Share Your Funniest Patient Stories...

Nurses Humor

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We all have lots of stories to tell. I thought it would be fun if we shared a few of our funniest patient stories with each other. :lol2:

Here's mine...

I keep remembering a particular incident a few years back. It wasn't even my patient.

I was heading down the hallway on the CCU unit in which I worked. I was minding my own business, heading down the hallway and I just happened to glance into a patient room...

I couldn't believe what I saw...

An older gentleman, who clearly was having some post-op dementia after open heart surgery....

he was sitting up in the middle of his bed and with knees bent and feet braced at the bed rail for extra support....

With both hands...

HE WAS PULLING on all of his CHEST TUBES with ALL OF HIS MIGHT!!!

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Needless to say, I sprang into action along with all the surrounding nursing staff. It took security along with all of us to restrain this man so he wouldn't hurt himself. Though it wasn't funny at the time....I can't get this picture out of my mind and find it amusing to remember.

What's your story?

I once had a patient in a Los Angeles hospital with a massive chest infection post heart surgery. The tissue over his chest had dissolved, leaving his heart, beating away in the open. I was flushing his IV site, and noticed by his facial expressions that he was afraid of what I was doing. The patient had free medical care as part of his legal settlement. As soon as I left the room, he called the chief of surgery and told him I was poisoning him( at 2 am, no less). After much bro-ha-ha and talking to every "official" in the hospital, they decided he was not to be my patient any more. I thanked them, then told them I was the only American nurse on the floor. Out of the 32 murses on the cardiac step down unit, all the others were phillipino. Two of them were male, but they were MD's in the Phillipines. A special agreement allowed them to practice as RN's in this country. Not a good idea, as nursing is quite different than medical. I ALWAYS got the worst patients on the floor. Standard load was 12 patients with admissions and discharges. I never clocked out out before 9am. All the nurses had rhythm strips to do every two hours. If you are planning to become a nurse, the worst place to work is in a public hospital. Noone in management will ever be happy with how good a job you do. If anything goes wrong, somehow, it is your fault. They will complain about unfinished admissions, and yet complain about the overtime. Best thing to do is quit. If you do, the conditions are the same no matter which hospital you go to.

Specializes in LTC, CPR instructor, First aid instructor..
pinchmesh said:
I once had a patient in a Los Angeles hospital with a massive chest infection post heart surgery. The tissue over his chest had dissolved, leaving his heart, beating away in the open. I was flushing his IV site, and noticed by his facial expressions that he was afraid of what I was doing. The patient had free medical care as part of his legal settlement. As soon as I left the room, he called the chief of surgery and told him I was poisoning him( at 2 am, no less). After much bro-ha-ha and talking to every "official" in the hospital, they decided he was not to be my patient any more. I thanked them, then told them I was the only American nurse on the floor. Out of the 32 murses on the cardiac step down unit, all the others were phillipino. Two of them were male, but they were MD's in the Phillipines. A special agreement allowed them to practice as RN's in this country. Not a good idea, as nursing is quite different than medical. I ALWAYS got the worst patients on the floor. Standard load was 12 patients with admissions and discharges. I never clocked out out before 9am. All the nurses had rhythm strips to do every two hours. If you are planning to become a nurse, the worst place to work is in a public hospital. Noone in management will ever be happy with how good a job you do. If anything goes wrong, somehow, it is your fault. They will complain about unfinished admissions, and yet complain about the overtime. Best thing to do is quit. If you do, the conditions are the same no matter which hospital you go to.

POOR Pinchmesh. That must have been an awful experience..

Specializes in Orthopedics, Phlebotomy, Emergency.

This happened a few days ago. Im an ER nurse for 2 years and its my first bedside work. Its the last two weeks of my 30 day render before leaving abroad. It was my first time to have an order of having a male patient to be connected to a condom catheter. We always use foley catheters when transferring a patient to the ICU. After having my 73 year old male patient wear his condom catheter(after several tries of me having to retract his member. It was so awkward, I swear!), I told him to just inform me or the ward nurse if he has to go pee. I dint know that I should connect it to a urine bag and tie the double sided sticker around his tralala, and everytime he has to go, I prepare and catch his urine using a urinal (DIY IV bottle urinal) Imagine that! I was so embarassed when I was called into attention of my supervisor regarding that situation. The ward nurse asked me if the urine bag got lost along the patients way to the floors! Hahahaha! Well, at least I know how to use (and put on) a condom catheter now.

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