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...
Specializes in Psych, Peds, Education, Infection Control.
The next morning I was so embarrassed when one of the two "patients" i.e. a young intern came up to me and asked if I was the one who gently took his temp under his axilla the night before and tried hard not to wake him up!! The other intern later thanked me for folding all their clothes. They obviously were teasing me. Turns out the nurse had forgotten to update the info before she gave me the list for vitals, and that was an empty room that the interns had decided to sleep in while on call!
OMG, that's so funny. :-D I love it...
I guess I got lucky the one time I crashed out in an empty room...I'd been held over from evening into nights, and then in the morning, things were still hectic... I had to be back and in that city, public transit would have taken me two hours to get home. I was getting to the near-manic phase of sleep deprivation, and our hospital had a gero unit that hadn't opened yet so was all set up but no staff or patients. I got permission from my manager to go sleep in a room on that unit since I had to be back for my evening shift. I slept without incident...or so I thought. Later, as charge, I had to call the administrator on call about something and he had a good laugh and asked how I slept. I found out that some poor housekeeper had seen me sleeping in that bed and, finding a person in a bed that shouldn't have had one, thought one of the patients got loose and was chilling in the empty unit...they did a patient headcount and found no one missing, and it was a small hospital so administration ended up getting involved before anyone could ask the manager who'd given me permission to sleep there what was going on!
I was a young nurse on MedSurg and at that time we prepped (shaved) our patients before surgery.
My patient was a cowboy type, 30ish male going for a hernia repair. I opened the prep kit and discretely placed the blue sterile drape on his pubic area, exposing only his right groin. I put the bed in high position to save my back and had the patient scoot to the side of the bed near me. Started shaving while making small talk.
He told me he was a pastor and wrote worship songs, would I like to hear one? I said "Sure" and he leaned across the bed, pulled up his guitar and started strumming and singing. I kept shaving. All of a sudden I noticed the blue drape "tenting" upwards.
He kept singing hymns and I kept shaving, nodding and smiling to show him I liked his praise song and pretending I really didn't notice the steadily rising blue drape. It was the longest prep ever.
......and went down as one of my most awkward moments
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
To be fair, this is why I always recommend NOT using jargon with newbies...
Perhaps you're right.
Years ago, I gave report to a relatively new nurse (a couple of years) on a comatose patient in the ICU who had that "waiting for Jesus" look. (OK, that's "jargon already.) He was mouth breathing, with his tongue hanging out -- which anyone who has read "House of God" knows is a "Positive "Q" sign." (A positive "O" sign is the mouth open without the tongue hanging out.) As part of my neuro assessment, I passed on "Comatose with a + Q sign." The receiving nurse didn't ask a question, just laughed with me. So I thought she knew what I meant. (Hasn't EVERYONE read "House of God"? Or do people not know where the term "GOMER" comes from?)
When I came back to work the next morning, I found out differently. "I didn't know what a positive Q sign was," she said, "So I called the intern. He didn't know either, so he called the Fellow. The Fellow had never heard of it, so he called Neuro. The Neuro resident wasn't sure what it was, so they've ordered a CT scan and the attending will be by to read it later."
After all that, I had to admit that "positive Q sign" was from "House of God", a hilariously funny book about one guy's internship and wasn't real medical jargon at all. Whole pages of the paper chart had to be scoured for references to the + Q sign and corrected . . . and the nurse, the intern, the Fellow and the nurse manager were all mad at me. The neurology resident, however, found it hysterically funny and so did the admitting physician. In fact, the admitting physician found it so funny that he guilted everyone into forgoing their usual consulting fees. He was famous for his nasty temper, but after that episode he always had smiles for me. Fortunately, the nurse manager was on her way out and the new nurse manager had heard about the whole + Q sign fiasco (from the attending) and SHE thought it was funny -- which was fortunate for my continued employment outlook.
On my clinical rotation a few weeks ago, I was assessing a diabetic patient and he had both big toes missing, but his feet looked great otherwise and not like "diabetic feet" that would have needed amputation. I asked if he had them amputated because of his diabetes mainly because the amputaton didn't match with how his feet looked. he replied "No, my dog ate them" he was totally serious, and i just did a double take. definitely not the response I was expecting.
So I guess "this little piggy tasted like roast beef???? "
Years ago, I gave report to a relatively new nurse (a couple of years) on a comatose patient in the ICU who had that "waiting for Jesus" look. (OK, that's "jargon already.) He was mouth breathing, with his tongue hanging out -- which anyone who has read "House of God" knows is a "Positive "Q" sign." (A positive "O" sign is the mouth open without the tongue hanging out.) As part of my neuro assessment, I passed on "Comatose with a + Q sign." The receiving nurse didn't ask a question, just laughed with me. So I thought she knew what I meant. (Hasn't EVERYONE read "House of God"? Or do people not know where the term "GOMER" comes from?)
When I came back to work the next morning, I found out differently. "I didn't know what a positive Q sign was," she said, "So I called the intern. He didn't know either, so he called the Fellow. The Fellow had never heard of it, so he called Neuro. The Neuro resident wasn't sure what it was, so they've ordered a CT scan and the attending will be by to read it later."
After all that, I had to admit that "positive Q sign" was from "House of God", a hilariously funny book about one guy's internship and wasn't real medical jargon at all. Whole pages of the paper chart had to be scoured for references to the + Q sign and corrected . . . and the nurse, the intern, the Fellow and the nurse manager were all mad at me. The neurology resident, however, found it hysterically funny and so did the admitting physician. In fact, the admitting physician found it so funny that he guilted everyone into forgoing their usual consulting fees. He was famous for his nasty temper, but after that episode he always had smiles for me. Fortunately, the nurse manager was on her way out and the new nurse manager had heard about the whole + Q sign fiasco (from the attending) and SHE thought it was funny -- which was fortunate for my continued employment outlook.
Never read it, but those are all very common terms in EMS. Just like the patient is FTD. Fixin' To Die, (time to buy flowers)
DFO'ed Dun Fell Out. depending where you work, this was commonly reported by family when the patient had a syncopal episode.
For So Cal folks patient is an LP 2.1 (Larry Parker got me $2.1 million) common commercial for ambulance chasing lawyer in So Cal. I actually went to a tape review where the MICN had to tell the medic that putting LP2.1 on the patient narrative was not appropriate.
Common illness that seems to plague Hispanic women, they have Chicken Breath.... Going to a Spanish speaking home and the family comes running out using their best Engrish to tell you the patient has chicken breath! She Can't Breathe!
Q'ing was definitely worse than O'ing on the Glasgow Gomer Scale. It was a thing.... don't know if it still is.
Years ago, I gave report to a relatively new nurse (a couple of years) on a comatose patient in the ICU who had that "waiting for Jesus" look. (OK, that's "jargon already.) He was mouth breathing, with his tongue hanging out -- which anyone who has read "House of God" knows is a "Positive "Q" sign." (A positive "O" sign is the mouth open without the tongue hanging out.) As part of my neuro assessment, I passed on "Comatose with a + Q sign." The receiving nurse didn't ask a question, just laughed with me. So I thought she knew what I meant. (Hasn't EVERYONE read "House of God"? Or do people not know where the term "GOMER" comes from?)
When I came back to work the next morning, I found out differently. "I didn't know what a positive Q sign was," she said, "So I called the intern. He didn't know either, so he called the Fellow. The Fellow had never heard of it, so he called Neuro. The Neuro resident wasn't sure what it was, so they've ordered a CT scan and the attending will be by to read it later."
After all that, I had to admit that "positive Q sign" was from "House of God", a hilariously funny book about one guy's internship and wasn't real medical jargon at all. Whole pages of the paper chart had to be scoured for references to the + Q sign and corrected . . . and the nurse, the intern, the Fellow and the nurse manager were all mad at me. The neurology resident, however, found it hysterically funny and so did the admitting physician. In fact, the admitting physician found it so funny that he guilted everyone into forgoing their usual consulting fees. He was famous for his nasty temper, but after that episode he always had smiles for me. Fortunately, the nurse manager was on her way out and the new nurse manager had heard about the whole + Q sign fiasco (from the attending) and SHE thought it was funny -- which was fortunate for my continued employment outlook.
Omg, that is HILARIOUS. And reminds me of a story I have too.
We had a new fellow on service who was from China. She had a bit of a "to the point" demeanor about her, especially considering our oncology population. I forgot what she said to one of our patients, but the patient got upset and was crying.
I hunted her down and scolded her, "You have to be a bit gentler with these patients! They don't feel well. Now she's in there bawling her eyes out."
The fellow freaked out and next thing I knew, an opthalmology consult popped up. I hunted the fellow down again. I couldn't find her, but found the attending, who also happened to be Chinese. I asked why the new consult.
"For the blind spots."
"Blind spots?"
"Yes, isn't that was you meant by balding of the eyes?"
Now that we've branched into a side topic of misunderstandings :^) ... here's a good one.
My ex had a very good Indian friend in college. This was way before condoms were something that were practically handed out in college pharmacies... they weren't even talked about all the time like they are now.
This guy went into a college bookstore, and asked the - apparently matronly - clerk if they had any 'rubbers'. The woman turned a little pink and declared that they most certainly did not. The guy was dumbfounded, and said "You call yourself a college bookstore and you don't have any RUBBERS?!?".
Erasers are called 'rubbers' in England - and since Indian English is based on England's English - they're called that in India too, or they were then, at least. (And in case some of you younger people on here don't know this, 'rubbers' was the slang term for condoms a ways back).
Um. I did something similar when I worked in a shoe store. An older gentleman walked in and stated he wanted to buy rubbers. I stared at him for several seconds and then exclaimed "oh, you want rubber overshoes!" He looked at me like I had the dirtiest mind ever. It was all I could do to get to the back room before I started chuckling. I told one of my coworkers the conversation and he asked "Did you tell him CVS is right down the road?"
Specializes in Med nurse in med-surg., float, HH, and PDN.
On my clinical rotation a few weeks ago, I was assessing a diabetic patient and he had both big toes missing, but his feet looked great otherwise and not like "diabetic feet" that would have needed amputation. I asked if he had them amputated because of his diabetes mainly because the amputaton didn't match with how his feet looked. he replied "No, my dog ate them" he was totally serious, and i just did a double take. definitely not the response I was expecting.
So I guess "this little piggy tasted like roast beef???? "
That is simultaneously hysterical and frightening.
(And in case some of you younger people on here don't know this, 'rubbers' was the slang term for condoms a ways back).
That is simultaneously hysterical and frightening. 
audreysmagic, RN
458 Posts
OMG, that's so funny. :-D I love it...
I guess I got lucky the one time I crashed out in an empty room...I'd been held over from evening into nights, and then in the morning, things were still hectic... I had to be back and in that city, public transit would have taken me two hours to get home. I was getting to the near-manic phase of sleep deprivation, and our hospital had a gero unit that hadn't opened yet so was all set up but no staff or patients. I got permission from my manager to go sleep in a room on that unit since I had to be back for my evening shift. I slept without incident...or so I thought. Later, as charge, I had to call the administrator on call about something and he had a good laugh and asked how I slept. I found out that some poor housekeeper had seen me sleeping in that bed and, finding a person in a bed that shouldn't have had one, thought one of the patients got loose and was chilling in the empty unit...they did a patient headcount and found no one missing, and it was a small hospital so administration ended up getting involved before anyone could ask the manager who'd given me permission to sleep there what was going on!