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

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 ?

Specializes in Emergency/Trauma/Critical Care Nursing.
I've worked as a Nurse Tech in the ER for 2 years now (I graduate in May with my BSN, yay!) and I have seen crazy and ridiculous stuff. Some to note are...

A guy came in who cut off his member, with scissors. Said "God told him to do it." Let's just say I've never looked at a member the same. :chuckle

Another guy came in with a Dove shampoo bottle in his butt, and when him and his girlfriend couldn't get it out, they decided to try a wire coat hanger. Apparently they didn't get the memo that there are toys made specifically for that area if that is what you are into!

People come in for crazy stuff all the time. It gets exhausting after a while. It's actually sad how many people are so uneducated in how to give basic care to themselves.

Soo weird but I also work in a detroit ER and had a guy a few months ago cut off his member with scissors too! Also because god told him to.... then he threw it in a field to feed the rats.. eww

God doesn't seem to like detroit men these days lol

Sent from my SPH-D700 using allnurses.com

Specializes in Emergency/Trauma/Critical Care Nursing.

ROFL!!!!

BWA HAHAHA. That must've been one helluva oyster lol, and I bet the cheese looked like the virgin mary too! Haha

Sent from my SPH-D700 using allnurses.com

Lol 2 come to mind.One a guy around 30 who checked in as chest pain, then told the doc he was really there because he just found out that a place he worked at 10 years ago, was found to contain asbestos and he wanted to get checked.Best triage sign-in ever though was "Eating carpet". A 3 yr old boy with PICA and a hilariously apropos name (damn you HIPAA) ate some carpet fibers. We female nurses guffawed like hell at that CC and figure he'll someday be very popular with the ladies.

Specializes in Emergency/Trauma/Critical Care Nursing.
I don't know about the rest of you, but one of the biggest problem we have in my ED is the nursing homes. They send pts over for the most ridiculous things sometimes, and I often find the people who work there to be completely incompetent. Here is a recent example:

Local nursing home sends pt to us for a fever. On their paperwork it states the pts temp= 105.1. Upon arrival I do a rectal temp which is 106.3. I immediately look through the med sheets from the home to see what time Tylenol was given. Now I look and look and look and cannot find ANY documentation that Tylenol was given at all. I give the pt ibuprofen, put her on a cooling blanket and call the home. The conversation went like this:

Me: I'm calling to find out what time you gave Tylenol.

Nurse @ the home: I didn't give her any.

Me: Come again?

Nurse: I didn't give her any.

Me: You do understand that a temperature that high in an elderly pt can cause seizures and can be life-threatening, right?

Nurse: I guess.

Me: You guess?! I'm sorry I'm have some difficulty understanding this situation. I see on your paperwork that the pt had a temp of 105.1, which is why you sent her to us (keep in my that they called a private ambulance which normally takes about 60 minutes to arrive, not a regular ambulance). The pt has a prn Tylenol order which specifically says to give for temp >101. and the last time I checked, 105.1 is greater than 101. So now the pt has a temp of 105.1, a life threatening problem in anyone, but especially an 86 year old woman. I would very much appreciate it if you would enlighten me as to why you did not give this woman Tylenol.

Nurse: Well we didn't want to mask anything by bringing her temp down.

WHAT???!!! Sometimes I really wonder about these nursing homes. What ever happened to basic nursing care?

My next question for her would be "may I please speak with your supervisor? Or would you like to explain to her why she will be getting a report of negligent/unsafe care practices of her staff? "

Ughhh

Sent from my SPH-D700 using allnurses.com

Specializes in Emergency.

I had a lady take an ambulance to our ED at 2 am once because she didn't get her piece of fruit before bedtime...because nobody was home to give her "care and comfort." I wanted to give her a fruit cup and send her home - the EDP wanted to work her up for a CVA!

Specializes in Emergency, Critical Care, Trauma.

The sheer number of young female "abdominal pains" that arrive by medic and then elope when their urine HCG comes back positive never ceases to amaze me. Hooray for 911 pregnancy tests they never have any intention paying. And people complain that a more socialized healthcare insurance system would cost tax payers too much. If only they knew how many people are abusing the ED on a daily basis. . .

Specializes in Med-Surg.
Just for fun information:

Here's some interesting stuff about Coke being used as a contraceptive. Great urband legends page at snopes.com.

snopes.com: Coca-Cola Spermicide

We have our share of pregnant pts using EMSA like a taxi service. It's usually the case of either someone being 1-2cm, the contractions hurt but they can't wait for their BF or whoever to get off work to take them to the hospital or the pt is 1-2cm, the cxt are starting to hurt and they call an ambulance. The ambulance pulls up front and drops off pt, followed by a carload of people who could have taken her to the hospital.

This always bothers me.

Well just to let you know, I had my baby 13 months ago. I went into labor at 3am, was getting contraction pains every 2 minutes or so, but was only 3cm when I got to the hospital. My fiance was out of town for the day and I was alone at home, no one I knew to drive me. I drove myself to the hospital and got grief by the secretary, the nurses, and the doctor when I told them how I got there, was told I should have called the ambulance...lol...

Specializes in Med-Surg.
:banghead: :banghead: Too many people need an anatomy lesson....:o :o :o

Now with 20 year olds not knowing about the privy parts, and others not knowing about the urethra...remind me again why they are removing sex ed from school?

Lets not forget about the 12 year old mentioned in a previous post who got pregnant because the other Darwin candidate she was messing around with told her to use Cling Wrap...

Let not teach them about sex ed...lets let them figure it out on their own. Then end up with more dumb visits to ER, more children having children...ugh...end rant lol

Im sure the ER staff didn't think it was silly! It may have been obvious to them that it was a KS but what if it wasn't. Those are so painful I wouldn't want to agonize in pain alone not knowing whats going on!

My friend had an ultra sound done to see if she may be developing a KS because she was having back pain. Her Dr. said that he thinks she may be developing one or two and he told her to drink a 40 oz beer the next time she has any pain in that region. I guess something in the beer is supposed to help break them up. She said it worked! Her pain was gone and has not come back since.

Specializes in Med-Surg.
When my mother was sick, we called an ambulance. The ambulance workers, unfortunately, knew her. They told us that they refused to transport her (no traige, no assessment...nothing). They gave us a voucher for a cab, and told us not to call 911 again. Ever. After a few hours of waiting and wondering if we actually needed to go to the ED, we used this voucher and got her to the hospital. She spent 12 hours in the ED, 2 days in ICU, and then she died. Septicemia from a bladder infection that spread...

I don't know if we should give ambulance workers the discretion to decide if a patient should be transported or not. Just my HO...I don't need rebuttals or anything. But just maybe we should leave the REAL triage to the REAL ED workers. They can decide who really needs to be seen.

...chrissy...

I hear ya. A few years ago I got a call in the early am at home from my mom. She tells me her husband is short of breath, CP, cyanotic lips, thready pulse, vomiting..You know, all the text-book S&S of MI. So I tell her to get off the phone with me and call the ambulance, she already knows he is having a heart attack. She does so, stressing how urgent it was to EMT. We had just had a big snow storm, took EMT like 20 minutes to get there. When they did, they told my mom they werent sure if they needed to bring him in, they thought he just had a stomach flu. When she called me back to tell me this, I was like :banghead: Really mom, which stomach flu do you know of that turns you blue and gives you a barely perceptible thready pulse? Needless to say, he was having MI, almost died. Im glad my mom insisted they bring him in anyways...

Specializes in Med-Surg.
I am with you on this one scampi - I hope I never become so jaded that I would snicker at this. I don't care how many people tell me to "get over myself" or that it is how nurses deal with stress. It is tragic and this girl needs help if not a compassionate direct answer at the least.

Signed student, ...with rose colored glasses?

Oh for Gods sakes guys...given some of the utter geniuses we have been made aware of, did you consider that maybe she was responsible for this bestiality? Teenager becoming aware of her body? Peanut butter episode gone too far or something? I mean, maybe the dog is the real victim here! :p

The only intervention I can think of is another round of sex ed along with some counseling...

Specializes in Med-Surg.
Things are a litle different the other side of the pond, in my A+E we are allowed to send patients home from triage, so the ones that come in complaining the the oral abs haven't worked after one day can be sent home, along with those that think constipation for 4 hrs is a medical emergency.

Had a good one last night, someone came in at 4 am and said they hadn't pu'd in the last 4 hrs. reminded pt that it is normal not to pu during the night,

oh and the mother that was concerned that her baby wasn't breathing whilst they were vomiting. assured mother that this was probably a good thing really, baby looked very well.

That happened to me. I was one of the geniuses who thought the UTI would just resolve itself by hydrating and excessive amounts of cranberry juice. After lower back pain developed, went to a clinic, started on po cipro, and not so much as an NSAID. That night, I was in so much pain, (I know, I know, after only 2 doses of ABX), I actually got stuck in the tub for hours, could not move for the life of me. So my bf at the time talked me into going to the ER. Get there, wait 6-7 hours, only to be told, we would have prescribed the same med, same dose, same frequency you are on. Go home. I did, again, nothing for the pain. I decided to tough it out for a few days, went to stay with my at that time MIL, who was an RN. After 2 days of writhing in pain, not eating, she decides enough is enough, and brings me back to a different ER. Another 3 hour wait, but when they got my lab results back, found creat through the roof, bad imbalances on NA and K, very elevated WBC. Turns out, listening to the first ER doctor almost led me into ESRD...

+ Join the Discussion