What's the goofiest mistake you've made on the job? No, I don't mean the med errors or the medical mistakes you learned from. Those are important and often terrible experiences, of course, but this isn't about danger to patients or trauma.
I just really want to talk about the silly things we ALL do and can have the good grace to laugh about. It seems I find so many great stories in the nursing community because we often are under such stress, that we're so focused on those important details and avoiding the critical mistakes...so our brain tends to reserve less power on the things that don't matter as much.
Here's my confession. (And if any of my coworkers are on this forum, I'm outing myself gloriously, because we ALL had a good laugh over it...) My adolescent psych unit is in a small, private hospital, so though EMR has been promised to us, it's not quite here yet. A frustration of mine, to be sure...but that's another story. The kiddos were being super impulsive and just SO MUCH limit-testing going on, and I'm trying to get meds passed and RN assessments done and also manage patients and such. My awesome techs are working their butts off. The usual. One of my team asks if I can bring him "four soaps." That's a bit excessive, I think, but I also know, hey, sometimes teenagers want A LOT of body wash and our trial size containers aren't that big. Or maybe he's distributing them for hygiene time or something.
THIS IS WHERE I PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE QUESTIONED SOMETHING.
Cheerfully, I grab four of the small body wash vials, and bring them to him, and he's like..."what?" Because he meant four SOAPs, as in SOAP notes, which we do on each patient q shift...and he was asking me to bring him the charts...
New Rn , transporting patient will full liter of saline hanging with the bed pole too high through the doorway , bag popped gave the patient and myself a bath. Oops! Couldn't help but laugh, the elderly lady looked up at me and said ' I think the bags leaking honey' . Well u only make that mistake once
I forgot until almost this minute the time I think I've come closest to killing someone in my nursing career.
My patient that shift was very ill, running levophed, vasopressin, neosynephrine, and dopamine, all at a pretty decent clip, in addition to bicarb, insulin, propofol, and fentanyl. Having that many things made me nervous since I only had a triple lumen central line in the patient. We don't even keep triple lumen kits; we only place quads. The only reason he had a triple was because he was a transfer from an outside hospital.
I was absolutely convinced that my triple lumen did NOT have enough ports to handle all of those drips PLUS antibiotics PLUS electrolyte infusions. The patient didn't have terrific veins, but I found one good one in his upper arm and threw an 18g in to give myself access for all of those antibiotics later.
We don't usually transport someone on those kinds of doses of pressors plus high vent settings to CT, because it's entirely possible that moving them from the bed to the CT table will kill them. For whatever reason the intensivist said we were taking him anyway. I very carefully eyeballed the height of the IV pole carrying all those drips as we were heading toward the door to the room. We cleared it. I was ecstatic, and stopped worrying about it.
I conveniently forgot that the door out of the UNIT actually has a lower clearance than the doors out of the patient room.
So it was me, a respiratory therapist, and a patient transporter wheeling the bed, a ventilator, and an IV pole with all of the things together. We got going towards the entrance to the unit at a pretty decent clip because we were all anxious to get him there and get him back to the room as quickly as possible. I realized too late we didn't have clearance through the entrance to the unit and told the other two to stop, but we didn't stop in time... and combination of the tension on the IV pole, which was stuck behind the door frame, and the bed still moving in the forward direction, straight up pulled the patient's central line out.
My vision legitimately grayed out around the edges for a second.
I pulled the bed back, hooked the pressors into the 18g IV I'd started, and told them the trip was cancelled and we were going back to the room. I called our intensivist while I was booking it to the supply room and said, "You know that guy in XX with all of those maxed out pressors? He just lost his central line and I'm running everything through a single peripheral - I'm getting a line kit and the ultrasound now, can you meet me in the room?"
I've never seen a physician get somewhere so fast. And I've never been so glad I threw a peripheral in someone who already had a line before. We have an IO drill on my unit so we probably could have salvaged the situation even if that line was his only access, but I'm really glad we didn't have to find out for sure.
OMG - Reminded me of my first death as a home hospice nurse. I was in training. My preceptor had actually discharged the pt from service the week before because the pt had been on hospice for almost a year and had actually improved so she no longer qualified. It was a small company and we had told the family to contact us if they needed anything. Apparently her aide got her dressed that morning, went to get coffee and came back to find her dead with a smile on her face.
We went and pronounced and prepared her, which was kind of hard on my preceptor because she had been working with this client for a year as the only nurse. The, as the mortuary attendant wheeled her out, they passed the family TV. The grandkids had been watching cartoons and at that precise moment I see porky pig announce in his stuttering voice "That's all folks".
Specializes in Psych, Peds, Education, Infection Control.
We went and pronounced and prepared her, which was kind of hard on my preceptor because she had been working with this client for a year as the only nurse. The, as the mortuary attendant wheeled her out, they passed the family TV. The grandkids had been watching cartoons and at that precise moment I see porky pig announce in his stuttering voice "That's all folks".
Specializes in Psych, Peds, Education, Infection Control.
I've never seen a physician get somewhere so fast. And I've never been so glad I threw a peripheral in someone who already had a line before. We have an IO drill on my unit so we probably could have salvaged the situation even if that line was his only access, but I'm really glad we didn't have to find out for sure.
Incredible. I actually gasped out loud at the central line coming out...
Specializes in Psych, Peds, Education, Infection Control.
I love you guys SO MUCH - thanks for taking this journey with me. :) Not nearly as epic as some of these posts, but I managed to butt-dial myself today. I supervise on the weekends. The supervisor phone has no lock screen, and is a fairly inexpensive model that makes it WAY too easy to accidentally dial random contacts. Given how many administrative personnel are in the contact list, one would think it should be harder to butt-dial, say, the CEO, but that's another story. (I haven't done that...yet.) I keep my personal phone on me when supervising, on silent, because a lot of the administrative team uses it to contact me. I got a call on the super's cell, handled it, hung up, then shoved it back in my pocket...only to have my personal cell start buzzing in my other pocket a moment later. Glanced at it to see if it was something I needed to answer...and it's the hospital's caller ID. ("They're calling from inside the house!") So I answered it, and...dead air. Then, hearing my own echoed voice going, "...hello?"
And then I realized. Yup, super cell had opened the contacts, dialed, and since Audreysmagic is near the top...
It took me about twenty seconds too long to figure that out...
Specializes in Med nurse in med-surg., float, HH, and PDN.
Working a 'fresh' spinal-cord and burns rehab floor (before there was ever an acute rehab facility); patient was a 70 y.o. man in a w/c, who had received multiple skin grafts for burns over 65% of his body, and was now getting PT. He was a crabby old so-and-so and constantly ragged on the floor personnel, and one day he asked me a question I didn't know the answer to. He began insulting my brain and intelligence. Well, I wasn't upset or insulted, but I just HAD to say something, so I observed his body and calmly replied , "Yeah, well, I'm not the one here who got drunk and passed out with a cigarette in my hand..."
I said this JUST as the head nurse walked through the door.
The patient demanded of him, "Did you just hear what she said to me?"
He answered with a small laugh, "She's got a point, you know. It wasn't anything but the truth."
When I was still in nursing school I was in the student nurse float pool working as a tech (think CNA, but could also administer O2 in transports which PCT's and CNA's could not: circa early 1990's) - so I could literally be in normal newborn nursery one day, then PACU the next. One day I was sent to the Med-Surg floor I eventually started work on after graduation.
A call light went on almost as soon as I stepped onto the unit so I ducked into the room to answer it. The patient complained she didn't like the taste of the toothpaste the hospital supplied her … I looked down and saw she was brushing her teeth with orificeol. I told her that I could definitely help her out by getting something that tasted much better.
Specializes in ED, Tele, MedSurg, ADN, Outpatient, LTC, Peds.
Had a mentally challenged schizophrenic patient that needed a hysterectomy. I went with her and offered to gown and step into the OR as she could get violent in a heartbeat. I was politely denied entrance as per policy. I sat quietly in the waiting room as 4 burly OR staff wheeled her away! Ten minutes later they came flying out of the OR searching for me as she had shook them off like flies. One of them had a black eye! I hurriedly gowned and went in on to the OR! My patient was holding the IV pole like a spear and the staff were by the door ready to run out at a moment's notice! I calmed her down and they got an IV in place! They gave me a chair draped in a sterile drape to sit during the operation and asked me to please stay just in case she woke up! Was trying hard not to laugh under the mask!
Had a mentally challenged schizophrenic patient that needed a hysterectomy. I went with her and offered to gown and step into the OR as she could get violent in a heartbeat. I was politely denied entrance as per policy. I sat quietly in the waiting room as 4 burly OR staff wheeled her away! Ten minutes later they came flying out of the OR searching for me as she had shook them off like flies. One of them had a black eye! I hurriedly gowned and went in on to the OR! My patient was holding the IV pole like a spear and the staff were by the door ready to run out at a moment's notice! I calmed her down and they got an IV in place! They gave me a chair draped in a sterile drape to sit during the operation and asked me to please stay just in case she woke up! Was trying hard not to laugh under the mask!
Holy cow Batman! That's wild!
Although I have to admit I may have been a pretty unhappy camper if I had woken during my hysterectomy. An IV pole spear would have been nothing compared to what they would have got from me in the event I woke up during it!
Specializes in ED, Tele, MedSurg, ADN, Outpatient, LTC, Peds.
No! Batman to the rescue! This pt had once stabbed a staff in her psychotic phase , so we never turned our backs on her! The Hosp staff learned that in a hurry!
Not me, but I was involved. It was in nursing school. We were paired up to practice intradermal injections. My partner was nervous...and she proceeded to slide that sucker in...and OUT the other end, like a safety pin. A crowd gathered. She didn't realize what she'd done until I very calmly suggested that she back that thing out verrrrry slowly. I thought it was hilarious.
calivianya, BSN, RN
2,418 Posts
I forgot until almost this minute the time I think I've come closest to killing someone in my nursing career.
My patient that shift was very ill, running levophed, vasopressin, neosynephrine, and dopamine, all at a pretty decent clip, in addition to bicarb, insulin, propofol, and fentanyl. Having that many things made me nervous since I only had a triple lumen central line in the patient. We don't even keep triple lumen kits; we only place quads. The only reason he had a triple was because he was a transfer from an outside hospital.
I was absolutely convinced that my triple lumen did NOT have enough ports to handle all of those drips PLUS antibiotics PLUS electrolyte infusions. The patient didn't have terrific veins, but I found one good one in his upper arm and threw an 18g in to give myself access for all of those antibiotics later.
We don't usually transport someone on those kinds of doses of pressors plus high vent settings to CT, because it's entirely possible that moving them from the bed to the CT table will kill them. For whatever reason the intensivist said we were taking him anyway. I very carefully eyeballed the height of the IV pole carrying all those drips as we were heading toward the door to the room. We cleared it. I was ecstatic, and stopped worrying about it.
I conveniently forgot that the door out of the UNIT actually has a lower clearance than the doors out of the patient room.
So it was me, a respiratory therapist, and a patient transporter wheeling the bed, a ventilator, and an IV pole with all of the things together. We got going towards the entrance to the unit at a pretty decent clip because we were all anxious to get him there and get him back to the room as quickly as possible. I realized too late we didn't have clearance through the entrance to the unit and told the other two to stop, but we didn't stop in time... and combination of the tension on the IV pole, which was stuck behind the door frame, and the bed still moving in the forward direction, straight up pulled the patient's central line out.
My vision legitimately grayed out around the edges for a second.
I pulled the bed back, hooked the pressors into the 18g IV I'd started, and told them the trip was cancelled and we were going back to the room. I called our intensivist while I was booking it to the supply room and said, "You know that guy in XX with all of those maxed out pressors? He just lost his central line and I'm running everything through a single peripheral - I'm getting a line kit and the ultrasound now, can you meet me in the room?"
I've never seen a physician get somewhere so fast. And I've never been so glad I threw a peripheral in someone who already had a line before. We have an IO drill on my unit so we probably could have salvaged the situation even if that line was his only access, but I'm really glad we didn't have to find out for sure.