Any funny misconceptions/misunderstandings when you first started as a nurse?

Nurses General Nursing

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Specializes in ER, ICU, Education.

I was thinking about this the other day and giggling. Years ago, during my first week as a CNA, I was extremely offended when I saw a chart. The nurse had charted that the pt was SOB, and I thought it said "Patient is an SOB." I remember thinking "how unprofessional!" and being very offended. :lol2:

Any funny misunderstandings for you when you just started as a nurse/in this field? Or a funny misunderstanding you may have witnessed?

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Specializes in ICU, Telemetry.

We had a guy who had a diagnosis of "malignant nevis." So, being new, I'm asking one of the other nurses why the doc wouldn't just say melanoma or basal skin ca or whatever. Patient's family member (different pt) wanders by, overhears us, and proceeds to walk in her family member's room and say we've got a patient with a "Malignant Elvis"

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Specializes in LTC, Hospice, Case Management.

Many many years ago I worked in a pharmacy while in nsg school. I was very gingerly carrying a bottle of nitroglycerin capsules across the room. The pharmacist asked what the heck I was doing. I replied in all seriousness "I'm making sure I don't drop the bottle". He chuckled & asked why. I replied, again in all seriousness "I've watched enough bugs bunny & road runner to know what this stuff will do if it blows up". He never let me live it down.

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For the longest time my sister kept hearing her instructor talking about the "bicycle tendon". One day she realized he was talking about the bicipital tendon, and was very relieved she had never asked anyone about the bicycle tendon.

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Specializes in PACU, OR.

Old jokes I remember from my early days... The nurse who was sent out of theater to fetch the "Otis Elevator", and a hilarious one I heard (don't know if it's true) about a nurse sent to fetch a butterfly, and hours later they found her in the garden, trying to catch one...

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A vertically challenged Dr. asked the CNA to get him a stool (he was doing CPR). The CNA went to the dirty linen, the patient had just been cleaned up after a BM!

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this really isn't a misconception, ... but I still am amazed how obsessed people are with their "Bowels". ;-)

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