Share Your Funniest Patient Stories...

alvardalton · Mar 19, 2005

I was called in one night to special a patient, a LOL. This lady just had a hip fracture and was very aggressive about wanting to go home and was trying to get out of bed! The ward was busy and the order of the night was to keep her quiet and in bed (easier said than done!). This elderly woman was becoming increasingly annoyed with me as I continued to tell her to stay put. She was calling me a mean spirited individual and many other phrases she could think of!. Just as I was beginning to believe her it was time for my break (a sanity break!). I was off for just half an hour but when I came back the nurse that had taken over was at her wits end and frustrated with the LOL, she was glad to see me. I took over and she left. I was uncomfortable in the chair I was sitting in and as I had just managed to convince the lady to take a break from squirming (and resume in a little while!) I decided to lay on the floor. Just as I had gotten comfortable this little old lady who I thought hated me, looked over the bed rail at me and said "are you okay dear?". "Would you like me to get you a blanket?". I found this very funny, and sweet at the same time.

alvardalton · Mar 20, 2005

ShirleyR said:

I remember when I first got out of nursing and worked nights on med/surg. This little elderly man was admitted to our floor with CHF. His wife was with him & was planning on staying the night in his room. The Doc had ordered 80 mg of lasix IM. Before administereing the lasix I placed a condom cath on ( my first). I gave him the lasix, explained the call bell system & made sure they were comfortable and told them I'd be in a little while later to check on him. I then went back to the nurse's station to start on my notes. About 30 minutes went by & the little gentleman's call light went off. Using to call intercom I asked, " How can I help you?'. The patient's wife timidly said, " Ma'am, this think you put on my husband is broken & it's making a mess everywhere." I had no clue as to what she was talking about, so a CNA & myself went right in to assess the situation. We get in his room & the patients little wife is sitting in the chair with her feet held up as to not touch the floor, she said, "Watch out you'll fall!" There was urine all over the floor. We get over to the patient and pull the covers back, expecting to see the condom off in the bed, but were we surprised! His member looked like a little water fountain & the condom cath held his testicles . The CNA immediately left the room, I appologized & started cleaning him up, One of the other nurses came to help with clean linens and a new condom cath. After the situation was controlled I went to the break area where the staff were at,almost lying in the floor laughing. I finally had to explain to them that I cound't find his member and had put all the wrinkly stuff inside the condom cath.

It's surprising the guy didn't say something about the placement!

FranEMTnurse, CNA, LPN, EMT-I · Mar 26, 2005

I just love the one about the new nurse who had just gotten a new job, and was helping resiscitate a patient. He spoke broken english, and what was so funny was how he pronounced the word, jewels. This is what he said, "300 Jews; convert!":rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

ninagrandma · Mar 29, 2005

This story happened in the good ol' days @ 1980 or so. I had a patient who was afraid of getting anymore staph infections. When questioning him he thought it was one of us staff that had given him this infection. When the air was cleared, we all had a good laugh about this one. This will certainly be included in my memoirs.

Frank01 · Apr 1, 2005

:lol_hitti

Psychaprn said:

Psych is full of funny stories-as a new prescriber, I tried to educate my pts.that some of the antidepressants can cause delayed ejaculation. A young construction worker came to me with this problem. I told him, as we talked about the drug, to "hold it "for a week to see :chuckle if things improved. He returned a week later telling me that holding his member hadn't helped with the delayed ejaculation. Neeless to say, I learned to be MORE clear when telling patients to hold or stop a medication.

Some years back I was working on an elderly care unit and we had a new patient admitted. As was the standard procedure the junior doctor came to do the assessment interview with me. One of the standard questions to ask is "do you know where you are" to which we got the reply " yes I am in the f*****g zoo" " what makes you think you are in the zoo" the doctor asked (he was very junior), the reply was "because I`m surrounded by f*****g animals".

EDNURSEANGEL · Apr 8, 2005

Had a little 90-something year old lady come in from the NH. No one had been able to get her to make a sound. Not the lab sticking her. Not the cold x-ray plate. Nothing. Until we went to put in the foley. She screams with considerable volume, "QUIT POKING MY PU$$Y." It was all we could do to maintain sterile technique until we could get out of the room.

The quiet ones will surprise you. :rotfl:

hello_nurse_mel · Apr 13, 2005

you know you're a nurse when:when drawing labs (the blood is soo cloudy that it's WHITE)you and others in the dr's office play "guess the total cholesterol level" (highest total chol ct of 800 was guessed) actual result was 820 - pt had no complaints & was in for WWE & >40 labs (CBC,CMP, FBS, TSH) she was told to see her PCP ASAP

starbright1923 · Apr 17, 2005

A friend of mine works in the ER....this is one of the great stories she has shared. Sad story...but pretty entertaining also. There is a young lady who repeatedly comes to the ER claiming seizures. One of our instructors taught us that if you truly believe someone is faking, take their arm and procede to drop it above their face-they'll instinctively keep their arm from wacking themselves. So my friend tried this on her first occurence with the young lady, and sure enough she jerked her hand away. She was well known in the ER with her "seizures" and her diagnosis was Pseudoseizures. So the next time she came in to the ER with these seizures, she informed all the doctors and nurses she saw that she had previously been diagnosed with pseudoseizures...she was quite impressed with herself to have an official diagnosis....too bad she obviously doesn't know what pseudo means.....

NoCrumping · Apr 17, 2005

stidget99 said:

I think that my funniest experience occurred while I was working home health. I had this female patient who was very slight on top but very wide across the bottom. One day, she soiled herself and her aide was unable to get her cleaned up. I was called to the home to lend a hand. It was decided that she was no longer able to remain at home so I called EMS for transfer to the local hospital. She had no clean gowns available so the plan was to transport her wrapped in blankets. Upon undressing her, the aide and I realized that she really wasn't that large across her hips........it was her breasts resting along side of her hips! When we (2 EMT's and myself) tried transferring her to the stretcher, we had a very difficult time controlling her breasts. This poor pt literally looked like she had two cantaloupes in a pair of nylons attached to her chest wall. The pt...obviously experienced in this situation....said "No problem. I know how to handle this". With that, she took both of her breasts and tossed them over her shoulders! They funny thing is that they stayed just where she put them! Once we got her on the stretcher, she was obviously uncomfortable w/ her laying on them. So, she pulled at the skin on her chest and they flapped back but fell off of the side of the stretcher. We tucked "all of her" in the sheet then secured her w/ the straps. We all excused ourselves back into the house where we all bust a gut laughing!!

OK. Thats so funny, I cant even laugh yet...........this is the funniest thing I have ever heard...........but, must have been painful for her.... deffinitely a candidate for a breast reduction!!!....or in her case..... a breast AMPUTATION..............

FranEMTnurse, CNA, LPN, EMT-I · Apr 19, 2005

That is a funny one.

Did anyone watch Untold Stories in The ER last noc on TLC at 9 PM? What a hoot one of the stories was. I loved it.

There was a doc there who was :uhoh21: afraid of bugs. A patient came in to be treated for a bug in his ear. He was the only ER doc on call, and so he first tried to look at it with his eyes. Nothing. Then he picked up the otoscope, which magnifies anything in the ear by at least 100 times. When he looked in the patient's ear with that, he saw his worst nightmare! :eek: There was a cockroach in there, and it was still alive.

He quickly ran out of the room, rested his hands on the sides of the sink, and held his head down. A nurse approached him and asked him if he was alright, and told him if he needed any help, she would be glad to remove the bug.

He told her he was alright, and was just taking a bit of a break, :heartbeat and said he was going to remove it. So back into the room he went where he immediately :coollook: picked up a pair of tweezers, thinking they were the most logical instrument for the job. So he reached into the patient's ear, and low and behold, he actually pulled out a very wiggly cockroach that wiggled its way free and onto the floor where it ran up the doc's pant-leg. :eek:

The doc went balistic. He ran through the ER, slapping at his shirt, front and back, finally removing it. By the time he got into the locker room, he was down to his shorts. While walking by the locker room with its door open, a curious nurse glanced at him and grinned. He quickly blurted out, :madface: " Do NOT say anything about this!" She nodded her head in agreement, and did tell him he would have more privacy if he closed the door first.

After he put another set of scrubs on, he re-entered the patient's room where he was surrounded by his family, and :imbar embarassedly apologized for freaking out like that. He told them he was always afraid of bugs. As he was talking, the patient said, "It's running up your pant-leg! (Aparently it was still on him and he didn't know it.) :uhoh21: He danced around franticlly, moving his legs up and down as fast as he could, and finally the cockroach fell out, and he stomped on it with his shoe covers. :coollook: Then he proudly announced his victorious killing of the dreaded bug.The entire ER :lol2: :lol2: :lol2: :lol2: :lol2: :lol2: and the patient :lol2: and :chuckle :chuckle :chuckle :chuckle :chuckle :chuckle his family broke out in laughter. :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: I joined them.

That definitely was the funniest ER story I have ever heard. I hope some of you had the opportunity to view it. It was a memory maker for sure.:yelclap: :w00t:

debbiemig · Apr 19, 2005

Of course it's for real! The times have changed for the better thankfully! I've been in long term for many years and I've watched how the restraint situation has changed. I remember years ago( going back into the 60's ) when as a nurses aide, we used to toilet our residents on our dementia unit every morning. We tied them with restraints to the toilet and put an overbed table in front of them and they ate their breakfast there on the toilet! We really thought this was a good thing! I was in high school at the time and did as I was told. I remember also one morning hearing a screeching sound coming from down the hallway. I went to investigate and found one of our little old ladies with a posey restraint around her neck pulling the bed toward the bathroom. Her face was beet red and once we released her, she had a red welt around her neck. She didn't stop for a second once released, she continued on toward the toilet where she had a huge BM. Didn't even mess herself!

So thankfully, the restraint, dignity and saftey issues are better now. This facility was at the time private pay and no medicare residents. So there were no state inspections like now.

Chad_KY_SRNA said:

Is this story for real?

jrzgrl · Apr 20, 2005

One night, early in my nursing career, we admitted a patient to our med-surg unit from the ER. He was well into his 90's, a retired physician and a dapper gentleman, well spoken, great sense of humor. I did his admission paperwork and tucked him in to sleep. It crossed my mind to put the "bed exit alarm" on due to his age, but he seemed 100% "with the program" and I decided not to affront his dignity. A short while later, one of the brand new grads came tearing down the hall in hysterics looking for me. She was stammering and white as a sheet. I entered the room and saw blood everywhere. My alert and oriented little doctor-patient had ripped out his IV, and worse, his foley with an inflated balloon. He was standing there stark naked with blood pouring out of his member. I thought the new grad was going to faint! We assisted him back to the bed, and I grabbed a washcloth and proceeded to apply pressure to the bleeding member. He realized what he had done, and was a little sheepish. The new grad said, "Oh my God, are you in pain?" With a twinkle in his eye he said, "No, it doesn't hurt, but why don't you wiggle it a little and we'll see if it still works!" I just BURST OUT laughing and she turned a lovely shade of dark purple! What a scream! That night was a real "learning experience" for her!!!