Strange experiences on the floor...have you had any?

[Anjann]

I'm not sure if this is just nerves, or if there is some other explanation, but EVERY time I walk into any patient's room, my nose starts to run profusely. This has been happening to me since day one of NS and is still happening now that I am at my first job. This happens every single time without exception. I used to think it might have been the humidified O2, but not all of our patients are on O2.

I carry a big pack of tissues with me (I am using a whole pack of tissues per shift), but it is still very embarrassing to be bent over a patient and have to stop to leave the room and blow my nose or risk dripping on them! I do not have the problem when I am in the hallway or at the nursing station. As soon as I leave the rooms, the runny nose stops! I don't have any allergy that only produces a runny nose and no other symptoms (that I know of).

I hope I don't sound like a freak! :uhoh21: Has anyone had this experience or can suggest anything? My next thought is to take benadryl before my shift, but that's going to be painful!

Has anyone else had any strange experiences on the floor?

[RedWeasel, RN]

OMG me too. Runs only in rooms, and I always sneeze in report. If my nose isn't running in a room it is itching like MAD. I have to itch it with my sleeve or I will go crazy-only if it is dry though (not if runny ick)

[Anjann, RN]

I don't know how "strange" this is, but we had a patient who was on our floor after some kind of palliative surgery for cancer. I don't know the specifics because he wasn't my patient and was clear on the other side of the unit.

He had been there a few days, was ambulating fine, eating fine, vitals stable, etc. etc., no pain meds being taken when one morning as the nurse was trying to get him up to the chair for breakfast, he just checked out. He went limp and the nurse had to get him back to bed and call a rapid response code. We all went running into the room and here is this 90 year old tiny, short, malnourished, little bald man with huge glasses lying in his bed with a most peculiar grin on his face, but his eyeballs were fluttering back and forth under his lids, he is unresponsive, but has completely perfect BP, HR, resp, temp, pulse ox, EKG, etc....no evidence of a seizure or stroke, no history of diabetes, good hydration, and he has had no pain meds on board X 3 days. We are yelling at him to wake up and he just kept on smiling.

We thought our 90 year old sweet patient was having some fun with the nurses and didn't want to get out of bed, or maybe trying to get some attention, but we sent him down to radiology anyway for testing and went on with our business. He was perfectly stable, what else could we do?

An hour later the rapid response nurse who had escorted the patient down to the test comes upstairs and tells us that this patient who has terminal metastatic cancer woke up in the middle of the test wanting to know why he was in the tube. The nurse asked him if he remembered what had been going on for the last hour and he said "of course". He said that he had been walking with GOD and asked if he was ready to die and GOD told him no, that he had to come back because his children MIKE and DENISE still needed him and they weren't ready to be without him yet, and that GOD would let him know when it was time to go, so he sent him back and that's when he woke up in the tube. Just a dream? We certainly couldn't arouse him. He came back to the floor after the test and was perfectly fine.

I always wondered if that peculiar smile on his face was the joy he felt if he really thought he was talking to GOD...that smile was so full of satisfaction, like a kid who just gobbled down a big sundae!