What is the grossest thing that's happened to you???

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I really want to know what is the grossest thing that has happened to you as a nurse. Has poo or vomit flung at you? I'm super curious. Thanks to all ^_^

As a cna I was slow answering a call light on older dementia woman, entering her room, I ducked quickly as she threw her BM at me and was cursing. In the Peace Corps, Honduras, an 8 yo boy was nauseous, while waiting at an OPD clinic for the doctor to see him. He vomited a few 8 to 10 inch round worms. The local nurse promptly went into a speech why everyone had to boil their water, cook food thoroughly and keep flies off it.

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Aide gave a bed bath and folds full of cheesy-fungus. Yak. Yes had my student nurses c/o to me during their rotations some patients had Belly Lint in various body parts.

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As an OB nurse, helping a mom to breastfeed who had an inverted nipple, after reversing the nipple so it was erect, got lint out of it.

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I used to work at a LTC facility as a CNA. I was helping a little old lady ambulate to the bathroom. She was mega-confused, didn't know how to sit on the toilet, yada yada. Once we get to the bathroom, I help pull down her pants. Before I get her seated on the toilet, she craps diarrhea all over - her undies, pants, the ground, and my shoes and pants. It was disgusting. All I wanted to do was ditch her so I could clean myself up. Smelled so bad.

But you don't ditch little, old, confused, incontinent ladies alone in the bathroom. You just don't. She wasn't aware of anything. I used about 4 full-sized towels to soak up that crap. Lol. Bleached the crap out of my shoes, changed my scrub bottoms, and finished out the rest of my 16-hour day.

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This was when I was a nursing student....

I was observing/kind of assisting with a lady partsl birth during my OB clinical rotation. I was standing off to the side of the physician as the baby was delivered. When the baby came out, the umbilical cord snapped and flung cord blood and fluids on me, the physician, and the floor. Thankfully I was wearing surgical scrubs and not my clinical whites. :yuck:

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Lololololololol...

This one was the best... by far!!! 😂

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I'm telling you.

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It was back in the days when I was still in Burns Unit when we had a 90% burned patient on ventilator having high fever and was on ampho-B antibiotics and he was having diarrhea. I was on night shift and doing morning care preparing all patient for endorsement when that patient had his loose bowel again we can audibly hear his loose stool coming out. we had to clean him up. He was around 100 kg with all fluid replacement on going. We are only 2 on that shift and someone needs to hold him as we turn him to the side while holding all his lines and tubing (on vent) and another one has to do the cleaning real quick and that happens to be me. As I'm prepared to do the cleaning on the other side and my colleague ready to turn, the moment we turn the patient to his left side (and i'm on the right side doing all the cleaning) he suddenly cough out and all his stool splattered all over me even to the wall of the room. I was shocked, I want to cry, I felt so grossed but life must go on... I cleaned the patient while i'm drenched with all his poops. (Oh yeah i'm on my full PPE with mask, head cover, iso gown and gloves and even shoe cover, i am wearing my I glass at that time too). Then after we are done with him, I ran to the shower and changed and cried. One of many worst shift ever. ;(

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Specializes in Aged, Palliative Care, Oncology.

As AIN was told to empty urine from a catheter bag before finishing my shift. I was too busy gasbagging to the patient when I realised I had emptied most of it on and into my shoe. I never ran out of a place quick enough, so I could rip my shoe off and wash my feet free of yuck. 😷😷😷

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Specializes in Aged, Palliative Care, Oncology.
As a student nurse I had a patient that had some type of disorder that caused the skin on his arms and legs to come off in large flakes. As if that was not hard enough, I remember him taking a shower. I went in behind to clean up as this was a community shower. There were piles of large wet skin flakes all over the bathroom floor. PILES. By the looks of it he had peeled off much of the skin in the shower and left it around the room for us to clean up.

Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwweeee

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Specializes in Aged, Palliative Care, Oncology.

I inhaled heaps of small but visible particles of dry, flaky skin off a patients dry legs the other day trying to moisturize and put his damn TED stockings back on. It was completely unecessary as he was being discharged an hour later. Too nice of me.

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Specializes in LTC, CPR instructor, First aid instructor..
When I was a student nurse in Pediatrics, a 6 year old boy I was admitting had difficulty getting me a clean catch urine, missed the specimen cup & urinated in my eye & right into my mouth. I ran into the bathroom, washed out my mouth & face. When i came back, the little guy had the specimen cup filled with urine & I sent it to the lab. I checked his chart days later, & much to my relief, his urine results came back normal.

Another gross one is the time I walked in a room where an elderly woman in Bucks traction had been digging at herself & was eating her feces. She was chewing away at it like a tootsie roll & had BM all around her lips. Being pregnant at the time, I promptly went out in the hall & had dry heaves. The LPN, who was working with me at the time, removed the patient's dentures to find BM stuck to the inside, & promptly cleaned & soaked the dentures in cleaning solution in the dirty utility room. To this day, over 40 years later, former coworkers still recall me heaving out in the hall.

I would have too. YUCK!
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