life. I nearly fell backward and left the room, wretching all the way! The second time I was one of six people who were asked to clean up the body fluids of a patient who had died and was in our morgue--the medical examiner had arrived to pick up the body, but because of the trauma to the patient's leg, which had subsequently necrosed and drained copious amount of fluid, there was fluid that had leaked through the body bag, and the M.E. refused to take the body until it was in a dry bag. The patient weighed well over 300 pounds, and when we went to clean things up, we found him in a pool of fluid that smelled like a freezer full of rotted meat. We all gagged and wretched over that one! So, I guess it's necrotic tissue and fluids that do me in every time!

Got a gross one for you, this happened to me when I was in the Air Force in Athens Greece. I worked nights in the ER and we would run our own ambulance calls. I was called out to the airport to pick up a body of a contract worker that had killed himself on the island of Crete. He drove outto a point and killed himself in his car. It was about a week in the summer heat (100 degree's plus) before he was found. I got to the airport and had to open the metal casket to identify the body to make sure there was not a bomb in the case due to a heightened levelof security on the base....being that the morgue was located next to the spy station on base,they were very concerned that nothing got on base that was not supposed to....wellback to the story...here I am opening this case to check that it was a body and they had only put 2 bags of ice in with him, and next to us they were unloading a pile of fresh fish that had been flown in with him....needless to say the smellof the decomposing body and fish together caused me to lose my dinner all over the body in the case....still cannot stand the smell of fish

Oh boy! Do some of these posts bring back the memories. I served as an ambulance officer (EMT) in Central Australia for a year back in 1988. The Aboriginal people are fascinating in many ways, but for many, personal hygiene was not a chart-topper. I found out very quickly that if an Aboriginal tells you something smells bad, you sit right up and take notice. So my partner and I were sent to a "humpy" (small hut) in a camp because an elderly man "smells bad and can't walk." My partner, who was a very young, idealistic woman, was attending. The patient indeed could not walk and we placed him on the stretcher which was then loaded in the back of the ambulance. The pt had indicated that his foot hurt. My partner was about to take off this old, mouldy tennis shoe when I stopped her. "Oh! Don't do that!," I screamed. "Never, ever take off someone's shoes unless you have to treat a traumatic injury!" Well, she said a few things about my level of compassion, etc. I remained silent. We were disinfecting the stretcher after off-loading the pt at the ER when we hear this anguished cry (AAAArrrrrrgggghhh!!) come from the examining room. Apparantly, this was a long-term diabetic pt, and when the resident took off this fellow's shoe, literally half his foot came with it and the smell was, inconceivable. This was winter, no maggots for debridement of the gangrenous tissue. I looked at the pt's foot and it was like an anatomy lesson. Not nice...

One of my worst experiences that made me gag was in the ER when an older man came in with both legs swollen and black fluid seeping from his shoes. The smell alone was horrendous. When I removed his shoes and socks both legs were wrapped with ace bandages that were black and wet. When I removed the ace wraps not only were both legs full of maggots but also cockroaches little and big came scampering out all over the place. I could take the maggots, I've dealt with them before, plus they move slow but those little roaches were fast and I couldn't kill them fast enough. My skin cawled the rest of the night.