What Is Your Most Gross, Yucky, Disgusting Nursing Horror Story?

To: rph3664

Yeah, I agree. That's what I was thinking when I first heard the story about the steel plant accident. See, the thing of it is, there's no way he could have been fully to blame.

In any event, people who do dangerous jobs like that are usually heavily insured. So, like you said, hopefully if he left any loved ones behind, they're well taken care of.

Oh, by the way, what was the deal about the mining accident?

And I'm going to Google the musician's names you gave me to find out more details because stories like this are really weird!

It's been quite a while since I read the Starzl book, but he did say there wasn't much left of the quarry victim.

Layne Staley was the singer for Alice in Chains (90s grunge band) and Kevin DuBrow was the curly haired guy in Quiet Riot who in the band's early 1980s heyday would, during their shows, empty a Jack Daniels bottle. Not a few kids ended up with alcohol poisoning from imitating this, only they drank actual Jack Daniels not knowing that Kevin's bottle was filled with iced tea.

Layne Staley:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Layne_Staley

Kevin Dubrow:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_DuBrow

Edit: Well, OF COURSE Staley's body only weighed 86 pounds when he was discovered! You can guess the rest.

While in NS I worked in hospice - I learned quite a bit about advanced cancer, for instance, as others have mentioned, the smell. We had a pt that had cancer of the uterus which had eaten through the lower abd and further down the leg, exposing the muscle and whatnot. It took 3 of us to dress the wound with piles and piles of gauze, and we had to be very, very careful because there was always the danger that through our manipulations we might accidentally rupture the femoral artery and cause a gusher. We would have to put chux all over the floor to catch the drippings. Each time we went in to do the dressing the nurse I assisted would say, "I am so afraid that that right leg is going to just fall of when we turn her!" Oh, and by the way, there were always a few flies circling when we did the dressing change that we had to swat away. The smell was - well, unbelievable...the entire floor of the hospice could smell it. Anyway, the facility had a workman show up one day and install a very pretty light fixture on the wall in her room. I wondered why they were doing this installation at such a time - until I found out it was a special blue-colored light that had the effect of killing flies.By the way, although heavily snowed on opiates, this woman still recieved a tray and managed a few mouthfalls at every meal!

BTW, Ryan, my statement about insurance was not his own personal life insurance, but worker's compensation.

Once again, if he had a wife and kids, I sure hope none of them ever had to work ever again. I also hope his family never found out exactly what happened to him, that they were told that they couldn't see the body and that was that.

And stories like these are proof positive that First Responders really aren't paid enough.

To: rph3664

Yeah, I knew you were referring to Worker's Comp. But I just don't know what the rules are about that. Can a person get Worker's Comp. even if the accident is partly their fault? If they can, I'm sure he did receive Worker's Comp.

Oh, and I agree with you: Just about everybody with a dangerous or really gross job is under payed. I'm still tying to read all the pages on this thread. And I'm on page 69. But even after reading the first few pages, I could tell these people are very much under payed.

The story about swallowing a patient's loogie is just too much for me!

You know, if a PATIENT accidentally swallowed someone's loogie while receiving treatment, he/she would want to sue for all the money he/she could get!

Truly, medical professional are heroes!

It only took two weeks but I finally made it through all 141 pages!

I'm not yet a nurse but I did work for an Alzheimer's facility. I quickly got used to the smell of feces and stale urine, which I think will help me immensely in the future.

We had one gentleman who we named "Poo Picasso". Whenever working in his hall, there would be the strong odor of feces, and we knew immediately who was responsible. Towels, bleach solution and masks were quickly dispensed and we went to find out how bad it would be. One morning there were streaks along each wall where he had dragged his hands, piles on the floor, all over doorknobs... and his room was a warzone. He went through two mattresses before it was suggested that a plastic mattress cover should be used.

Another afternoon, just as I was about to clock out, I had another gentleman come up to me and tell me that "it was time"... which meant that he needed to have his briefs changed. I escorted him into his bathroom and helped to undress him (his briefs hadn't been changed in what seemed like hours, and I wrote up the caregiver for that little incident). As soon as his briefs were off of him, I tried directing him to the toilet. He simply looked over his shoulder at me and smiled.

I don't know how I knew, but I jumped out of the way just in time. Projectile liquid bowel movement. Everywhere. He kept turning in circles while I kept trying to convince him to sit on the toilet. When he was finished, three walls were plastered, the floor was covered except for where his pile of clothes had been, the sink was painted, the toilet was covered, and even the CEILING was spattered.

It took four people two hours to clean him and the bathroom.

This isn't exactly gross but it is funny (I can't help it, stupid is funny). I had a guy show up at triage one day with all of his fingers in a zip lockbag. Seems he put his fingers under the rim of a running lawn mower.

I had another guy who rented a lawn mower to mow his grass. He then decided that it might be a good hedge trimer, so with the mower running it picks it up to try to trim the top of his hedge. Of course, this did not work out. He came in and the plastic surgeon managed to save a few of his fingers. He sued the rental place and WON, because no one had told him that a lawn mower cannot be used as a hedge trimmer. TSTL. Just shoot him and get him out of the gene pool.

I have heard both stories more than once. Remember Spinal Tap's drummer who died in a bizarre gardening accident? Maybe this was how.

Whats the NANDA dx? Risk for injury secondary to being stuck on stupid?