Story time! And the grosser, the better. Kudos to the first person who makes me throw up a bit in my mouth.
My story - I'm a burn nurse, relatively new. Anyway. I'm helping with a dressing change on a massive (90%+) burn who was also massively fluid resuscitated. Basically, that means that this guy is putting out gallons of insensible fluid loss. Plus skin sloughing. Picture this thick, partially congealed grey-brown liquid - like a poorly made Thanksgiving gravy - that is just sitting in the patient's bed.
Now, we do dressing changes in water proof gowns, hair nets, gloves (duh), and masks for a reason.
So we're turning the guy and, of course, a wave of fluid flows over the bed, coating my shoes and advancing upwards to soak through my scrub pants. I'm in the room for about an hour like that. We're almost done, turning the poor guy butt-towards me, when he starts to liquid stool everywhere. ("Burn poop.") It hits the wall behind me. I duck, manage to only get poop in my hair net. However, the turn buddy on my side who was holding up the patient's leg....drops said leg in order to get out of the way. Splat. (Splash?) I ended up getting a tidal wave of burn goo ALL OVER MY FACE. None in my mouth, thankfully.
Thank goodness for lock rooms and showers.
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Got to the floor one morning while doing LPN clinicals and received my patients. Was looking up med info before I went into pt #1's room. Saw a few CNA's look into a room, laugh, continue walking. One of them actually said "glad that ain't me". I had never been on that floor before, so wasn't aware the room they were looking into belonged to my patient. One of them finally asked which of us students had room xxx. I said that was mine, and they advised me to get in there asap. Literally, the biggest shock of my life that did not include death. My patient had escaped her restraints and used her bowel movement to fingerpaint her walls, herself, the bed, jeez, everything in the room had poop on it somewhere. Even the ceiling. And she was snacking on it as well.
Yep, reading these and making dinner haha. Dementia pts do love their poo don't they?!? I worked as a CNA for 3 years in an alz/dementia AL, and wow, a lot of poo dealings went on there! Gave me a good stomach for my nursing career!
Specializes in Trauma-Surgical, Case Management, Clinic.
A lot of these stories have mine beat by a long shot but the nastiest thing I've done is irrigate maggots from a pts nasal sinuses. Several times a day pt got normal saline flushes through his nostrils and the maggots would just come out. No idea how they got there, I'm itching just thinking about it!
OK, grossest thing I have ever seen, two things are tied.
Hospice- a guy with so much cancer inside his abdomen that it ate its way out of the skin. He had big open wounds on his belly that were full of tan, foul drainage that smelled so bad (necrotic, not poop) we got permission to keep his hospital window open (not an easy feat to talk infection control into this). It was so horrible, like two big gaping open mouths on his belly, that itched and he kept scratching them...
and the other one, tonsil cancer that did the same thing to a patient's neck. I had no sense of smell at that time, so I got to take care of that patient. Even wearing a mask, my nose would just run and run and run, so I knew it was pungent, and was glad for my anosmia. Really nice guy too.
I feel like all of these nasty stories revolve around poop!
I have one, Involving poop.
When I was a CNA, on summer break from Nursing School I'd work on an ortho trauma unit. I was helping take care of this lady who weighed at least 600 pounds, who had a femur fx. She needed to get out of the bed and use the BSC. So me, our male charge nurse, and 3 other male nurses went into the room to get her up. I was in the middle one was in the back and the other two under her arms. I for whatever reason had my leg between her legs in case she fell... and she said, "I HAVE TO GOOO!" and I felt warm on my leg. I looked down and there was (Brown word) from my Hips to my toes, soaking my scrubs and socks/ shoes. Of course this was 9am, and I refused to leave the room until our charge nurse went to the OR and got me some scrubs. That lady had no remorse either!!
OK, here is my humble poop contribution to the thread. Was being helpful and was holding the back of the gown closed on a LOL while she walked from a gurney back to her bed. She took 2 or 3 steps and yup, projectile C-Dif down the whole side of me. Even after a shower and clean OR scrubs I swear I smelled that all day. I am now more careful about where ummm , it is aimed.
I had just finished taking my CNA course and was hired at my place of employment. I was so excited to get going. It was around lunch time and all the residents were in the lunch room being served when our little lady resident needed to go to the bathroom...she was famous for needing to go #2 loosely all the time. So I told her caregiver that I would be happy to take her to the restroom. Her caregiver was quiet pleased . So I brought her to her bedroom bathroom and her pad was dry and clean!! I thought AWESOME! So as I am helping her out of her wheelchair and on to the toilet before sitting she let loose...when I say loose I MEAN LOOSE!! She went all over the walls on my white scrub pants and shoes on her wheelchair all over the toilet EVERYWHERE but guess where she missed HER PAD!! UGH!! Then she said "Shhhh don't tell anyone what happened!!" I didn't know if I should laugh or cry! I didn't volunteer as much after that episode :rotfl:
last semester I had a gentleman who kept mistaking the toilet and the floor - more than once he urinated everywhere BUT the toilet/urinal...anyway at one point I walked into the room and it was COVERED with poop - down his legs, in his socks, in between the bed rail and bed and on the floor and all over his bed....there were poop footprints all over the room etc...so I get him cleaned up and changed into fresh clothes and the bed stripped and wiped up (I went through an entire pack of wipes) and he was comfortably seated in his chair awaiting transport to rehab...the room STILL stunk even though houskeeping had mopped etc...(and the entire floor stunk - the CNA on the floor was hosing down the hallway with Lysol etc...LOL) anyway so I'm packing up his personal items and turned around to throw something in the trash can and realized his trash can was full of liquid poop - hello the source of lingering stench!
i remember this one lady I had when I worked OB, she had chorioamnionitis at about 16wks. it was so bad the smell when I was down there made me and her both gag, I felt so terrible! the amniotic sack was intact when it came out, I had to bust it, the stuf in there was like green slimy snot. the placenta was even green! the worst part was the fetus, it was not only green but had its skin sloughing off of it down to the bone in some places, I retched after that for about 30mins in the bathroom. i will never forget it.
:barf01:
. So I brought her to her bedroom bathroom and her pad was dry and clean!! I thought AWESOME! So as I am helping her out of her wheelchair and on to the toilet before sitting she let loose...when I say loose I MEAN LOOSE!! She went all over the walls on my white scrub pants and shoes on her wheelchair all over the toilet EVERYWHERE but guess where she missed HER PAD!! UGH!! Then she said "Shhhh don't tell anyone what happened!!" I didn't know if I should laugh or cry! I didn't volunteer as much after that episode :rotfl:
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Got to the floor one morning while doing LPN clinicals and received my patients. Was looking up med info before I went into pt #1's room. Saw a few CNA's look into a room, laugh, continue walking. One of them actually said "glad that ain't me". I had never been on that floor before, so wasn't aware the room they were looking into belonged to my patient. One of them finally asked which of us students had room xxx. I said that was mine, and they advised me to get in there asap. Literally, the biggest shock of my life that did not include death. My patient had escaped her restraints and used her bowel movement to fingerpaint her walls, herself, the bed, jeez, everything in the room had poop on it somewhere. Even the ceiling. And she was snacking on it as well.