It's been awhile since we had a stupid nurse tricks thread, so here goes: How to look Incredibly Stupid Without Really Trying:
Call in to work because it's snowed and it's "not worth your life to drive to work on those roads." Be in a bar down the street from the hospital when your best friend at work uses the "Find My Friends" app on her iPhone to check on when her replacement will get there in to relieve her. (Will you lose your job?)
You've got horrible abdominal pain, but you suck it up and come to work anyway. Yay, you! You collapse in your patient's room and are whisked off to the ER by your manager and an RT. You insist that you're infertile and couldn't possibly be pregnant as you're delivered of a full term baby girl. (OK, this one was a CNS and nursing student.)
Call in sick to work because you want to go to your manager's wedding and you didn't win the "get the weekend off" lottery. Catch the bouquet. (And lose your job.)
You're having palpitations, and you're a little lightheaded and slightly diaphoretic. Strangers at the mall are concerned and offer to call an ambulance. You decline, telling them you're fine. Then you think that you probably should go to the ER, but since you know from AN that you won't get a sandwich to eat, you sit down at Bertucci's and order a plate of ravioli. Then you drive yourself to the ER, park at the bottom of a hill and walk uphill to the entrance. You're surprised when the triage nurse takes you straight back. (Yes, that was me. I was fine.)
Tell everyone at work that you're young, you want to have fun, and you're going to a friend's Halloween party after work. Go to the party dressed as a sexy nurse, and be in lots of pictures. Post those pictures on Facebook. Now call in sick to work the next day at 06:50 for your 07:00 shift. You've friended everyone you work with on FaceBook. (And NOT lose your job. What are the odds?)
Steal money from your colleagues' bags in the breakroom. Get caught by a colleague with a black belt in tae kwon do. Be photographed with a 5 foot tall girl flipping you and then sitting on you until Security arrives. (Have your manliness questioned by everyone who sees the pictures.)
So I know I've mentioned this before in another thread, but this is the one that sticks out most to me. I'm a klutz and forever tripping on things, but this one takes the cake.
My first job out of nursing school, I was sure this was my dreeeaaaammmm job (turned out not to be, but story for another thread). I am in my first day of orientation, minding my Ps and Qs. I follow my preceptor into our first room, reach to the alcohol pump at the door (gel, not foam), and proceed to shoot it directly into my eye. I couldn't reproduce that act if I tried.
My eye went lobster red in all of 5 seconds. I had tears streaming down my face, but kept insisting to everyone that I was fine, don't worry, on to the next room. Didn't fly. I ended up spending my very first lunch break in the ER, getting my eye flushed out. Then had to finish my shift with my hair matted down on one side of my head from said flush. I was mortified.
The one I remember best is when you're changing the spike on tubing from one bag to another and forget to take the first bag off the IV pole spilling 500 cc's of saline all over the floor, yourself, the (very alert and oriented) patient, and the patient's bed while you desperately try to figure out whether your should spike the next bag or take off the first bag clumsily with the spike/line in hand, or just drop everything and cry. Then your preceptor, as she tries not to laugh at you, tells you, as punishment, to remake the patient's bed, then leaves the room and proceeds to tell the other nurses what just happened. Totally happened to me on my last semester of nursing school... lols[/quote']
I posted the exact same story earlier in this thread. Glad to know I'm not the only one who has done this :)
Specializes in Ambulatory Surgery, Ophthalmology, Tele.
So I know I've mentioned this before in another thread, but this is the one that sticks out most to me. I'm a klutz and forever tripping on things, but this one takes the cake.
My first job out of nursing school, I was sure this was my dreeeaaaammmm job (turned out not to be, but story for another thread). I am in my first day of orientation, minding my Ps and Qs. I follow my preceptor into our first room, reach to the alcohol pump at the door (gel, not foam), and proceed to shoot it directly into my eye. I couldn't reproduce that act if I tried.
My eye went lobster red in all of 5 seconds. I had tears streaming down my face, but kept insisting to everyone that I was fine, don't worry, on to the next room. Didn't fly. I ended up spending my very first lunch break in the ER, getting my eye flushed out. Then had to finish my shift with my hair matted down on one side of my head from said flush. I was mortified.
Posting just to make you feel better.
Not nursing related: While at a mexican restaurant eating chips ans salsa, I took a bite of a tortilla chip. Somehow in mid-bite a piece of the chip flies upward and lands in my eye. (What are the odds?) My family didn't understand why I was suddenly freaking out. Have you ever had a salty corn chip in your eye? NOT. fun.
But I think the alcohol gel probably hurt worse......ouch.
Not nursing related: While at a mexican restaurant eating chips ans salsa, I took a bite of a tortilla chip. Somehow in mid-bite a piece of the chip flies upward and lands in my eye. (What are the odds?) My family didn't understand why I was suddenly freaking out. Have you ever had a salty corn chip in your eye? NOT. fun.
But I think the alcohol gel probably hurt worse......ouch.
I feel like upping the bar. Or lowering it. Whatever.
I was in class and a tiny, tiny gnat was flying around my face. I tried shoo-ing it away but it was simply in love with me. It flew around my forehead, nose then eyes. I blinked and...
Oh God....
I blinked the gnat INTO my eye.
I bolted out of class and into the bathroom to wash that thing out.
The class was for my BSN program so I guess this is still nursing related? LOL
Specializes in Ambulatory Surgery, Ophthalmology, Tele.
The one I remember best is when you're changing the spike on tubing from one bag to another and forget to take the first bag off the IV pole, spilling 500 cc's of saline all over the floor, yourself, the (very alert and oriented) patient, and the patient's bed while you desperately try to figure out whether your should spike the next bag or take off the first bag clumsily with the spike/line in hand, or just drop everything and cry. Then your preceptor, as she tries not to laugh at you, tells you, as punishment, to remake the patient's bed, then leaves the room and proceeds to tell the other nurses what just happened. Totally happened to me on my last semester of nursing school... lols
Oooh, you reminded me of the time I did something similar with a bottle of mannitol. I didn't realize there was a special spike piece for our type of tubing. I spiked the bottle and the whole rubber stopper was pushed inside the bottle and the mannitol spilled then crystalized all over the med cart, me, the floor...... Yep, that was fun.
It's amazing how we learn with time and experience. When things like that happen all you can say is, "Well, I won't be doing THAT again." :sofahider:
This actually happened while I was working my way through nursing school as a nurse tech.
So, it was a full moon (must have been, because there has to have been a reason for things to have been so nuts), and I was asked to stay overnight, as the two little old ladies who shared one of the floor's double rooms were both sundowning something crazy and the whole hospital, it seemed, was understaffed. So here I am, sitting in between the two of them, the privacy curtain hitting me in the face while I try to keep an eagle eye on both.
All of a sudden, the first little old lady (LOL1) lets rip a humongous fart, causing the second lady (LOL2) to gasp. She grips my hand hard and says, "There's a man in my room!" And then, with obvious relish and anticipation, she loudly announced, "He's gonna rape me!!" Then LOL1 says, "What do you mean, there's a man? There's a woman in my room!" LOL2: "Ha! Then you won't get raped!"
I worked at a facility whose in room TV were on swing arms. A co worker was 9 months pregnant and dropped a restoril and asked me to look for it. I got down on the floor to check under the bed and stood up and smacked my head on the TV so hard I saw stars. I cannot tell you how many times I did that while I worked there. You think I would have learned.
I was piercing a nimotop capsule and stabbed my thumb with a blunt needle. That hurt like heck. My thumb was so bruised too.
I tripped over the pt IV tubing and fell flat on my face. My co workers came running to see me on the floor and not the pt.
I have rolled my ankle more times than I can count.
Lose weight. While awaiting arrival of new smaller scrub pants, continue to wear old baggy scrub pants with tightened drawstring. Give new clinical group tour of floor. Note that drawstring is loosening and pants have descended about an inch. Plan to escape to restroom to fix drawstring, but step on hem of pants instead. Note the sudden sensation of bare legs. You have now shown 8 students and assorted visitors your new undies. Die a thousand, mortifying deaths. Consider that the only bright side is that you weren't wearing the granny panties today.
You are in an isolation room on a 1:1 with an immunosuppressed patient and you have a bit of a UTI yourself. No one can relieve you and you have to pee so bad you think you'll die. Finally, you go in the patient bathroom, hoist up the gown, drop trou, and use the toilet. Replace gown, wash hands, new gloves, go on about your business.
In less than a week, your entire posterior butt and thighs are covered with herpes from said immunosuppressed patient.
Since this happened in the 70s I have always wondered if this was the beginning of the big genital herpes epidemic. (No, it was NOT me.)
Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.
It reminded me of the post a couple of months back about a volunteer hearing a nurse "yelling" at a patient in ICU and feeling like it was so mean and wrong. Sometimes what is heard out of context sounds pretty shocking.
uRNmyway, ASN, RN
1,080 Posts
So I know I've mentioned this before in another thread, but this is the one that sticks out most to me. I'm a klutz and forever tripping on things, but this one takes the cake.
My first job out of nursing school, I was sure this was my dreeeaaaammmm job (turned out not to be, but story for another thread). I am in my first day of orientation, minding my Ps and Qs. I follow my preceptor into our first room, reach to the alcohol pump at the door (gel, not foam), and proceed to shoot it directly into my eye. I couldn't reproduce that act if I tried.
My eye went lobster red in all of 5 seconds. I had tears streaming down my face, but kept insisting to everyone that I was fine, don't worry, on to the next room. Didn't fly. I ended up spending my very first lunch break in the ER, getting my eye flushed out. Then had to finish my shift with my hair matted down on one side of my head from said flush. I was mortified.