Stupid Nurse Trick... Don't try this at home... or work!

Uh... I once ran face-first into a pole and hit the back of my head. Don't ask me how that worked, but I've never been able to repeat that trick.

I haven't done it myself, but I've seen someone grab a stethoscope and not notice an ear piece was missing and slap it into their ear hard and fast enough to draw blood. Ouch!

Umm...I once dropped a syringe which then rolled under my pt's bed, as I bent to retrieve it she pressed the button to raise the head of her bed which then caught my hair in one of the joints and pulled tight. No amount of changing the angle of the head of the bed helped me get loose. We had to press the call light. The other RN working with me laughed her butt off as she cut me loose. I wore a surgical cap the rest of the night and got a hair cut (a VERY short one) the next day.

I flipped a new BP cuff around my neck, and all the velcro stuck into my hair bun, security started laughing but came over and very carefully helped get me loose.

Many years ago, as I was studying for my finals, I decided to make something nice in the blender. I was too lazy to get something to stir up the clogged stuff at the bottom, so I stuck my finger in the mixture to stir it, all the while saying to myself "don't turn it on, don't turn it on". You guessed it, I turned it on and earned myself a free ride to the ER. Never felt so stupid in all my life.

TXRN02,

I'm also a TX RN, but you and I should stay far, far away from each other. I once vagaled myself out the day after a wisdom tooth extraction. When I passed out, I slammed my head on the kitchen counter, then the kitchen floor. Woke up after an unknown downtime, unsure how I ended up on the floor, with a bloody nose, and a lac on the back of the head that required five staples. Concussion, but luckily no brain bleed.

Last December DH and I bought a safety gate for our toddling son that was had 2 pieces held together by those plastic tie things similar to what you'd find in kids' toys that hold them in the box. Instead of going to get scissors (which would have involved going into another room), I reached for a knife, not realizing how dull this particular knife was. So I'm sawing and sawing trying to cut this tie with the blade pointed toward me...yeah. So you can see it coming. The knife slipped under the plastic tie and impaled itself about 2 inches into my LFA. And you know when you're a nurse you think the worse...oh no, it's spurting, I've hit an artery, I've hit a bone and I'm going to get osteo and I'm going to be on IV Abx for 3 weeks, I'm probably going to need an ortho consult, and am I going to pass out, do I call 911 or do I call DH and have him come home from work to take me to the ER? Long story short -- 3 stitches, out of work x 2 nights and some really bad bruising from wrist to elbow. No IV Abx.

The ER doc asked me if I was deliberately trying to hurt myself. I assured him that I'm a nurse and would know how to do it right were I going to, at which point he just laughed.

i had posted this elsewhere:

I had a resident that had BenGay PRN. She was requesting it so I smeared it on her back and a shoulder. I ripped my gloves off to help her back into bed. She said something about one of her knees may need some also. So i just gooped some on my hand, and smeared it on her knee. I did the usual wash hands, leave room, finish treatments, wash hands between residents. Later on that night I took a break. My eye was a little irritated and dry, so while rubbing, God love contacts, my contact popped out. Went to the treatment cart, grabbed some NS, and started cleaning my contact in my palm. Rinsed contact off between fingers, crammed contact into eye. OMG! I had the most severe pain in my entire life, including child birth! Needless to say, Bengay is a lil' harder to get off hands than thought, and I did my last medpass minus one contact and a red/puffy eye. Genius ... pure genius ...

OUCH!