Stupid Nurse Tricks (Or How To Look Incredibly Stupid)

[Ruby Vee]

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.)

[Bortaz, MSN, RN]

Steal your co-worker's credit card, get caught on camera buying dog food with it. Get probation (and fired).

Fail to own it to the BON when you renew...get away with it...for now.

Get arrested for trying to stab your husband when he confronts you about your boyfriend. Get probation.

Fail to own it to the BON when you renew...get away with it...for now.

Get arrested for leaving your young children at home over the weekend, alone, while you and reconciled hubby party at the beach. Get probation. Fail to own it to the BON...get caught...license finally revoked.

Have a spiked bag of TPN hanging above your head. Inexplicably decide to unspike said bag. Get TPN in your eyes, which are burned badly. Miss 3 weeks of work while recovering.

Neither were me. :)

[Bortaz, MSN, RN]

All I can say is, thank sweet baby Jesus that I don't work with adult patients.

Oh, one more. Not so much how stupid I looked, but a moment in which an unprofessional comment rolls off the tongue.

Order for Foley placement on A/O x 4, heavier female patient. All set up, positioned, urethra visualized, swabbed, it disappears and fingers slip. Ask CNA assisting to go get a handful of swab packets from the supply room because I've already run out. She returns quickly, open labia again, swab, it disappears and fingers slip again. Finally realize that the patient is clenching right after I swab in anticipation of insertion. Therapeutic communication used. Repeat x 2. Then, the comment slips out.

"You need to stop clenching your butt cheeks. The hole goes into hiding!"

To which the patient replied, "With how much you're digging around down there, you could make your own hole!"

[Bortaz, MSN, RN]

Hospital Administrator: Nurse, why are you wearing a marijauna leaf pendent at work?

Nurse: What? The salesman told me it was a Japanese tea leaf! I just thought it was pretty!

(My wife)

[nursefrances, BSN, RN]

Hospital Administrator: Nurse, why are you wearing a marijauna leaf pendent at work?

Nurse: What? The salesman told me it was a Japanese tea leaf! I just thought it was pretty!

(My wife)

:rotfl: :rotfl:

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

Hospital Administrator: Nurse, why are you wearing a marijauna leaf pendent at work?

Nurse: What? The salesman told me it was a Japanese tea leaf! I just thought it was pretty!

(My wife)

Shame on you for not telling her!

[Bortaz, MSN, RN]

I didn't know her at the time.

Shame on you for not telling her!

[redhead_NURSE98!, ADN, BSN]

Come on for night shift early. Look up all your patients and steal their PRN narcs out of the Pyxis. Get caught, get fired. Get new job elsewhere. ROB TWO BANKS AND FIVE HOTELS TO SUPPORT YOUR NARC HABIT because you found out that whole Pyxis stealing thing doesn't work well. Get caught, lose license, go to prison.

[HyperSaurus, RN, BSN]

Come on for night shift early. Look up all your patients and steal their PRN narcs out of the Pyxis. Get caught, get fired. Get new job elsewhere. ROB TWO BANKS AND FIVE HOTELS TO SUPPORT YOUR NARC HABIT because you found out that whole Pyxis stealing thing doesn't work well. Get caught, lose license, go to prison.

Go big or go home, apparently.

[nursefrances, BSN, RN]

Come on for night shift early. Look up all your patients and steal their PRN narcs out of the Pyxis. Get caught, get fired. Get new job elsewhere. ROB TWO BANKS AND FIVE HOTELS TO SUPPORT YOUR NARC HABIT because you found out that whole Pyxis stealing thing doesn't work well. Get caught, lose license, go to prison.

Oh my.

[RetRN77]

Oh, my, I feel so badly for you! Who would have thought it would take that long to heal?

[RetRN77]

This thread is hilarious!! I'll add a story.

One day when I was still on the floor as an RN, another nurse had floated to the unit. Our floor had many GI patients, and this nurse came from a cardiac floor. Later in the day, she came to me and asked where we kept our enema equipment because she had an order to give a milk & molasses enema. I showed her where it was and since this wasn't her regular unit asked if she needed help. She smiled and said no and that she had given enemas before.

I remember sitting at the nurses station as she went into the pts room, and running in after hearing someone shout "What the &%$# are you doing!!!" Turns out the nurse had inserted the enema tube into the pts lady parts instead of the orifice. I'm not sure how much of the enema got in. I ended up caring for the pt after that (the pt banned the prior nurse from entering her room). It wasn't fun because she was suspicious after her milk & molasses douche and kept asking me questions for the rest of the shift! The pt was chubby (not obese), but I'm still not sure how she did that.

Forgive me if I've posted this before. Our very first day of clinicals, another student came to me in distress, telling me she couldn't get the rectal thermometer to stay in place. "It keeps falling out!" I couldn't imagine how that could happen. She begged me to come check it out. As I approached the bed, the elderly lady said, "It's in my lady parts! I used to be a nurse! You put it in my lady parts!!"

[RetRN77]

Oh, my, I feel so badly for you! Who would have thought it would take that long to heal?

Oops - thought I quoted the person who posted the original. This was meant for the nurse who drained her hematoma and needed months of wound care afterward.