It's no secret. We all know that nurses see a lot of crazy/gross/nasty things when on duty. Would anybody be willing to share their story with us? Please, don't spare any details.
I'm interested in your stories because I know that it's not all rainbows and kittens. There must be things that sometimes you'd wish you could un-see or un-experience (I know that's not a real word). Whether that be sticking your fingers in a patient's wound (for whatever reason), or having phlegm coughed on you, etc. Don't be shy.
I'm very curious to know some of the things I might see and/or experience once I become a nurse. Being a nurse is so exciting!!!!! 😃😃😃😃
Senior nursing student was doing her practicum in the ICU. We couldn't let them give meds, but pretty much everything else was open season. We had this horribly obese woman with an enormous sacral decub -- the kind that you stuff with 8 or 9 rolls of wet-to-dry Kerlix. Since the student was the smallest of us, my large male friends and I held the patient on her side and I was talking Kim through the dressing change. She set up her sterile field and dumped sterile supplies on it, all the while explaining to me that she was SURE we didn't need 9 rolls of Kerlix . . .
And then she starts pulling the old dressing off and removing Kerlex from the decub. She was still pulling out Kerlex when I heard her say, in awe, "Holy (bad word that rhymes with "duck"), I could fit my whole HEAD in there!"
Necrotizing fasciitis. Patient was playing golf and noticed "a big pimple on the back of my leg." He didn't feel well; thought it was the sun. When he collapsed on the 16th hole, he was brought to the ER where it was noticed that MOST of the back of his leg was rather mushy. Within hours, his entire back half was eroding away. He died well before the sun rose again . . .
Chronic patient on a vent had a propensity for playing with his call light. He'd push that button over and over again for no good reason, and then just laugh when you went in to see what he wanted. As time went on, his call light went lower and lower on our priority list. When he realized that he got a lot of attention pretty immediately after his vent started alarming, he started taking himself off the vent. Over and over. We'd restrain him, and he'd work one hand out of the restraints, or curl up so he could reach the ventilator tubing with the hand still tied . . . .
Eventually, we got so even the vent alarms didn't get an immediate response. So then he'd yank the ventilator off the stand (in those days, the vents were about the size of a large cooler, sitting on a metal stand. That made a really satisfying crash and set off all sorts of alarms and people came running from as far away as the next ICU. It was my misfortune that I had him the day he pulled the ventilator off the stand, which yanked on his trach until the tubing came free. By this time, he'd messed around yanking his trach this way and that so much that he'd eroded the artery . . . When I got into the room, there was blood everywhere, and he was drowning in the stuff.
And then there was the colleague who gave her patient a bottle of Mag Citrate and a dulcolax suppository, tied her into a chair and went to lunch. I heard the call bell go off, and when I got down the hall I could see a literal river of poop coming out of the room. And the poor patient was sitting there crying and chanting "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry."
A patient who had a abdominoperineal resection (removed the orifice, rectum, and part of the colon and 'rerouted' it to a ostomy). Patient had been complaining of a strong desire to defecate, despite the former "exit" was now securely (SO I THOUGHT) sutured shut.
Day 2 postop and the ostomy was already looking good, making stool and passing flatus. I figured he was just puffed up with air from the procedure (it wasn't laproscopic) and that the sensation would pass along with the gas.
About 20 minutes before shift change I hear him groan and the sound of what could best be described as someone ripping a sheet in half quickly. I hear his monitor alarm and look up at the central monitor to see his usual NSR is now 130s...briefly...and drops back into the 80s. Just as I am crinkling my brow thinking *** is he doing in there.....THE SMELL HITS US ALL. This smell was the lovechild hate-brew of all smells unholy. Fearfully I approach his darkened room, I can hear him snoring softly. Can't be too bad I think to myself, he didn't even wake up.
As I enter the room, I see the unmistakable shadow of moisture spreading across his gown. I press the call light to get someone to bring me fresh linen as I turn on the light to see....OMG IT'S [redacted] EVERYWHERE! The gown - soaked. The sheets - soaked. The bedrails, splattered. The floor, puddles forming. Pulling back the gown I see the ostomy appliance best described as blown off his body, still puffed full of air like some old school bag of jiffy pop. Stool soiling his abdominal dressings, dripped down into a bottomless, vile lake of greenish-black chunky stool over his genital area. Meanwhile the sheet under him is utterly saturated in an almost clearish green fluid that is literally dripping off the edge of the bed. These two fluids are clearly different. WHAT THE HECK!? The patient looks up at me and says, "you know, I feel a LOT better".
I now have fresh linens, but the aide is cowering in the corner trying to look busy rearranging items on the sink. 15 minutes to shift change. I sop up all I can see on the front. I rip off the surgical dressings, there is no saving them. I clean the everlasting you-know-what out of the incision area and redress them. Coax my terrified aide into helping me do a quick linen change, spritz the air with some air purifier spray, wash my hands, and walk out just in time for day shift to come out.
The oncoming nurse walks up to me and says with a voice too cheery and bright, wow it's kinda stinky in here today. I try not to throw up in my own mouth reliving the horror of the stench that was.
To this day I can only conclude he had a total blow out - from both ends. The thick nasty stuff out of the stoma, and the liquid out of the "sutured" remnants of his orifice. The man poo'd out of a surgically closed butthole. A LOT. Who knew you could poop out of a surgically removed former orifice. Sadly, I do. Now. -shudder-
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I am simultaneously fascinated and horrified by this.
Specializes in Cardiac ICU, ER, PICU, Corrections.
There was an older gentlemen who was constipated on the Med Surg floor. I went into his room and he handed me a water bottle. He had reached up his bum and pulled out hard pieces of stool and put them in the water bottle.
Inpatient rehab patient had 4 teeth extracted during his stay and one day later, we had to sent him out 911 with suspected sepsis. He later admitted to sticking his toothbrush up his butt to combat constipation (caused by narcotics)...count 2-and-2 together!!!
Eeww. sickening!! A young guy was seen in clinic, had put a test tube in his member. I didn't take care of him. But I guess a forceps was used.
Speaking of memberes. peni? My first yr a young guy was in for member reconstructive surgery.
Said he got it stuck in a drawer. Yea right. So several days later he called me in the room to ask 'why do I pee this way?' his urine was coming out a whole on the side about an inch before the former meatus. I wanted to say youre lucky you have one, but don't know what I said. This was a few decades ago. I did realize a good thing to say is ' be sure to discuss with your dr in the morning.'
A patient whose catheter had eroded though his member. His member was split from base to urethral opening on the ventral side. This was not given in transfer report and I found it upon doing his admission assessment.
New mother. Didn't come in soon enough with mastitis. She had a hole at least 2cm in diameter and tunneled deep into her breast. I got her several days after treatment started but milk was leaking (ok, squirting) out of the hole. We struggled with trying to stop the milk in that breast while continuing to encourage and pump the other breast so that when she finally got to go home, she could actually breast feed that new baby. The doctor had noted that it would probably be about a year before this wound actually healed.
Admitted a homeless guy whose clothes wreaked, shoes worse. I tied them in double plastic bags and put in closet. That closet kept the smell for weeks after he left.
A patient whose catheter had eroded though his member. His member was split from base to urethral opening on the ventral side. This was not given in transfer report and I found it upon doing his admission assessment.
Had a RN who was struck with Alzheimers. She would be fine most of the day but sundowned hard. I went to see her and saw she had taken a stroll this evening to the tv room. Bless this lady, she was lying on the couch in her panties and tee shirt, legs in the air filing her toenails with her emery board. The first thing I thought was, boy, she sure is flexible, no way I could manage that! I asked her to go back to her room, and she got pissed and told me to "get lost, lady". After some convincing she did go back, under protest. She was young for Alz. I've always secretly felt that if I ever get Alz. I hope I'm as happy go lucky as this RN!
Adele_Michal7, ASN, RN
893 Posts
Your stories always fascinate me. =)