Dumbest thing a doctor has done/said to you

Nurses Relations

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I'm very curious. I'm sure we've all been there. We've dealt with doctors from all spectrum and mindsets. Most are very good at their jobs and have sound ideas!

But sometimes docs just say and do the craziest things

My example: at my last LTC facility I had one doctor seriously outright refuse/fight giving and prescribing pain meds (for patients who really, really needed it/were on vents/dying) because he honestly believed that these residents who had been stuck in a bed for years were going to get better and go out to buy/smoke crack cocaine.

According to him "prescribing narcotics leads to methadone and crack usage." These poor residents have been here for years taking the same medications and pain meds for years...just WHAT?

What kinda crazy stuff has your doctor done?

Specializes in Infection Control, Med/Surg, LTC.

LOL! Love this thread. After 40+ years, I've got a few goodies too.

MD calls all panicked when I was IC/EH manager. A patient of his in ICU was found to have tetorifice and he wanted all the staff to have tetorifice boosters because they 'might get it'. Explained it was not communicable person to person. Long pause and then tiny voice saying 'Never mind'.

MD ordered only Tylenol for terminal CA patient in final stages. Why? 'They might get addicted' ?????

MD not discharging elderly woman home after fall. (Pt uninjured, living on own, lucid, refusing nursing home.) Why? 'She might fall again'. Well, yes, she might. But he might get hit by a car crossing the street to his office, does this mean he has to give up his office practice? We can't swaddled them in cotton!

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Called one of our docs in the middle of the night for a new admit, known diabetic, who had not be given any insulin during his 12 hours in the ER. As you can imagine, his blood sugar was way up and he was feeling like crap. This is around 2 in the am. Call the doc, doc answers, I explain, he gives appropriate orders, I carry out said orders and move on with my shift. At 6am my phone rings, it's the doc. He says "Did you call me last night" Me: Yes, I did; on Rm whatever. Him "Okay good, did I give you orders?" Me: Yes, you did. Orders for insulin for hyperglycemia. Worked beautifully, his BS is normal now. Him "Oh, good. I had the weirdest dream and didn't know if I gave real orders or dream orders."

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Specializes in Internal Medicine, Geriatric Medicine.

I had a patient die soon after becoming an NP. Now mind you, I'd been pronouncing patients as an RN for 6 years and never been questioned. Told MD.

MD: Get an EKG.

Me: He was on a monitor. It flatlined. No pulse. No respirations.

MD: Well, did you try CPR?

Me: DNR/DNI. Nope. No CPR.

MD: Well, get the EKG anyway. We have to be sure.

Me: Nope. No need. He's really dead.

MD: I'm the doctor. Get the EKG.

Me: Nope. He's dead.

MD: I gave you an order.

Me: Well...

MD who was sitting next to me at the nurse's station takes phone: "Hi Doogie, if you want the EKG, come up and get it yourself. He's dead as a doornail."

End of discussion.

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I just had a physician covering for our hospitalist service over the weekend discontinue my patients antibiotics that they were supposed to be on for three weeks and when I questioned him about it, he asked, "what was he on it for?" And when I told him what for and that infectious disease had ordered it he asked me to reorder it for him lol

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Specializes in ICU.

Had a patient come in with hyperkalemia and was going to need dialysis, wasn't currently on dialysis and so didn't have access. Didn't seem emergent and renal was swamped so they decided to hold off until the following morning. Throughout my nightshift he progressively looked worse. Finally, he goes into a junctional rhythm in the 30s. I literally had him hooked up to the crash cart when the resident called back. She tried to tell me that since his BP was ok they were ok with that. I used some very assertive language and told her that I was not, and her attending wouldn't be either.

Someone was placing a quinton 10 minutes later.

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Where to begin? My patient, who was totally oriented was waiting for the doc to come see her. As the day passed with no doc, I looked in the chart and saw he had written aphis daily note. I checked with the patient and she assured me no doc had seen her. I paged the doc. He said, "I don't have time to see EVERYONE today, but I wrote a note to cover myself" um, can you say fraud?

m favorite thing they say is, "let's watch him/her overnight'. AKA I'm too lazy to do anything about your issue

actually, my real favorite is 'this is my patient, don't question me'. No no no no. This is our patient and I'll make your life miserable if you don't listen to me and respect my opinion and trust my gut!

Sorth, I could go on and on

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Specializes in Critical care.

Had a med student (bless his heart) ask me to adjust my patient's ETT so he could talk to him

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Quite a few years ago, one evening there were two of us RN's working in the PACU, with 3 OR's running and we had 4 pts in the PACU. The anesthesiologist working with us that night decided to bring us a kidney transplant (had transplanted earlier that day and was not putting out urine so they went back to the OR to see what was wrong) instead of going straight back to the PICU, where the pt had come from. When we voiced our concern over our RN to patient ratio/acuity, he stated to me, "Let me go get my skirt on and come back and help you". Needless to say this was overheard and he was promptly pulled into HR for 'debriefing and counseling'.

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Loved your post.

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Today I had a doctor (oncologist) ask me what happened to his patient, so I explained how he had PEA in the OR. Then he said, "Yeah, I saw that in the chart. What's a PEA?" Kind of stunned I replied "Pulseless Electrical Activity. He coded." He laughed at himself and said it was time to go back to school. I'm still stunned. And a little scared.

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Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
Today I had a doctor (oncologist) ask me what happened to his patient, so I explained how he had PEA in the OR. Then he said, "Yeah, I saw that in the chart. What's a PEA?" Kind of stunned I replied "Pulseless Electrical Activity. He coded." He laughed at himself and said it was time to go back to school. I'm still stunned. And a little scared.

Oncologists rarely actually run codes. That's what oncology nurses are for. Of course, I've worked most of my forty years in teaching hospitals. I might be appalled at what's out there!

I had a patient return from cardiac surgery 40 liters up. When they gave him that much volume in the OR, you know it was a rocky surgery. It was a rocky night, addressing his many issues. His blood pressure would dwindle and the surgeon, who was parked in the room most of the night would order volume and that would improve the blood pressure -- for awhile. Towards morning, when the new residents come in to prepare for rounds with the attending, a brand new (this was July or August) cardiology resident parked herself at the nurse's substation right outside our door to review the chart on another patient down the call. (All the activity in there, I thought I might see something, was her reasoning.). Kevin the surgeon had wandered off to look at another patient when my patient's art line flattened out while the monitor was still reading sinus tach. BP alarms were going off, and I was troubleshooting the art line just in case, when the Cars Resident wandered into the room.

"He's in VT!" She announced. Get the paddles!"

"No," I responded. "He's in SVT. Don't shock that. Besides, I'm more concerned about the PEA." I had already hit the code light, pulled out the ambu bag and taken the bed rails down in preparation for CPR.

"Why would he be in PEA?"

Teaching hospital, I told myself. Let me teach. So I briefly explained cardiac tamponade as it relates to recent cardiac surgery. She seemed to receive this well. Then she asked "What do we do?"

In PEA, you treat the cause. I sent the tech for the warmed saline and Vancomycin from the pharmacy substation on the unit, made sure the chest cart sitting there was the clean one and counted the seconds until Kevin could possibly make it back. And I explained that we'd be opening the chest.

"OK," she said. "Get me some scissors." And she started rolling up the sleeves of her filthy white coat. Fortunately, Kevin got back before I had to restrain her from cutting my patient with scissors. He was pretty senior in the surgery hierarchy and, being tired after being up for 24 hours, cranky because some strange medical resident took it upon herself to try to interfere with his surgical patient and just naturally very blunt and direct. He looked her over for about a second and then said "Who the F*** are YOU?" I could see the poor thing deflate. He delivered a lesson in inter-service protocol while dumping Betadine over the chest and then a lesson in cardiac tamponade and open cardiac massage while he got the chest open.

That cardiology resident decided to be a surgeon after that! I wish I knew how that turned out.

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Specializes in Hospice.

Back when I was working in a SNF, I had a patient on Coumadin. The INR came back at 5-something and there was blood in the foley bag. Called the MD and he said to give the Coumadin and retest in the morning. Um...No. Sorry, not going to do that. Got him to agree to hold and retest in the morning. What the patient really needed was some Vitamin K.

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