What squicks you out?

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According to CSI: every criminalist has a fluid that especially grosses them out. From my admittedly non-scientific polling, it's the same with nurses. So what's yours? What's the one thing you'd take another nurse's entire assignment to avoid?

Going by my reaction to our lectures today, I think mine's necrotic tissue in a pressure ulcer. :barf02: Thank god I'm going into an NNP program! Give me poop, blood, vomit, ANYTHING before a festering wound.

Any fluid related to the eye...grosses me out...eww...queasy just thinking about it...

I can handle anything..but ANYTHING coming out or hanging out of the eye gives me the willies!:stone

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Specializes in Psych, M/S, Ortho, Float..

Give me an MRSA infected wound or a trach patient with pneumonia and I'm your girl. Hand me a pair of clean dentures and I can put them in the denture cup. Hand me a set that haven't been cleaned in a while or take them out to "take the bits out of them" and I am out of there in a flash. Yucka!!

I'm also freaked out by eyeballs. I had a patient lose one (a contact lens) up inside his eye lid and he asked me to get it for him. I tried, but as soon as I lifted the eyelid, my stomach heaved. Couldn't do it. The ER show with the guy with the expanding eyeball? I turned off the TV!

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I work ER now and nothing really seems to gross me out - and granted it's not nice to see CSF or brains or blood or pus or vomit or feces, but hey, it just doesn't trouble me - I just focus on the job at hand.

But- you know the old joke that about "I'm not being bothered by the sight of blood- unless it's my own"? Had bilateral arthroscopies done 10 days ago - was out walking last Saturday and a large quantity of synovial fluid started to drain from one of the wounds -in public, while I was wearing shorts - now that grossed me out.

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Nursing Education.

sputum here is the worst. never used to get sick before i had my baby... now I get sick alllll the time! anything with a strong odor gets me.

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Smegma's the worst---especially when it's smegma from an elderly, uncircumcised male (or an uncircumcised morbidly obese male) who, either through no fault of his own (i.e., frail, unable to wash himself or see well enough to do so, with no one to help him; neglected in a nursing home) or just uncaring about personal hygiene, has layers of it built up--and you have to catheterize him. I just look away once the foreskin is retracted and I am cleaning well with Betadine--then quickly pull the foreskin back once the Foley is in.

Smegma is a good scrabble word, though! :rotfl:

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Give me an MRSA infected wound or a trach patient with pneumonia and I'm your girl. Hand me a pair of clean dentures and I can put them in the denture cup. Hand me a set that haven't been cleaned in a while or take them out to "take the bits out of them" and I am out of there in a flash. Yucka!!

I'm also freaked out by eyeballs. I had a patient lose one up inside his eye lid and he asked me to get it for him. I tried, but as soon as I lifted the eyelid, my stomach heaved. Couldn't do it. The ER show with the guy with the expanding eyeball? I turned off the TV!

I'm with you there on the dentures. Awhile back someone here told a story about hearing this little old lady smacking on something. When they turned to look, they saw that she had her dentures in her hand and was eating all the leftover goodies in them. Ugh!! Grossed me out for life.

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I can usually handle just about anything--til I worked per diem in ER. I had a guy come in with a bellyache. Said he hadn't had a BM in NINE DAYS!!! :uhoh3: The Doc ordered an HHH enema and the charge nurse recommended an oil retention enema first. I had sh** everywhere!! LOL. The charge nurse made him a l:l until we could get him cleaned out. :rotfl:

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According to CSI: every criminalist has a fluid that especially grosses them out. From my admittedly non-scientific polling, it's the same with nurses. So what's yours? What's the one thing you'd take another nurse's entire assignment to avoid?

Going by my reaction to our lectures today, I think mine's necrotic tissue in a pressure ulcer. :barf02: Thank god I'm going into an NNP program! Give me poop, blood, vomit, ANYTHING before a festering wound.

anything eye related is major gross-out for me.

And also hemmrhoids ::shudder::

fluids in general so far haven't gotten to me. Prolly I haven't seen enough of them yet! :)

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For me, it's not the substance, it's the sound. I can clean vomit all day, but if I hear them heave, I'm going to heave too.

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Sputum #1, Emesis #2

What's the big deal about eyes? They don't bother me in the least.

Now some slimy dentures - yeearrgh. Thank goodness for gloves!

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Specializes in CCU,ICU,ER retired.

I can deal with every thing that has been posted here except gray matter! I have actually passed smooth out seeing that stuff. And now heres the laugh, I work in a very busy ER. But if the stuff is gonna be a possibility to show one of the gals I work with will take it and I will clean her pt. that has vomited or pooped since she can't deal with that.

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Specializes in Community Health Nurse.

gi bleeds :barf01: and anything that has an awful smell.

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