Okay, people. It's time for a nice, fun, light-hearted discussion to blow off some steam.
WHAT FREAKS YOU OUT? What bodily fluid can't you STAND? What wound gives you the absolute WILLIES? It doesn't matter if you're an ADN, BSN, LPN, CNA, PQRST, ABCDEFG...every body gets the heebie jeebies over SOMETHING...even you stomach-of-steel ER nurses!
Mine is eyeball injuries/surgery...aaaaaaaaackkkkkkk!! Gross! Makes my skin absolutely CRAWL. Or when someone gets a little cut on their finger/toe/whatever and then squeezes it to make it bleed!! Bleah!! Then there's the ever-popular RESPIRATORY SECRETIONS. I can handle poop, pee, amniotic fluid, lanced boils, pus, whatever...but give me a nasty snot-filled trach, and I'm OUTTA THERE.
Well I'm a steel stomached ER nurse and the thing I've done that most grossed me out was when I was looking after a woman who fell ot of a window through a pointy tree and into a garden. She partially scalped herself and I had to peel back the scalp and pick the leaves, dirt and flowers off her skull while she waited to go to theatre. The weirdest thing was taht she was awake and none of thsi was causing her any pain, kinda hard to make small talk was difficult!
I've been this patient before! Not exactly, but similar. I was in a bad car wreck back in '05, my head (close to my forehead/hairline) literally hooked onto where you hang clothes up in the back seat of a car and ripped about 6-7 inches. They wouldn't let me look for fear I'd go into shock, but I was told my scalp had peeled back some, all the nerves and muscles were ripped apart, and you could see my skull, and I didn't feel a thing, luckily. The worst part of the wreck (pain wise) besides the whiplash was the tetorifice shot, ahah! Later that night I went down for plastic surgery and 200 stitches later I was all fixed.
Two weeks after an uneventful T&A as an adult, I returned to my job as an airline pilot (weekend hospital pharmacist); while approaching an internatinal airport I felt my nose dripping...didn't realize that I had been bleeding and dripping down my throat (tasted funny) for quite some time...I didn't even feel my necktie and shirt soaked in blood until I turned to my First Officer and saw the horrified look on her face. It looked like I had been shot. No big deal, we landed (cockpit door closed so as not to scare the passangers).....I then started to barf up blood clots the size of golf balls and it was totally gross. I grabbed a big paper cup to catch the blood and deplaned. I continued to swallow and barf up blotted blood for hours before we could find a doc to do an anterior pack and I ended up as an inpatient overnight. Totally gross since it was me.
2. Colostomies - To me, a filled colostomy bag full of stool resembles a cake frosting bag. The odor is over-poweringing. I can only do colostomy care with a mask on and a peppermint tea bag inside my mask.
What freaked me out was when doctor was asked to give some cough med to a patient who was coughing his brains out all night and no one had bothered to get him an order. Doctor's reply was "He's a whiner. Let him cough." I thought Huh? You don't like the guy so you're going to let him suffer? I felt like calling Protective Services but then saw doctor start writing for Robitussin after all. Should have been codeine but I have seen where the OTC suppressant works just as well.
Cleaning poop......sorry to put it like that but for real i am sooo freaked out about cleaning up poop off of some one. But hey you gotta do what you gotta do right!
cleaning poop......sorry to put it like that but for real i am sooo freaked out about cleaning up poop off of some one. but hey you gotta do what you gotta do right!
try vicks or tuck a cotton ball with a drop or two of oil if peppermint or wintergreen into your bra. if the smell is truly obnoxious, a spearmint or peppermint teabag tucked behind your mask will help a lot. believe it or not, you really will become used to a lot of bad smells as you gain more experience. with poop and barf cleaning up, just keep in mind that your patient is uncomfortable and embarassed that you have to do it. :imbar
The grossest thing I have ever seen (and I put it on another post as well) was this little ol lady on the LTC unit where I work who takes out her glass eyes and washes it in her mouth! Meanwhile, there is green discharge around her eye!
EEEEEEWWWWWWWWW! :imbar
OMG I am on page 50 of this post and that is the only thing that made me gag so far! The dog with the diaper came close!
Anything that involves mucus or someones mouth and mucus, puke etc.
I can clean feces all day and that is just fine... but don't make me catch your sputum or clean it off the floor, or for that matter listen to you.
I am a CNA at a nursing home, one ngiht at work had been particularly nasty! I had been peed on twice, craped on, and when changing the brief of a really nasty MRSA infected resident the brief was so full it flung urine all over my face and arms. Even had a lady puke all over and I had to clean her up(that really grosses me out) I kept my cool through all of that.
Came home and the cat had puked on the floor. Went to clean it up and went flying out the front door and puked all over the poarch railing!
I could not handle the cat puke with the mouse tail in it! YUKKKKKK
Ok I have mentioned this before, but this situation is the grossest thing I have come across. Had a pt hooked to NG suction, she had unhooked herself for whatever reason and I assisted her back to her bed and told her not to do this herself, apparantly she had been unhooked for 15-20 minutes. Well she had been there for a while and she knew how to hook it back up herself, she took the plug from the tubing and a long bile green string of mucus trailed so she just put the open end of the NG in her mouth and SUCKED!!! watching in awe as the green tube went clear again I thought I would lose it. I couldnt help myself I yelled at her and told her that was nasty, dont ever do that again. This is of course the same pt who was so foggy on dilaudid that she kept putting her bloody menstrual pad on her abdominal incision (dont know if she thought it was an ABD or what? To no surprise she got a serious wound infection and had to be opened back up. Did I mention I was pregnant in the few months time we had this patient. The plastic surgeon grabbed me one day to assist in her room so I went in and he debrided her wound at the bedside, I held the biohazard bag as he put the nastiest smelling peice of black/green flesh in, the weight of the hunk of meat alone got to me not to mention the smell. He left, I tied the bag in a knot at the top not knowing what in the hell to do with it and mistakenly felt the warmth through the bag and my gloves...I almost lost it. I ran to the soiled utility room threw it in the biohazard bag and told the doc if he needed it for patho or otherwise he would have to fetch it himself! Just think all this was only one pt on our surgical floor, and I thought surgical floor would be a "clean" place to work
Okay that one got me also!! I am trying not to gag just sitting here... if I would ahve bene there I would have puked I know it!
LindaGib
24 Posts
Suctioning Trachs, for sure!