What was the MOST ridiculous thing a patient came to the ER for?

Specialties Emergency Nursing Q/A

And did you have to treat them?

I am just curious. Your stories always seem to either crack me up or shake my head in amazement.

Thanks for sharing ?

Here is some I have seen whilst working as a float tech in the ED:

- Paper cut (brough in by ambulance, complaining of breathing difficulties due to shock. Given a band aid and sent home by NP within 5 minutes of arrival)

- Young woman demanding an X-ray of her chest to see if her lungs got sunburnt(!)

Specializes in LTC, CPR instructor, First aid instructor..
paper cut (brough in by ambulance, complaining of breathing difficulties due to shock. given a band aid and sent home by np within 5 minutes of arrival)
snort!! this on tickled my funnybone royally. thank you.

Still a student - but I remember some funny reasons I had to send some of my students to the ER when I was a RA at Michigan State University.

Probably the worse was I had a guy on my floor who thought it would be a swell idea to glue his eye lids together with super glue after a Frat brother of his dared him to!

I also had one guy who got dared to slam 2 bottle of Soy sauce at the dinner table! He told me later that after "his ass felt like a super soaker" he had a friend drive him to the ER! LORD!

Crazy college antics has prepared me for this line of work! LOL!

Specializes in ICU, Telemetry, ER.

What I particularly like is things like the beads up the nose or in the ear and they come by ambulance because they didn't have "any way to get here" but then a miracle occurs and there are 4 loved ones that show up of course with a car who of course can take them home..... No matter what part of the country you work in we all get this stupid stuff because these people simply can't afford to go to the Doctor's office or they are too lazy to get up when the Dr's office is open and they know we will see them no matter what. BTW I think a pregnancy kit can be gotten for a dollar at the dollar store and so can tylenol and ibuprofen ---- amazing isn't it.....

Specializes in ICU, Telemetry, ER.

We had a pt present w/law enforcement (can you believe it) and when she was told she could go back to jail she threw herself down on the floor and fakes the absolute worst "seizure" in the world- anyway the other nurse with me proceeded to tell her that if she was going to try to fake seizures again that she should really read up on it because that had to be the worst fake seizure that we had ever seen. So she jumps up and says some lovely choice words and said ok guess i'm going back to jail and we said yup see ya later and then we both just almost wet our pants laughing to hard....

I also had a girl that presented with a "black tongue" and was all worried about this in the middle of night. I asked if she had been eating anything black and she said NO but her friend said "didn't you have some black licorice" oh she forgot about that. Then she ask me to call her probation officer to let him know that she had been there She was wearing a bracelet around her ankle and could only be out for some much time. Anyway, I declined and told her she needed to go right home because she did not need to see the dr.

Specializes in ER, ICU, Paeds, Gen Surg.
I used to work with this triage nurse who just loved the expression "therapeutic wait", at first I was a little shocked but I must admit that the expression has grown on me somewhat.

I'm sure I don't need to (or probably want to) elaborate.

Suffice to say, there is limited scope for deterring inappropriate presentations

or unreasonable demands, but the "therapeutic wait" ensures that they don't get it all their own way at least.

"Therapeutic Wait" This is EPIC! Hope you don't mind - but I will be adopting that phrase!:D

Specializes in ER.

Word came from security that they had a woman outside who couldn't walk to triage because her arm hurt too bad. She wanted a stretcher to carside, LOL.

We had a 3 hour wait to be seen in a+e last night and i was in triage doing the simple cases that my mentor assigned to me when the bleeper goes off (this is reserved for those who have chest pain/breathing difficulties/ie those who need to be seen now) so i go round and pick up the info 'wasp sting, anaphlaxis' so i see this guy and the following conversation takes place.

me: ok, when did you get stung and where abouts on you?

patient: on the back of my neck

me:did you use your epi pen? have you been stung before?

patient: oh no i dont have an epi pen, yes ive been stung before, about 3 times.

me:what happened when you were stung before?

patient:i came to a+e (at this point i checked his previous visits and allergy information ( there is no evidence/record of any allergies)

me: erm ok (all of his observations are fine,no breathing diffculties,no swelling, in fact i cannot even see the frikking sting)erm...when did you get stung? and has your gp referred you for allergy testing?

patient: at 1pm today and no i havent seen my gp about this.

me: (looking at my watch) well it is now 7pm, if you had a true anaphlaxis you would been exhibiting symptoms immediately.This is not an allergic reaction.If you were truely allergic then your gp would have given you an epi pen.

(I went to speak to my mentor and a doctor who laughed and sent the guy round to the out of hours gp where the patient had at least 2 hours to wait)

A woman rang an ambulance for an ear infection, paramedics arrived to find three family members who were going to drive to a+e anyway 'to keep her company'-The worst thing of all, the patient lived less than a 5 minute walk away, she lived just over the road from the a+e department.

But the best has to be ear wax. Guy came in at 4am thursday morning complaining of excessive ear wax. Doc told him to use olive oil and see his gp. Patient says oh im seeing him at 4pm friday anyways.

Grrr!!

Pt came to the ED because she wanted to be tested for H1N1.. because she flew over Mexico. No symptoms/complaints. No Joke

Not a nurse or anything like that but my friend's father once had her put on a psych ward when she was 16 because he and his wife read her diary and found out she had sex with her boyfriend.

Specializes in Emergency, Occupational Health.

Several Weeks ago---

A gentleman, in his mid 60's...

-Constipated for several days

-decided to attempt to disimpact himself....... wait for it......

WITH A VIBRATOR.

-the vibrator got stuck.

bwahahahaha.

another good one from a couple weeks back--- (i didn't have this patient, but i just saw the general complaint come up on the waiting screen)

"13 F

Possible worm in lady parts"

what the...

This is rediculous because it is so shocking...not because it's dumb to come in if this happened but...

and I'm not a nurse yet but my aunt who is a nurse in the ER shared..

A man came in with a cell phone stuck in his orifice...he and his signifigant other were putting phone on vibrate and um..calling eachother. And now he couldn't get cell phone out.

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