Grossest Thing You've Ever Seen

Nurses General Nursing

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So today I was emptying my patient's recently revised colostomy drainage...And I removed about a pound of what looked like pot roast, along with peas and cucumber seeds. I didn't freak out in front of him, but on the inside I was gagged and trying not to freak out. I've seen lots of other really "gross" things and not even flinched, but for some reason that almost did me in.

So now I need to know... what's the grossest thing you've ever seen?

Specializes in Med/Surg.

Nothing that I care to share or remember seeing and dealing with. I find this a gross question but that just my opinion :nurse:

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Specializes in med/surg, psych, public health.
grossest.......mushrooms growing in crevices of a leg with elephantism :bugeyes:

I bet he was a fun guy! (fungi) :wink2:

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I had this 600 lb pt with arterial insufficiency, and his feet had like a 1/2 inch of dead skin-- it looked like they were covered in sand. Every time I was in his room, especially when I had to remove/apply the heal protectors, I am imagining myself breathing in all this dead skin that was sloughing off. I thought it was getting in my mouth. It was freaking me out, because when you took the sheet off, the specialty bed was covered with dead skin dust. It's really grossing me out thinking about it now.

I had a patient story similar to that except my guy had severe plaque psoriasis that he looked like an alligator so his dermatologist started him on a med, don't remember the name but it essentially stopped his keratin production. It took about a week to work but then just like that all of his giant pieces of plaque just started to fall off. We had to keep giving him red bio bags for his skin and clean his floor and bed at least three times a day cause there was dead skin flakes everywhere.

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I was fortunate not to witness this. It happened quite a few years ago on a med/surg floor. A patient with a new colostomy who had psych issues decided to pull the thing apart. The night shift staff heard him yelling in his room and went to see what was going on. He had pulled his colostomy bag off, tore his stoma apart and was pulling his colon out of the hole & shredding it to bits. There was a lot of blood, poop and tissue thrown on the wall. I'm so glad I wasn't there. The staff that was still makes faces over that night & it was over 5 years ago.

omg you win!

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A few years ago I worked at an outpatient endoscopy center. But wait, it's not what you think. The weirdest client c/o nausea and vomiting with the prep she was required to do the night before ( phospa-soda). She had even called the center that morning and c/o vomiting all night. When she arrived for her procedure she presented me with the blue grocery bag she had been vomiting in. I almost took it from her but then had her dispose of it in the bathroom. I guess she thought we wouldn't believe her about the vomiting. Just plain weird!!:uhoh3:

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I have read this entire thread and my stomach was just slightly butterflied but when I came to this the visual that I got was just gross. I think I have found the thing that will gross me out when I am a nurse. I have always thought I had a tough stomach but I think this might get me going. Something about the flaking just gives me the creepy feeling you get when you think a bug is crawling on you.

:barf01::nuke:

This reply is for Toph McGee's post with the flaky skin and severe plaque psoriasis. Sorry... still learning how to reply to certain quotes.

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New nurse so the only one I have is the GI bleed that projectile vomited coffee ground material (and one lonely grape) all over the bed, the floor, and the wall. I could not get the stink out of my nose!

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Ahh... coffee grounds. That reminds me....

I had a pt with untreated cancer. She wasn't doing so hot. It was dinner time and we had all the pts in the dining room, except for this pt, I'll call Ann.

My gut told me to go check on her in her room where she was in bed.

As soon as I walked into the room, I knew the end was near. You know, you can just tell.

Sure enough, I told her, "Ann, honey, it's L888. You're not alone. It's okay."

I held her hand and, sure enough, she let go and died.

I left the room to tell the charge Ann had died.

The charge asked me if I needed help cleaning her up. Everyone was busy feeding pts and I had cleaned up dead pts before. I said I'd be fine, I could handle it.

Well, I turned Ann to change her and make her look nice before her dtr arrived.

When rolled her back, coffee grounds started to come from her nose.

I'd seen that before and kept working to make her look nice.

Then the coffee grounds let loose from her rectum.

I rolled her back over to change her again.... then began the deluge of coffee grounds from every orfice.

The poor woman was a mess. Every time I thought I got it, out came more... nose, mouth, ears, lady parts, rectum... I mean, holy cow. She was just oozing like crazy. It was like her insides were mush and it was all escaping.

I couldn't believe it. Looked like a horror movie!

I didn't know when the dtr was arriving and did NOT want her dtr to come in and see her mom like that.

Poor lady was absolutely swimming in foul brown muck.

I finally got the job done, but I then had to rinse out all the linens in the hopper.

I was 8 months pregnant and my stomach wasn't feeling to good. I remember I thought I would pass out!

I'll never forget the sight and the smell. It was unholy!

God love her, but it was hard.

Fortunately, when her dtr came, I was done and Ann did look peaceful.

My nerves were shot, though!

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Hygiene Queen, is that how you got your handle?

Good job, btw.

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As a cna in the nursing home I saw alot of gross things. Once as I was doing pt rounds I had a little old lady who was eating what I thought was a candy bar.....by the time I was able to glove and go for her treat she took another delicious bite out of her poo stick.....yum!

...Same job, had another lady that was confused and would get up in the middle of the night to wander and such. She appeared at the nurses station fully dressed with what I thought was chocolate pudding around her mouth. You guessed it. They loved thier pooh.

As a nurse took care of a man once that had a rare disease that caused infectious boils only in the sweat glands. He had been there several times to have the boils treated and huge areas of the skin removed. It caused these huge boils filled with (coffee with cream) colored thick pus. We had to dress the areas that popped but this would cause other boils to pop easily......so nasty.

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Specializes in Icu, ltac, stepdown.
grossest.......mushrooms growing in crevices of a leg with elephantism :bugeyes:

just a thought........ butter and basil?????:saint:

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Heh heh... I AM the Hygiene Queen!

No pt of mine looks scruffy!

I have never failed to get compliments on my pts.

I have cleaned more disturbing things out of toes, under breasts, out of mouth and between legs than I care to think about.

I'm scared to think about what I am going to be like when I am a nurse. If the aides working with me don't measure up to my standards, I might be a witch.:watherthunderstormc

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