What Is Your Most Gross, Yucky, Disgusting Nursing Horror Story?

[yazisizit]

I was working a night shift on a tele floor as a new Nurse.

We had this one poor old lady who was confused and was restrained as usual for her safety. She was our designated resident nightmare geri from hell, so she was placed near the Nurse's station.

So we are chilling out at the Nurse's station, chatting and trying to get through another night...

Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I see our lady in question standing in the dimly lit doorway of her room!

I instantly leap out and run to her. As I approach her, she appears to be falling towards me, so I meet her in a bear hug...my arms around her waste, and her arms around my shoulders.

As I catch the lady, I notice a very strong smell of feces, and I feel something warm on my hands, arms and shoulders...

My fellow heroes come in behind me, and as the lights are turned on, my worst fears are instantly realized.

Yes, I caught the poor old lady with a good old bear hung football catch, but I was also covered in the lady's feces.

As I look at her, she has feces smeared all over her arms and hands... (and even her face!)

And of course, now so did I!

[lynus9000nurse]

Any one have any Bot fly or other disgusting parasite/insect stories? If your not sure what a Bot fly is or what could be "nasty" about it, I recomend Youtube search: Bot fly. Be ready. (as a nurse or will be, you already are!)

[iNurseUK, RN]

On my old Plastics ward (I guess I should really call it "Reconstructive" surgery as we didn't do boob jobs or liposuction or any of the cosmetic stuff) we routinely used both maggots and leeches as treatments.

Maggots are superb at non-sugical debridement of necrotic wounds. We had specially-bred sterile ones from Pharmacy and would put them into a wound, cover with a special breatheable membrane secured with waterproof tape. Left for three days they would happlily feast on necrotic tissue and when washed off with nothing scarier than normal saline would leave a nice clean wound ready for grafting or placing a flap.

Leeches we used for flaps (either free flaps or tunnelled ones) that were showing signs of venous congestion (slow venous return, dark colour, coldness or hardness) and the critters did a great job. Some patients even nicknamed the leeches. They secrete an enzyme similar to heparin to thin the blood but have a localised action only.

We always used to joke that the leeches had a good life. When they had their fill of blood they would fall off and we would drown them in alcohol. Not a bad way to go! :)

[FranEMTnurse, CNA, LPN, EMT-I]

On my old Plastics ward (I guess I should really call it "Reconstructive" surgery as we didn't do boob jobs or liposuction or any of the cosmetic stuff) we routinely used both maggots and leeches as treatments.

Maggots are superb at non-sugical debridement of necrotic wounds. We had specially-bred sterile ones from Pharmacy and would put them into a wound, cover with a special breatheable membrane secured with waterproof tape. Left for three days they would happlily feast on necrotic tissue and when washed off with nothing scarier than normal saline would leave a nice clean wound ready for grafting or placing a flap.

Leeches we used for flaps (either free flaps or tunnelled ones) that were showing signs of venous congestion (slow venous return, dark colour, coldness or hardness) and the critters did a great job. Some patients even nicknamed the leeches. They secrete an enzyme similar to heparin to thin the blood but have a localised action only.

We always used to joke that the leeches had a good life. When they had their fill of blood they would fall off and we would drown them in alcohol. Not a bad way to go! :)

Neat. I don't mind the medically controlled andcultivated maggots nor leeches. They do excellent debridement. However, when an injured person is found still alive after baking in the sun a few hours, and maggots unexpectedly fall out of openings, it becomes disgusting.

[lynus9000nurse]

Yeah I've heard of maggots being used in medicine and it makes sense. They thrive on dead tissue and what better than to use natures "clean up crew". Especially if they are being bread via pharm. It's interesting, I might look up how they exactly do that. As far as leeches, they have been used for medical purposes for hundreds of years. If something works good, why change it? Any-hoo, like I said, if you get a chance check out the bot-fly larva extraction. Pretty freaky but interesting.

[NP Sam]

Well...

Another CNA and I were cleaning up a dementia patient and all of a sudden he started smiling and... masturbating. We were taught that this is common so we knew what to do when this happens.

[lynus9000nurse]

What do you do? I'm just starting school and have'nt worked in the feild yet but yeah, what the heck do you do? "Please sir! there's better things to do with your time!" LOL

[meintheUSA]

Well...

Another CNA and I were cleaning up a dementia patient and all of a sudden he started smiling and... masturbating. We were taught that this is common so we knew what to do when this happens.

YOU STAND BACK.... WAY BACK.

[NP Sam]

We were taught to provide privacy but we actually just removed his hand and tightened his brief (diaper).

Of course he "found" it again lol.

[delgadojbc]

Grossest thing that happened to me. The FIRST and ONLY time I wore my hair down, in a half ponytail. Think long, thick curly hair. My poor patient started coughing and then vomiting what I thought was phlegm...turns out he had end stage lung CA and what landed in my curls was lung tissue. My lunch barely stayed down and I almost ran but he was so embarassed he started to cry. I swallowed the chunks and reassured him it was OK and no big deal. Poor little guy passed the next day when the pulmonologist tried to intubate.

[StudentNurse2011]

I've been a surgical/endoscopy tech for many many years, so it takes a lot to gross me out. I have 2 stories, tho - one for now, and another later.

A couple of years ago, we had to bronch a pneumonia pt (basically a wash and suction). Normally not a problem, but the bronchoscope kept getting clogged. The doc would extubate so I could clean the scope (wipe the end with a 4x4 then irrigate with saline). A few times, the scope had some nice lugeys on it. I was already gagging, the circulating nurse wouldn't even look in our general direction, and the CRNA had her eyes fixed firmly on her charting. Only the doc and I would actually look at what we were doing, but we didn't have a lot of choice.

He extubated at one point for me to clean the scope, and the attached lugey was truly impressive. That did it for me. I gagged so hard I had tears flowing down my face, and I thought I was gonna hit the floor from vagaling down. My glasses were fogged, but I couldn't take them off because my hands were dirty. I asked the circulator to come get them off for me; she refused. LOL I was like.....I'm serious. These glasses gotta come off. I can't see crap. She finally removed my glasses, but she still refused to look at my face, the doc's, the patient's, or the monitor.

We continued the procedure as before, wash a little, suck a little, extubate, wipe, and irrigate. Every time I tried to clean the scope, I gagged all over again. The doctor was in tears too - from laughing at me. I was gagging too hard to care. It got to the point that I'd lean over and wipe my eyes on his shoulder. I've never gagged so hard in my life without actually losing my breakfast.

A couple of days later, we had to put a PEG tube in this pt. The pulmonologist decided that while we're there, he'd just do another bronch. So now, I have 2 of my docs working with me - both of whom live to torment me. The pulmonologist happily recounted the story for the gastroenterologist, and they both delighted in tormenting me all over again - I wouldn't respond verbally to their teasing, but I flipped them both off - several times, and of course that made them laugh that much harder. lol Never mind that the RN and the CRNA in the room didn't even have the testicular fortitude to LOOK at what we were doing. At least I TRIED. That's been a couple of years ago - and I still haven't lived that procedure down.

[NurseCherish]

Ok, so prepare yourselves for this one. A year or so ago, I was doing charge and working with a nurse who walked out of a pt's room and frantically waved me over. I'm thinking "oh crap, here we go". So, I run down to this ladies room, who was suffering from some dementia. This nurse is telling me "You have to look in her mouth!! Please tell me it's not what I think it is" This poor woman had dug into her diaper and was proceeding to eat her own BM! I start gagging!! The nurse then turns to me and tells me "I told her she was NPO!" Needless to say, I was not amused!

[StudentNurse2011]

unfortunately, I've seen that a few times....that's one ya just can't get used to, tho.

My other gross out story was from the operating room. One Saturday morning on callback, an orthopod and I were doing a fx hip repair. Of course, these procedures are about as bloody as they come. While we worked, blood was dripping down the drapes, and of course, into my shoes. I couldn't do a thing about it but stand there and try my hardest not to think about it.

When anesthesia started calculating EBL, I quietly spoke up and told him he should probably add 100ml to the count for the blood in my shoes. After everybody quit laughing and gagging, the surgeon spoke up - add another 100 for my shoes too. Another round of laughing and gagging.

The nurse got extra shoe covers for both of us. We threw our bloody shoe covers, shoes, and socks in the red trash, put on the fresh shoe covers, and made our way to the janitor's closet. We both washed our feet with chlorhexadine, but we were tempted to wash them again with bleach (we didn't lol). We both wore shoe covers (barefooted underneath) home from the hospital that morning, even though it was the middle of January and as cold as a witch's....you know. That weekend, I bought 2 pairs of shoes - 1 pair to wear and 1 pair that I dedicated to the OR. I've never scrubbed in my street shoes again. That was just about the grossest thing I've ever endured - standing in a pool of somebody else's blood inside my shoes for over an hour.