Funny things that pts say

In my CNA clinicals at LTC I had one grumpy patient who would yell and scream and make grumpy faces. I gave in to curiosity and went in to talk to her, half afraid she would try to hit me. She told me I have nice teeth.

Another patient's wife was concerned about his "cathenator". I corrected her a few times but in the end I thought that was a nice way to make a cath sound cooler than it is.

my hearts good it has a distributor.(pace maker)

I think I should wait till after my appointment to take my Latex today

Had a very nervous patient the other day getting ready to be taken the following morning to another hospital for a cardiac cath. His nurse approached me and started talking about how he didn't seem to understand why he had to have the cath done, so I offered to go give him some education because she looked so busy. She told me that he was VERY nervous and unable to settle down for the evening, so she'd given him a dose of xanax.

I printed some handouts and went in the room, all set to give him the rather standard education for the cath. I started out by handing him the handouts and then I started to say that the procedure involved "inserting a catheter into your groin area". He didn't let me get very far before he blurted out his fears. He said "I don't want them to put a tube or anything in my penis or anything down there. I'd really like to leave with my family jewels intact, you see..."

I had to keep my face neutral because he was totally serious. Apparently, everyone had been telling him that we were going to insert a catheter into his groin. He didn't understand that what we meant by catheter WASN'T a foley and what we meant by groin WASN'T via his family jewels. The poor guy thought we were going to cut into his penis or testicles and insert a catheter to his heart... After I provided all the required education, he appeared much calmer and thanked me for telling him that he'd get to leave the cath lab with his "boys" intact, apparently his misperception had been the source of all his anxiety.

It sure shows that a little knowledge can be dangerous... and adequate education can save the day!

I admitted a patient the other night (postpartum floor) who'd just had her 3rd baby. The L/D nurse gave me a heads-up that she used fairly colorful speech, which, between the Marines and nurses in my family, is not really a big deal to me at this point. Anyway, I warned her just before I felt her fundus..."I'll try to be gentle, but I've got to feel your uterus to make sure it's where it's supposed to be right now."

Her response: "Yeah, I know. That joker's probably pretty damn ****** off with me right now..."

I couldn't help it - I laughed out loud and told her that I'd heard a lot of expressions (see above - nurses and Marines in my family) but a ****** off uterus is a new one.

lol... I had a (very confused dementia) patient on shift yelling for me to "rub lotion on my penis, Rub it, rub it good" I told him I would put the lotion in his hands and he could rub it all he wants. He responded with it was my job to do it and if I wouldn't, then he would talk to my supervisor... Laughing, I told him hand j*bs were not part of my job description, to which he responded " you nurses aren't like the one's in the movies" OMG!!!!!!

I was in a room one time with a patient and a nurse who were both in their 60's. The patient motioned for the nurse to come closer, then calmly says: "Know what the difference is between you and me? I have aged like a fine wine, you have aged like milk."

I used to work in a LTC facility and we had a really bad hail storm. Golf ball size hail was coming down and one of my dementia residents was standing in front of the glass door. I told her to get away from the door and she looked at me and asked why, I told her because it was hailing. It was so funny, she looked at me and made the funniest face and replied " Helen, well invite her in I havent saw her in years!" I couldn't stop laughing it was so cute, how do you try to explain that? lol!

Working in the ER last summer, there was a patient being typed and screened for a blood transfusion. As the lab guy walked out of the room with his blood the patient waved me over urgently.

"Make sure I get man blood! I don't want to grow b1tch tits!"

One morning I had to remove vag packing from a hysterectomy pt. In my attempt to make light of a situation I was explaining the procedure as if it's like a magician pulling hankerchiefs out of his hat; we never know when it's going to end. And the patient said "as long as you don't pull out the white rabbit!" OMG I about died from laughter.