How do you deal with "patient-know-it-alls"?

Nurses General Nursing

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I just had to ask b/c I am finding lately that a lot of my patients seem to think they know how to do my job better than I do because they watched a procedure one time or another. What do you all do when this happens?

Just this morning I had a 26y old female whom I had to re-prime her IV line b/c it went partially dry in the tubing. She kept telling me that I didn't need to unhook the tubing from her heplock, I could just run it. Um...OK, whatever. Then she decided to tell me how I should poke the tubing into the new Saline bag. Not even 30 seconds later she's telling me that I put the tubing in the pump wrong because she had less tubing to work with for movement than she had previously. Sorry, but I wanted to throttle her.

Specializes in 5 yrs OR, ASU Pre-Op 2 yr. ER.
Originally posted by Rapheal

Don't you just love when a patient asks you their BP and you respond 128/70. They then say "That can't be right. I had it taken at the doctors' last week and it was 120/68." lol

And yes you will do teaching on how BP fluctuates and then you will later hear a blood curdling scream and you run into the patients' room and they are hyperventiliating becuase they saw an itsy bitsy air bubble in their IV tubing (true story). lol

Funny you say that about the IV we just had someone go into their bathroom and ring the emergency light over an IV air bubble. And i stood there after shutting off the light and watched it float to the bag on its own.

Apparently the jarring of the pole as it ramped the threshold of the bathroom was enough to send it on its way ;)

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LOL...You gotta love it, don't you? :D

I'm short...very short as a matter of fact. A few days ago, I was hanging a new bag of IV fluids...since I can't reach the hook on the pole without lowering it, I clamped the line, paused the pump and lowered the hook. The patient's husband started screaming for me to raise the hook back up..."You're going to put a clot in her lung...you're sending air to her heart...stop that now!" I quietly told him that the line was clamped, so she wasn't getting any fluid for the moment and he litterally grabbed the pole out of my hand and pushed the hook all the way to the top. I then stood on the legs of the pole (the extra inch or two usually allow me to reach the hooks)...he then screamed at me for doing that...said I was going to fall and land on his wife and puncture her heart with the pole...sigh.

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Specializes in 5 yrs OR, ASU Pre-Op 2 yr. ER.

And i'm sure all that yelling helped the pt.'s anxiety level. :chuckle

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Specializes in Critical Care.
Originally posted by nialloh

Being a cardiac nurse, I don't come along peritoneal dialysis (pd) patients very often. The first one I came across, the pt wouldn't let me touch him until an experienced nurse showed me first (I knew the theory, but no practice). After that, he let me do the next exchange, but kept telling me what to do. The more exchanges I did, the more tips and tricks I was shown. He was a grumpy pt, but one day explained that if I did it wrong, he was the one who had to live with the peritonitus afterword. He was a good teacher, and tought many nurses well.

The thing I learned from this is when a pt has a chronic illness, they are often very focused, and can know more then we do. I have been supprised many times by the level of knowledge they have.

That is not to say I haven't been equally supprised by their lack of knowledge. :D But that is another story.

This is exactly why I think PD pts should do their own exchanges while hospitalized if possible. I know if it were me I would.

Noney

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Specializes in IMCU/Telemetry.
Originally posted by Noney

This is exactly why I think PD pts should do their own exchanges while hospitalized if possible. I know if it were me I would.

Noney

Noney, I would like to agree, but 6 months later, this pt expired. He went into general failure, and took about a week to pass. By this time he had been on and off our floor, and had pretty much trained all of us how to do it to his standerds. This ment that when he was too weak to do it, we had enough people on the unit who he knew could do it, and it was one less worry for him.

He was a royal PIA. But I still miss him, even two years later.

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I would love to ask them why they are staying in the hospital if they think that we are incompetent. I think that they would be afraid for their safety and seek another recovery "venue."

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Specializes in LTC, ER, ICU,.

i am glad some know about their medicines. it has helped several times even a simple sentence as "this isn't the color of my pill."

otherwise, i listen with a smile. :)

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Specializes in 5 yrs OR, ASU Pre-Op 2 yr. ER.

OR the pt that says "i don't know what it's called, but the pill is round". Oh THAT narrows it down!. :chuckle

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HI GUYS,

I AM FROM THE PHILS. AND I AM CURRENTLY TAKING UP VN/PN. I AM AN ENTREPRENEUR AND DECIDED TO TAKE UP NURSING BECAUSE FOR ME IT IS A VERY NOBLE JOB WHERE YOU CAN HELP AND GIVE CARE FOR PEOPLE. CAN ANYBODY HELP ME?? I JUST WANT TO KNOW HOW DO YOU GIVE CARE TO A PERSON (NURSING INTERVENTION) WITH CVD. I HOPE SOMEBODY WOULD BE VERY KIND ENOUGH TO HELM ME ON THIS.

CHEERS,

LYN:)

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Specializes in IMCU/Telemetry.
Originally posted by LPN2Be2004

OR the pt that says "i don't know what it's called, but the pill is round". Oh THAT narrows it down!. :chuckle

Or it's the blue one:D

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