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 ?

Specializes in Emergency Room.

Left pinky toe blister after wearing heels all night. Came in at 3am. Hmmm....

Specializes in Emergency Nursing.

Had a guy come in, said he had a fever of 99 degrees F, but what really made him come in was that he was having bad dreams.

Specializes in ER.

"Lost luggage"

I'm not even kidding.

Specializes in ER.

Also had a lady who drank a fleet enema. She cut off the tip and put a straw in it. She still pooped though..

Specializes in Med-Surg.
Also had a lady who drank a fleet enema. She cut off the tip and put a straw in it. She still pooped though..

Oh Ew. Wonder what the fleet tastes like though...is it weird that I automatically thought of that lol?

Specializes in ER.

A lady that is a FF herself brought her 11 year old to the ER complaining of knee pain. Dx with growing pains. The lady asked "Can you give him the "extra strength" Percocet so he has something to take for pain? The doctor explained that they do not give out narcotics in that strength to little kids, in fact very rarely to they prescribe narcotics to kids. She continues to try "Wellc can you give him regular Percocet for his pain? Or the extra strength Norcos?" The doctor explained that Motrin would be the best thing to take for him, and if it was really bad he could alternate between Motrin and Tylenol. One thing is for sure, the lady was drug seeking and using her son to try and get some narcotics.

Specializes in ER.
Had a guy come in, said he had a fever of 99 degrees F, but what really made him come in was that he was having bad dreams.

LOL @ bad dreams. Did they want a doctor's note to miss work? Or did he seriously think you could make them go away?

Love it.

Bister. On the thumb. He wanted a band-aid.

A woman came running in to our ER and started stating in a excited tone "I think my daughter broker her leg" several times. I was ready to run out the the car with a wheel chair when the girl came skipping (kid you not) into the ER, no tears, smile on her face. Apperantly a broken legs looks like a 3 cm surface scratch we treated with Neosporin and a bandaid. The women still had us do a complete x-ray of the leg. She banged it against a metal pipe (at least that was the story).

Funny thing is most of these stories end up with the parent asking for Narcotics but this one didnt. She seriously thought it might be broke.

Specializes in Emergency Nursing.

Had a girl come in the other night with a tooth ache. No big deal, I get it...the likelihood of getting an oral surgeon on a Sunday morning is nil, but we can give ABX and pain control. Tooth aches hurt like hell, I get that.

So, I start a line, infuse clinda, etc. She gets 5-325 Norco. Doc tells her he'll write a scrip for Norco and let her go if she's going to see her dentist/oral surgeon on Monday, but that she should take Motrin 600 regularly for additional pain control and swelling.

Before we discharge her, her mom, who is with her, asks the doc to write a once order for Motrin 600 before they leave so she doesn't have to stop at a drug store.

So, she got a dose of NSAID for a couple hundred bucks to her insurance that she could have gotten by making a five minute stop for several doses at $8 or $9 .

My story:

My ex (who is a idiot may I add) was convinced my daughter (who was 3 at the time ) had ringworm. Her socks were on too tight and left a red mark for x2 days. He thought it was because I had dogs. OMG if you google ringworm it looks nothing like a sock mark.

Rushed her to the er, against my advice.

Another time, he was convinced she was having a reaction from her shots, no fever, a stuffy nose (that was there before her shots). That was a er trip too. OMG.

Even if it was ring worm, that's no reason to go to the ED.

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