Do you sometimes get grossed out at clinicals?

Nursing Students General Students

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Today I had the remnant of a migraine, so I am hoping that is the reason I feel this way.

Yesterday and today at clinicals I got kind of grossed out. I was gagging during a hemoccult and grossed out by the smells today. Usually we talk about gross stuff at lunch and today it was making me lose my appetite.

I hope that this is just because I didn't feel well, has anyone ever had bad days like this? I'm afraid after today that I may not be cut out for this.

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Specializes in Med-Surg.

Hmmm. The only day I ever had like that was when I was pregnant.

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:)

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Specializes in Women's Health.

You know, my first GI bleed in clinical made my stomach do somersaults. Something about squatting on the floor, with my stick in a bloody hat trying to get a hemacult (it was EXTREMELY obvious to @ least 4 of my senses it was positive...so why was I doing this?:eek: ) sort of made me gag...so I would say yeah...it's pretty normal. 10 GI bleeds later, it isn't pleasant...but the nausea is gone...so far at least!

Yuck!! I can't believe I actually typed that!

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Don't feel bad... I think we've all been there at some time or another!

Before I even started nursing school, in my CNA course, the nurses on the floor were very eager to show us EVERYTHING. On like my first or second day, (cant remember which) I helped a nurse change the dsg on a pt that had a HUGE wound from a flesh eating bacteria. It was awful - she had a hole in her calf about 6" long, 2" wide, and about 1" deep...

Her leg was so weak, I had to help hold it up while the nurse re-packed the wound. You could see straight to the bone! After a couple of minutes, the room felt like it was closing in, and I got dizzy. Ended up asking another student to cover for me because I had to go in the hall and put my head between my knees!!! I'm sure I looked pretty green. ick... still gives me the heebie jeebies!

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Specializes in CV Surgery Step-down.
Hmmm. The only day I ever had like that was when I was pregnant.

That's the first thing that popped into my head!!!

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You know, my first GI bleed in clinical made my stomach do somersaults. Something about squatting on the floor, with my stick in a bloody hat trying to get a hemacult (it was EXTREMELY obvious to @ least 4 of my senses it was positive...so why was I doing this?:eek: ) sort of made me gag...so I would say yeah...it's pretty normal. 10 GI bleeds later, it isn't pleasant...but the nausea is gone...so far at least!

Yuck!! I can't believe I actually typed that!

:chuckle Ok now I can't believe how much I can relate to that!! And bloody hats are awful, but it's true, you do get desensitized!!

I'm beginning to feel like I'd take that over C-diff any day!! About a month ago, it seemed like half the patients on our floor were pos for c-diff. - and maybe it wasn't half, but it was a LOT of them. (Yeah, I came home every day smelling RANK!!) And scooping it into the speci-cups is another one of those "Why am I bothering because it's obvious" tests!!

Don't know where it came from, but can we say nosocomial infection? :rotfl:

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I am defenitely not pregnant...

I feel better today, I think it was because I was sick. I talked to some other students and yesterday was gross as far as smells to more than just me. The lunch trays smelled awful, one student asked a PCT if someone on the hall had C-Diff because of the horrendous smell and the PCT was like, umm no, I think it is their lunches.

I also learned that retrieving a poop covered chux and having to attempt to scrape enough diarrhea out of it to even do the hemoccult is not a pleasant experience no matter how experienced you are. No wonder the PCT was so willing to change the patient if I wanted to do the hemoccult

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Specializes in Women's Health.
No wonder the PCT was so willing to change the patient if I wanted to do the hemoccult

:) Hee hee!

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Specializes in Med-Surg.

I'm a CNA on a med-surg floor and have been for 3 years. I have seen many gross things and have yet to have a day that I gag, except for when I was pregnant and we had a man when I worked on the Oncology floor who was dying and he had this diarrhea that was just awful and smelled so foul. Then when we were cleaning him and we turned him everything spilled out of his mouth. It wasn't even like he vomited, everything from his inside just came out and was dripping on my shoes! That was the worst day I ever had in my work experience. Other than that I have seen pretty nasty stuff and cleaned up some pretty nasty stuff and believe it or not I just haven't gagged. Even if there was a day I wasn't feeling well. But the one and only thing that really bothers me to this day is sputum! I can't stand to watch a person spit it up and I hate looking at it when we have to collect a specimen for the lab. Blech!!! I haven't started my nursing school clinicals yet so I don't know if I'll see anything more gross so we shall see.

Hope it was just that day of lingering migraine that made you feel queasy.

Shannon

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