Odd interactions

Jensmom7, BSN, RN · Oct 19, 2015

The hallucinating residents can be hilarious. One particular gal that comes to mind regularly has visits from "friends" and even helps herself to snacks to pass around to them. Kind of funny to see about 15 little ice creams scattered around her room all open with spoons in them for her friends. She will also occasionally insist her friend is sick and needs to go to the hospital. She gets very upset that we will not call the ambulance for "Dr Bob" after all, he's right there in that chair, "CAN"T YOU SEE HE NEEDS HELP!"...umm, no I can't see him. Gotta admit I've been kind of tempted to call the ambulance to pick up her imaginary friend just to see how they react.

I know a nurse on a Memory Care unit who will call one of the extensions, hand the phone to the resident, and the go pick up the extensions. Works every time-she acts like whatever friend or relative the resident is hallucinating about, and the resident is happy.

nrsang97, BSN, RN · Oct 19, 2015

I had a family member of a patient who should have been a rapid response but the nurse handled it and did the right thing. The patient had an ortho surgery and was post op and should have been placed in IMC after for monitoring due to desaturating but was not. The nurse on the ortho unit had gotten an order to transfer the patient down, and did so.

After the pt was moved, her daughters stopped me as I was leaving the ICU. They asked me in a rather attacking manner if I worked in ICU or IMU and I told them that I did not. They then proceeded to tell me that the IMC unit seemed substandard. They wouldn't elaborate but kept saying the unit was substandard. I later found out that the one daughter was removed from the hospital for harassing nurses and interfering with her mom's care. She actually was shaking her mother at one point.

littlehoneybee · Oct 19, 2015

When I was a nursing assistant, I was floated to the peds unit a few times. One day, we admitted a four month old baby girl and while I was taking her temperature rectally, her father asked if I was sexually turned on because I was smiling. That guy gave me the creeps.

lavenderskies, BSN · Oct 19, 2015

little honeybee said

temperature rectally, her father asked if I was sexually turned on because I was smiling. That guy gave me the creeps.

:cautious: man, there are some serious freaks out there.

Cricket183, BSN, RN · Oct 19, 2015

little honeybee said
man, there are some serious freaks out there.

True Story!

Angelicpurl · Oct 20, 2015

Did you work with me once?

I had a lady like that too!

Angelicpurl · Oct 20, 2015

Hey, if it works....we had a former nurse on our dementia unit. She had her own "book of notes" that she wrote on each resident. The doctor even humored her by "reading" them and making suggestions.

But we swore a resident was hallucinating down on another unit. She saw spiders & snakes. Truth was that there really WAS a snake IN her bed and the cupboard was INFESTED with spiders! She have a room that freaked a friend of mine out....if she saw someone on the floor in the mirror, look out! They WERE there in the mirror if you looked. Maybe just not IN her room, but someone fell elsewhere in the building (usually within 15 minutes of her calling out!). Creepy!!! We learned to start doing fast checks when she rangets out someone was on the floor beside her bed. The night she died, someone DID fall beside her bed. A confused older man from down the hall. Who died the next week....

NurseMikki · Oct 20, 2015

Years ago on nightshift l had a cute little Bil AKA lady that apparently sundowned. She used her bedside phone to xall the vols saying we were holding her against het will. The police HAD to come to the unit to investigate. After they left we decided to move her closer to the station and gave het a dummy phone not plugged into the wall. Only for her to sweetly ask for her craft bag and we thought, "great! She'll entertain herself until shift change." Sigh, she used her craft scissors to cut the wires on her tele bix so it looked as she went asystole. I really earned my salary that night.

NutmeggeRN, BSN · Oct 20, 2015

And somehow I (a person who can do all their own ADLs and everything) am still single. Sigh.

Yup, I hear ya!

Pumpkinn · Oct 21, 2015

5) When I was a charge nurse, I at times was summoned to patients' rooms to basically hear their complaints. I was talking to a patient who was providing a litany of complaints...she hadn't been helped right away when she came from PACU, her IV had beeped all night, this was the worst hospital, etc. I was patiently listening when dietary arrived. Patient exclaimed that she was hungry, starts shoveling in food. Tell her I'll come back to let her finish. Return and she's like, "Oh, I think I was just hungry. I'm good now."

She was HANGRY

CloverPark, RN · Oct 21, 2015

One of my favorite stories ever, although more funny than odd:

Back when I was a tech at a hospital, I had a patient who was in his early 20s, alert, oriented x3, walkie talkie. At that hospital, patients needed an order to be able to shower, so most got bed baths, or in the case of the walkie talkies, would be given a basin and supplies to wash up. When I went to his room to give him washcloths and towels, etc. he insisted that he was unable to wash himself, even after I explained how most patients usually did it, and then I even filled up the basin and set everything up for him. Being that he had absolutely no physical limitations whatsoever, I asked him why he believed he couldn't wash himself, and he started with some story about feeling "weak," and unable to move his arms enough in order to wash himself. The strangest part of all of this was that his girlfriend was right there and even started crying. It was so awkward. Even though I wanted to slap him, I very politely offered to help him wash his back, but stated that he should be able to do the rest himself. He kept insisting that I needed to do his "entire body." He then ripped off his hospital gown, and while sitting at the side of his bed, closed his eyes and spread out his arms as if to say "wash me." The girlfriend then cried even more.

I excused myself, stating there was something I needed to go do, and I went to the male nurse who was on that shift and told him the story. He decided that HE would go in there and offer to "help." Now this nurse was probably about 6 1/2 feet tall, on the heavy side, and had a handlebar mustache... I was DYING with laughter! When he went in the room, I hovered near the doorway to listen in.

Male nurse in his big deep voice: "Hello, I heard you needed some help washing up."

Patient: "Where did that girl go?"

Nurse: "I'm afraid she's busy, and I'm the only one here who can help you."

Patient: "Man, bring that girl back here, I don't wanna get washed up by a dude."

Nurse: "I don't understand why you can't wash yourself. What seems to be the problem?"

Patient: "Well, I can't reach here, and here..." as he points to those places.

Nurse: "Well it looks like you just did."

Patient: "Oh screw this BS, I'll wash myself."

Nurse: "I thought so. Have a good day."

The tears were pouring down face and my stomach hurt so bad from laughing! That nurse was awesome!

JerseyTomatoMDCrab, BSN · Oct 21, 2015

Okay, folks. Here's a couple for you.

My old job had an outpatient sickle cell clinic. My floor was the go-to spot for the clinic patients when they were in crisis so the Dilauded was a-flowing! 10, 12, 14mg q2H. On the dot. With IV Benadryl. The most I gave was 16 but that's beside the point.

Anyway, we had this patient who came relatively frequently. Outside the hospital walls, she was a totally normal, functioning person. Job, kids, out and about in the community. Once that Dilauded hit her veins? Game. Over.

She was like a completely different person. Once, we walked into her room and she was flinging baby powder all over the room. Just waving the open container all over the room. It looked like Christmas.

Another time, I found a pork chop in her bed.

Once, we had to place her with a roommate. We usually wanted her in a private but if none were available we had to subject a poor sucker to her craziness. Her roommate was an 89 year old deaf Greek lady in a neckbrace. It was ideal that she couldn't hear or turn to see the rest of the room because on this admission our Dilauded princess decided to wrap herself up in the curtain that divided the room. All while humming patriotic tunes and masturbating. God bless America, indeed.