Self inflicted

[SCRN1]

What are some of the craziest things you have seen that patients' stupidity have caused themselves? Here's a few I have taken care of:

1. Patient with a fungal infection in his brain. Cause: snorting cocaine.

2. Patient with knee infection cultured to reveal E. coli. She had knee surgery and after being discharged, she wanted back in the hospital for stronger narcotics. So, she rubbed feces in the wound knowing it would cause infection. Yep, she actually admitted to this...after being confronted with lab results.

3. Patient whose with occupation as a stripper. A man, claiming to be able to safely inject saline into the breasts of the strippers for a cheap breast enhancement. The patient ended up with a nasty infection and ended up losing a breast. The doctor had to do reconstruction in several phases. In trying to save the nipple, he attached it to the abdomen until the final surgery, where it was put back where it belonged.

[caroladybelle, BSN, RN]

dh worked in the cath lab a few years ago. he had a frequent flier that came in every couple of months with an mi after snorting cocaine. each and every time, he'd swear that he'd learned his lesson and this was the last time he'd use cocaine. i wonder if he's still doing it!

and then there was the guy who came in after his wife caught him with a girlfriend. she shot him in the ass while he was on top of the other woman. you could argue that this was a self-inflicted injury since it was the second time she'd shot him after finding him in flagrente! she stabbed him once, too! the guy never learned!

i had a "repeat mi - cocaine abuser" this week.

and are you sure that you haven't worked with me? a guy comes in shot in the butt by his wife, after being caught fooling around. gets restraining order, and goes home with gf. nine monthes later, admitted for having had his knee shot out - by gf. gets restraining order against gf and goes home with wife. gets re-admitted w/stroke at age 47 (noncompliant/smoker/drinker/diabetic - the trifecta) - recovers well, leaves wife, goes home with girlfriend. gets readmitted a few monthes later after being hit with car by another gf. first gf comes up to hospital drunk, gets evicted from hospital after abusing staff - is warned that if she drives off property, will have cops siced on her for drunk driving. she replies %^&* you!, drives anyway. cops bust her and toss her in jail.

so what does patient do - try to get leave from the hospital to bail her out, while on iv and 2 days postop. after leave refused, he sneaks out on a "smoke" break.

sometimes there is just a special kind of stupid out there

[pebbles, BSN, RN]

I call him "coat-hanger man".

He had genuine Münchhausen syndrome, the RCMP had a file on him because he traveled to different hospitals around Canada under various assumed names - trying to GET surgery.

He un-bent wire coat-hangers, and shoved them up his member, down his throat and into his colostomy. All in an attempt to get doctors to operate on him.

His throat was fine. His bladder had a small puncture that would heal on its own. And they admitted him to watch for bowel complications.

He used to come to the nursing desk when the doctors gathered for rounds, just to YELL at them to operate on him. We had to get the lawyers to draft a contract that if he came within 10 feet of the desk, he would be discharged and escorted off the property by security.

It was not fun while he was on the unit, but it's funny now....

[texas_lvn]

Had a guy that to keep track marks off his arms, would shoot up in his "member" came to us with gangrene in numerous places. Had to peel it like a banana all the way below the scrotum. Stated he had 3 different orificale sexes before he came in to the EC for the "hurt". Cant imagine the girl. She herself must have been a coke-head!

[liebling5, MSN, RN]

These are all my xh:

Sleep apnea, refused to use a cpap machine

Bad peridonditis with several teeth missing - hadn't been to a dentist in at least 5 years "because I know I'll need surgery, but can't afford the days off." And oh yeah, took off from work for miscellaneous reasons and therefore never stored up enough time to take off for something major

Ground his teeth at night so loudly that it often woke me up. No, not going to dentist for a bite guard, see above.

Hypertensive, stopped taking his meds, I caught him after he c/o a severe h/a. His bp was 190/110! Had the nerve to yell at me for checking up on him.:angryfire

Smoker with chronic smoker's cough. If we got separated in a store, I'd just listen for a bit for the distinctive cough.

Had a belly that looked like he was ready to give birth and was proud of it!

Oh, did I say that he had full medical and dental coverage? Yep.

Self-inflicted for sure.

[fetch33]

Gosh, I've seen so many.. I'll start with the first:

A man tried to kill himself, so he shot himself in the head. He awakened to find a nasty wound to his head. He called his doctor's office, but was told it was closed for the weekend. He hung out all weekend at home with his brain exposed and called Monday for an appt. He tried hard to convince the doc he had walked into a door... doc didn't buy it, LOL. When I had him, he was just out of ICU with a drain hanging out of his head and enough skull missing that you could count his pulse with the pulsations of his brain. Amazingly, they had enough skin to cover the wound.

I took care of a mental hospital patient who had an appetite for bedsprings... he had just had 15 of them removed from his stomach. This was not his first surgery for this problem. He later died from peritonitis after he did the same thing.

Along the line of swallowing things... had a patient who swallowed a spoon and ink pen so he could get all of the 'good drugs' , assuming he'd be opened up to retrieve them. Nope, the docs fished them out with a scope, LOL. I still have the pictures!

A railroad worker was drunk at work and ... oops.. accidently put his foot under a moving rail car. I can't believe the ER nurse actually brought me the boot... that was now missing it's front half... just like the foot. Maybe she thought the state would use it for evidence?

The most recent is a child who was bored and playing with daddy's pocket knife. He cut his pinky clean off!!! The docs reattached it, but even after a week of leeching, it didnt' make it. Turns out the kid didn't go tell daddy right away, but hung out in his room for an hour or so until he could get up the nerve to show his parents what he had done. By the time he got to where I work (hours away by car), the pinky was pretty much non-viable.. but they gotta try.

[justme1972]

A Bart Simpson doll up the orifice. It was the best Xray I've ever seen. You could see his hair and arms open wide , like he was yelling ' get me out of here!"

Almost got coffee through my nose! This is where HIPAA sucks..Too bad they won't allow you to upload copies of the X-ray and put it on YouTube.

Ha!

[ssouthernyankee]

I have a question about the E.Coli abcess. Is it always caused from injecting/rubbing feces into skin? Had a pt with a huge abcess in breast cultured out E.Coli. I have a hard time imagining this particular pt would have done this to herself, she wasn't a frequent flier, I spent quite a bit of time with her and she just didn't seem to be "one of those" pts.

[blondy2061h, MSN, RN]

We had a patient who sailed through his transplant easily. When home, smoked, got some kinda funky fungal infection in his lungs, and died.