What is the weirdest thing someone has been admitted to the hospital for?

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I am in the mood to read some reasons that patients were admitted to the hospital. Working on a general medical surgical unit, I see a little bit of everything. I often see patients admitted for strange conditions and I thought we could all compare stories and get a few chuckles. Ok so I will start I have a toss up between internal hemorrhoids and constipation x 2 days(no bloating, no abdominal discomfort they just said that they felt they should poop everyday and were concerned).:lol2: Nursing can be happy, sad, humorous and stressful so with that being said let the stories begin. :yeah:

Specializes in MED/SURG STROKE UNIT, LTC SUPER., IMU.

small nose bleed to which the pt was in the hospital for 3 days with Dilaudid ordered 2mg q3 hrs. ?????????????

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Specializes in Med/Surge, Psych, LTC, Home Health.

Helped to take care of a lady once who was horribly impacted. The impaction had to be surgically removed.

What the surgeon removed, essentially, was a giant ball of poop and sunflower seed shells. This lady, this nice, normal lady, apparently liked to eat whole sunflower seeds. The shells don't pass very well. :cool:

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Specializes in NICU,ICU,ER,MS,CHG.SUP,PSYCH,GERI.

I saw a 26 year old healthy young man admitted for a bug bite on his hand.He got an MRI of the hand,an ID consult, and Dilaudid q 3 for pain.The ID doc wrote that there was minimal erythema,no evidence of cellulitis, and that he agreed with the current treatment (IV Vancomycin).The young man had no insurance and thought HIPPA meant we had to draw up his narcotics in front of him (which we certainly agreed to do.) I have never figured that one out!:uhoh3:

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Specializes in Case Manager/Administrator.

Had a prison female c/o lady partsl pain. Found a galss brown full beer bottle that had been there for at least 4 days per patient. Sent to hospital ED where admitted for surgery. Ended up septic and in ICU for 10 days.

Did I mention the patient told me there was a holiday coming up and they wanted to celebrate.

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Specializes in PICU, ICU, Hospice, Mgmt, DON.

Just a quick note. I do medical review for insurance companies, to assess the appropriateness of admissions and utilization review for continued stays...and I can tell you that with my companies, several of these would most certainly have been denied...the man with the toe, for instance, no way! If he is private pay, fine, but if they try to file the insurance claim at a later date then, no it could and would be denied. This happens frequently. I get calls with a totally bogus diagnosis, I can't tell them flat out not to admit....but I can and do send them out to my medical reviewer who can deny the claim---but also I am talking to the case managers at the hospitals daily who should be trying to get these people out of there...like the ones who are there for 3 weeks for pain management....that wouldn't fly...I wouldn't continue to authorize that because there are alternative treatments available...it's all about cost containment these days and I don't know how those Utilization review departments in those hospitals are allowing that. Oh, yeah, and I do psych, too...the Extenz guy would have been out of there in a flash...whoa...

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Specializes in Med/Surg.
Just a quick note. I do medical review for insurance companies, to assess the appropriateness of admissions and utilization review for continued stays...and I can tell you that with my companies, several of these would most certainly have been denied...the man with the toe, for instance, no way! If he is private pay, fine, but if they try to file the insurance claim at a later date then, no it could and would be denied. This happens frequently. I get calls with a totally bogus diagnosis, I can't tell them flat out not to admit....but I can and do send them out to my medical reviewer who can deny the claim---but also I am talking to the case managers at the hospitals daily who should be trying to get these people out of there...like the ones who are there for 3 weeks for pain management....that wouldn't fly...I wouldn't continue to authorize that because there are alternative treatments available...it's all about cost containment these days and I don't know how those Utilization review departments in those hospitals are allowing that. Oh, yeah, and I do psych, too...the Extenz guy would have been out of there in a flash...whoa...

I agree when I worked on days I worked with case management to get them out of the door. One because they will be stuck with a large hospital(if they have insurance and the claim is denied, two because there are people out there that need the bed, three the hospital has to eat the cost of their stay. The woman with 3 weeks pain management probably does not have insurance, so the hospital is basically paying for her to get dilaudid and benadryl q 3 hours, be on IV fluids and that is it. The reason is the doctors will not discharge them!! We tell them to, we leave notes for them and all informing them on the condition. I wouldn't be surprised when I go back next week that she still is there. This is one of the reason that health care corporations and insurance companies are loosing money. Everyone is afraid of being sued however if a person comes in with abdominal pain and is essential a negative assessment and has gastritis, she can be managed as an outpatient.:hdvwl:Unfortnately what we find out is because we are non for profit we can't turn anyone away, often they go to the next hospital in our town and are admitted just days after they are discharged here with the same complaints, they discharge quicker because they are for profit and can do so.

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Specializes in ED, OR, SAF, Corrections.
Omg :yawn: how did he drive ? And how and why did he do That . I hope They where able to identifi him at some point .

I've had several patients come in with shaving cream cans, potatoes, apples, etc... shoved up their butts. If they can get it in there, they'll try it out, though I don't understand the non-phallic shaped ones. When I would get them in the ER, they'd just be sitting there in triage like nothing, you didn't know what was wrong until they told you. When I went into the OR and got them there, same thing. They didn't seem to be in all that much distress.

Now twice I've gotten a patient with a closed wrench on the member (the kind you can't adjust). The first one was when I was in the ER in NYC and he was in quite a bit of discomfort in triage. I got another one in the OR when I was in Nevada and that guy died. He'd apparently had it on there for several days thinking the erection would eventually go down and he'd get it off, but his member got necrotic and by the time we got him in to amputate, he'd gone into sepsis and died a few days after the initial surgery. I've gotten patients with other types of rings around the member, but those closed wrenches are the worst. The metal is heavy-duty and a ring cutter cannot do the job.

You'd think common sense would keep people from doing some of this stuff, but then common sense also tells people not to change a lightbulb while standing on a chair with wheels, but I can't tell you how many time I've received a patient who's injured themself doing just that.

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Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.
I wonder how some of these patients have things that can be treated at home and they wind up taking up a bed that can be used for someone who is REALLY sick or injured...I always wonder why the ED docs admit some patients with things that can be treated at home or even in the ED(and not have to be admitted) like constipation, food poisoning without a symptom or swollen toes.

I have also seen situations where the ED doc is ready to send someone home and either they call the PCP or the pt's PCP calls, and they want he pt to be admitted.

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Specializes in Emergency, Telemetry, Transplant.

On out list of pt's on an inpatient unit, the "dx" appeared 'generally feeling not good.' My guess is that this is what the man wrote at the CC for the ER and he was never given a medical diagnosis. Whatever the reason, it seemed wierd in report to say "he is in the hospital because he is generally feeling not good."

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Specializes in Oncology.

We've admitted people because the person who was taking care of them at home is in the hospital.

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Specializes in Gerontology, Med surg, Home Health.

A man who let his girl friend insert tubing from the fish tank into his member. Then the doc wanted him to come to the skilled facility for rehab. Huh? He stayed for a day...tried to get more narcotics and when we wouldn't give him 'extra', he signed out AMA. Egadz.

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spoon shoved up the urethra... 'spoon' side up:eek:

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