Nursing School Bloopers

UM Review RN, ASN, RN · Feb 14, 2005

My nursing student buddy asked me to help her pull her pt up in bed. The pt was really groggy and was asking why were we pulling him up in bed. I told him "So your feet don't get caught down here at the bottom." We pulled him up, got him all comfortable, and it was then when I realized he was a double above the knee amputee!!!

Waaaaaaaaay back in the Dark Ages, it was discovered by the nursing staff that I apparently had supernatural powers. To wit, according to my charting, I had walked John, a double amputee, every single day for a solid month!

Hallelujah!

What the staff failed to tell me is that both residents in the room had switched beds, nor was it reflected in the charts because it was such a small facility that everyone knew everyone else--except me.

The error was corrected and nobody sued. In fact, both of the guys got a kick (pardon the pun ) out of it when they heard about it.

cjssn · Feb 15, 2005

My most embarrassing moment happened the first time I inserted a foley catheter into a female patient. Embarrassing because I am a woman and you would think I would know a little sumpin' about sumpin'.
Anyway, I prepare the patient and the sterile field and am ready to start. I tell the patient I am going to touch her, and then carefully and slowly clean her with the betadine soaked cotton balls--taking great care to clean the area I THINK is her urethral meatus. This is so embarrassing--I cringe now just thinking about it. Right before I get ready to insert the tip of the catheter into a small crease that I THINK is the urethral meatus, I get a feeling something is not quite right and hesitate. At this point, I've got the catheter just a few inches away from where I am planning to insert it. I'm so nervous I can hardly think straight because the instructor and 3 other classmates are watching. The instructor tells me to go ahead, and mercy me, I have a moment where the fog clears out of my brain and I realize what I think is her urethral meatus is actually her privy parts. In that split second of lucid thinking--you know how nervous you get with the instructor watching--I took a closer look, saw the 'real' meatus and inserted the catheter correctly--realizing how close I came to making a mistake. I felt so stupid and my face turned red as a beet. I don't know if my instructor knew--I wouldn't doubt it because she was smart as a whip--but she just looked at me, smiled and said "Good job."

Last year during clinical one of my friends had to insert a foley in a woman. None of us had done this yet so we were all eager to watch. The poor girl goes in there with the instuctor and three students. She explains to the patient what she is going to do and then begins to set up. Well The patient is not happy and is yelling out the whole time which only makes my friend more nervous. When it comes time to insert we all look and realize there is no definite looking meatus. There are these little holes all over, or they were spots that looks like holes. Our instructor justs starts pointing and saying, "Try this one, try that one." The poor woman is yelling in pain and the student is getting upset. Suddenly one of the other students who had been a nurse in another country says, " One time we had a patient and we had to put it in her lady parts." We all kind of looked at her, but the instructor said, " I don't know, try it." So the student put it in and sure enough it worked. The stuff that came out, uuggh! It was so gross! It figures the week after in lecture we were told about how this might be a possibility when you can't find it on the outside.

icyounurse, BSN, RN · Feb 15, 2005

when i was in nursing school, i definantly had some awkward moments.heres a couple i remember from school

1. i was told to get a u/a from a pt with a foley, when i asked how i was told "just draw from the port." so i drew a curiously clear sample, only i drew it from the balloon port! to make matters so much more humiliating, the pt's daughter was in the room, and yes, she was an rn with 10 plus years of experiance! she was very nice about it, were able to reinflate the balloon and save the catheter, but i'm sure she wondered about the care she was leaving her father in!

2. a girl i went to school with was supposed to get a stool sample, she didn't know you only need a little stool. so she packs the little container to the top with stool and sticks the lid on and tubes it to lab. we were told it exploded from the gas buildup in the lab. we had a good laugh and learned a good lesson. now all stool specimens must be walked to the lab.

blue heron · Feb 22, 2005

On Peds, I was doing the admit on a baby, and she was called down to X-ray, so my instructor told me to go along, and do what paper work I could during the waiting. Babe already had an IV, so off we went, mom, baby, big sister, the pump and me. We got to the elevator, and the pump starts beeping, and I don't have a clue what to do to make it shut up! and I'm SO nervous because the mom is a peds RN, one of the best. She relizes my problem, and teaches me how to work this pump-absolute class-and I just wanted to die!!! :imbar She was so kind, so I settled down and the rest of the shift was fine.

Then a couple weeks ago, (now I'm on sug) my instructor calls me, and I see her and an RN standing by the med cart. So I go over and instructor is holding a bottle of Humulin R out to me. I take it and start to say, 'insulin", when she says so and so Pt's guc was ___. I look rather blankly at her :stone , when the RN shows me the insulin administration record out and all of a sudden the LIGHT GOES ON :idea: It turns out I'm two and a half hours late with insulin!!! :uhoh21: The RN says ' we both missed it', she forgot too. We gave it imediately, and I found out from my instructor that it wasn't as critical THIS time, b/c this pt is on TPN, so no spikes and valleys, nor is he actually a diabetic. The insulin was being given because he has acute pancreatitis.

It took me awhile to stop shaking!!! :uhoh21:

Now I check the print out AND the divider in the MAR AND the purple section in the chart!!!!

Gwailo · Feb 23, 2005

I'm doin my pregrad and the other day while preparing a syringe to administer meds via tube, I was eliminating air when the plunger got stuck. All of a sudden the plunger freed itself and a large "wad" of water hit the ceiling like a bullet, bounced off of it and struck a doctor right on top of his bald head!

He was very good about it and laughed.... I swear it wasn't on purpose!

JessicRN · Feb 23, 2005

Yep - you are so right. Another great one is (at least in the ER) we use pressure bags on our IVs sometimes so if you accidentally disconnect it - whew! - out it rushes!

When I was a student I was giving blood and I was told to speed it up by adding a pressure device. I pumped it up to what I thought was the recommended pressure but the device was faulty and as a result I pumped it up too much and the bag exploded. I felt so bag everyone in the room looked like a war victim. (this was the days before AIDS ) Then everyone just exploded in laughter including the patient thank god

dknunges · Feb 24, 2005

Great student nurse stories. It sure brings back memories!! :wink2:
I am rather new to the forum, but let me add a couple of tales.
The first one is on me.
I was passing meds for one of the first times on a med/surg unit. I guess I was soooo up tight about the 5 rights and all that I wasn't thinking. On the med sheet, it said "crush meds". So I did. (can you see where this is going)
I held out this spoon full of powder to this poor old man with the intent of literally shoving down his throat dry!!! He wasn't that senile. He looked at me, then at the spoon, then at me again, and blew the contents of the spoon (lasix and dig. among others) right into my face!!! No one said, "mix the crushed meds in apple sauce".
Second story, one of my class mates, I believe. The order read, take out half of the skin staples. She did. The top half!! After returning the pt from surgery for a dehis. it was explained to her.
And last. A SN was told to change the gown on her pt, who had an IV. Your have to know, this was before those new gowns with the snaps on the shoulders. Anyway, without any problem she worked the gown up and over all the tubing, then the bag and continued with the gown down the pole to the base. She was found sitting on the floor, trying to figure out how to get the gown over the base and wheels.
My daughter is now in her first quarter of nursing school. I hope she and others can enjoy and learn from our "incidents".
If not, I hope they share them so we all can get a good laugh!!
Mike

Mike,

Thanks for sharing, I laughed so hard I was crying. I can just picture it! :rotfl: :rotfl:

Donna

dknunges · Feb 24, 2005

I had just graduated from school and was was working nights on OB/GYN Surgical floor. It must have been close to midnight, patient were settled for the night. I was in med room with a couple of co-workers and were talking about anything and everything while I was preparing to spike a new bottle of Procalamine. I took the bottle off of the cart and was talking and looking at my co-worker at the same time I was setting the bottle on the counter to spike and prime the tubing. Well you guessed it, I missed the counter and that glass bottle hit the floor and exploded. It sounded like a cannon it was so loud. I think every call light on the floor went on at the same time, all phone lines started ringing and nurses came running down from the other end. All this to see what that big boom was. We all got a good laugh about it, but you can bet from then on I paid attention to what I was doing.

PS The night went down hill from there :uhoh3:

xmaxiex · Feb 24, 2005

On my first cath experience I was being watched by my instructor and three classmates. Everything went perfectly and I was as proud as a peacock . However I had never fixed the other end of the foley into the specimen container but instead it was facing my instructor and proceeded to splash her . Needless to say the students enjoyed the spectacle.

cathy2005 · Feb 24, 2005

i had to give pt care wash pt up no promblem?well shes on heavy side and i lift under neath her breast she screamed ouch whats wrong i asked she said i slaped her in the face with her own breast :rotfl: :chuckle

Ruby Vee, BSN · Aug 21, 2005

anyone have any funny nursing school stories from their past?
i had to change an iv bag and went in with my instructor to do so. my instructor always made me nervous but i was determined to remain confident and do the task....it wasnt difficult. she proceeded to ask me what was in the bag and i told her normal saline. she told me "ok, go ahead" and stood back to watch. i proceeded to pull out the line to put it into the new bag, but didn't take it off the iv pole before doing so. i received a saline bath with the remaining fluid that was in the bag. my instructor ran to get a towel and we cleaned up the wet floor. she then asked me to step outside the room. i thought i was going to hear it. what i heard was her laughing and telling me that i had to laugh sometimes and "everyohne has a saline bath once and then it never happens again." i still don't believe her but its funny looking back now.

at least yours was a saline bath. i've had two: tpn (which was bad enough) and blood. yuk!

ruby

mandrews · Aug 21, 2005

A friend of mine was asked by a little elderly man if he would assist him onto a bedpan. So he gets the little man on the bedpan and he grumbles about how uncomfortable he is then says, " son I think you got this thing a** backwards." Indeed it was and we had a good little snicker over that one. :)

melissa