For Fun: Weirdest Thing in Pt. Bed

NICU_Nurse, BSN, RN · Oct 10, 2003

Ahhh! You just reminded me! My mother told me once that one of her post-op patients was a brittle diabetic- she worked on an open heart floor and he was comatose after surgery. The CNA had gone in to perform PM care and she came out of the room slid the wall shut, and leaned against it and started to cry. My mother thought, OHMYGOD, he's DEAD in there, and went running in. He was alive (but still comatose), and she suddenly was very confused. She pulled the CNA in the room and said, "What are you crying for?" and the CNA pointed to the bed.

(dramatic pause.)

Apparantly, she'd been removing his TED hose and one of his toes fell off.

My mom said it just broke. Off. Fell into the bed.

So that's her story.

My runner-up is when I was teching in postpartum. I had a young, 16 year old mom who was totally cowtoeing to her mother- I mean, this woman was AWFUL and had totally intimidated her daughter. She also weighed about 600 pounds. She had a terrible time walking, and once she was in the room (semi-private, mind you), she wasn't going ANYWHERE. Well, this mom had a c-section and was going to be in for 72 hours. The (grand)mother (or should I say grande-mother? ) camped out in the room, but couldn't fit in the chairs because the chairs had arms and were too narrow for her. So she sat on the bed. Except she sat ON THE BED, right in the middle, and left a tiny sliver for her newly-delivered daughter to enjoy at the end of the bed. The first night I met them, I walked in to find the grandmother in the whole bed with her post-c-section daughter curled up in a ball at the end of the bed like a little puppy dog, legs dangling off and everything. The second night I had her, I walked in and found the grandmother in the bed, alone. Mom was curled up in one of the chairs with a pillow under her head, and her head propped up against the wall. Poor baby. We asked the daughter if she wanted us to have her mother forced to leave, but the daughter was afraid that if she p'd off the mom she wouldn't have a place to live, so she declined and that woman stayed in that room the entire time, in the bed almost the whole time. I was never so sad for someone as I was for that little girl. Wanted to kick her mother's butt all the way to the streetlamp.

My winner, and the one that still confuses me to this day, was this one (and I posted this in another thread a while back, so forgive me if you've read it, but I'm copying/pasting it here- I am NOT retyping this!):

When I first started school, we did a nursing home rotation the first semester. With me and ANOTHER STUDENT it took us an hour to do a bed bath on an alzheimer's patient! AN HOUR!!!!! ROFLROFLROFL! ;> ) I would have quit nursing school if it hadn't gotten better than THAT!

We bathed her, and she had little bits of food stuck in every wrinkle, from head to toe, and how that happened I"ll never know.

We got her cleaned up and ready to put her clean clothes on, and I went to the chair, picked up her CLEAN CLOTHES, and we put them on her while she was in her CLEAN BED WITH CLEAN SHEETS. I go to adjust her clothing after it was on, and I'm like, 'What the-..."

There were kernels of corn EVERYWHERE!! CORN!!!!!!

Where the hell did it come from? The sky? We STILL can't figure it out!!

There was corn all over the sheets, and all over her clothes, and we'd just bathed her nude body from head to toe and brushed her teeth and everything while she was lying in a bed we'd JUST CHANGED THE SHEETS AND BEDDING ON!!!!!

SmilingBluEyes · Oct 10, 2003

omg IYUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

sanakruz, ADN · Oct 10, 2003

Good thread!

I found rocks in a pts bed once. Long term psych. They were nice and clean, too and the bed had been neatly made. I saw and felt lumps so I pulled back the covers. I mentioned to a collegue my unusual find and was pondering where the could have come from...She said "they probably fell out of his head!...."

purplemania, BSN, RN · Oct 10, 2003

Knife-the kind you cut people with in street fights-in bed of 17 y/o female pt.

mystc42 · Oct 11, 2003

Well I haven't come across a particular item yet that sticks out in my mind. But I did walk in on a guy and his girl friend having sex one day. Can we say EEEEKKKKK!?!

jadednurse · Oct 11, 2003

Originally posted by wv_nurse 2003
Under the breast of a very (I mean VERY) large lady-- a half eaten Oreo---moldy

This deserved an encore! Gross!

Long Term Care Columnist / Guide · Oct 11, 2003

Toes falling off, ewwww, I can relate. But the weirdest thing I've found in a patient's bed was the bottom denture I located......stuck to the patient's bare behind! The woman was about 400#, diabetic (surprise, surprise), and she had no idea she'd been sitting on them all day. I'd gotten her to turn on her side after supper, and there they were, firmly planted in the right cheek. What was worse, when I told her of my discovery she reached back there, yanked 'em off, then said "Thanks, honey, I've been looking for those damned things all day" and popped them into her mouth!!

GLDLPN · Oct 11, 2003

We had a little eldrely fellow one night, who had m&m's in his bed ~ he kept his stash (not in the candy bag) loose and for safe keeping down by his scrotum. He was very generous and offered to share them with us. EEEWWWWWWW!!!!!

Gayle

mattsmom81 · Oct 11, 2003

Originally posted by GLDLPN
We had a little eldrely fellow one night, who had m&m's in his bed ~ he kept his stash (not in the candy bag) loose and for safe keeping down by his scrotum. He was very generous and offered to share them with us. EEEWWWWWWW!!!!!

Gayle

:roll

Great thread...and a great argument for never going without gloves...:chuckle

caffine addict · Oct 12, 2003

Were those M&Ms plain or with nuts?

allnurses Guide · Oct 12, 2003

The M&M's reminds me of a guy who comes in to visit our LTC patients. Very nice old guy, kinda disheveled, dirty coat, always insists that we try his homemade deer jerky. He keeps it stashed in his coat pocket . . .we can't bear to hurt his feelings so we take it and then toss it later. One of the docs takes it and eats it though. Who knows what else is in that pocket or if the old guy ever washes his hands. . . . :eek:

I have found syringes, tape, gauze, food and Copenhagen in the bed of patients.

Be careful where you lay things down.

steph

nowplayingEDRN · Oct 12, 2003

Found a wig....walked in to answer a call bell....and almost had a heart attack when the woman had no hair!! :chuckle Well, she had it, in a death grip under the sheet! Minnie loved me and told me I saved her life......what a cute, eccentric jewish lady...OIY!