What's the funniest nursing superstition you've ever heard? Do you believe it?

[guest1048932]

We've all heard "DON'T SAY THE Q WORD!" lest ye be cursed with a shift full of mishaps. What's the funniest, strangest, or maybe most true nursing superstition you've ever heard?

Here's mine:

Open the window to let the spirits out! When one of our patients has just died (or is on the way out), we crack open the window in the room to let the spirit out.

[nursej22, MSN, RN]

For a long time our hospital had no patient rooms that ended in 13. I suspect if we had a taller building there would have been no 13th floor either.

Not a nursing superstition , but I had many patients ask if anyone had ever died in that particular room. Of course, no one had.

[TriciaJ, RN]

It's well and good if you HAVE windows that open. On my old med/surg floor we had to let our spirits hang around and press the call lights in the rooms they recently vacated.

On psych, you never say a frequent flyer's name out loud, because that person will be back in within 24 hours.

[Daisy4RN]

Never say, or let another nurse say to you, this is a "easy patient". The "easy" patient will always turn into a hot mess!

[Daisy4RN]

On 2/20/2019 at 6:12 AM, TriciaJ said:

It's well and good if you HAVE windows that open. On my old med/surg floor we had to let our spirits hang around and press the call lights in the rooms they recently vacated.

I also worked in a facility where we were unable to open the windows. We had 1 room on the unit that people (both staff and patients) swore was haunted, I normally dont believe in ghosts but that room did freak me out at times.

[ruby_jane, BSN, RN]

On the day after the giant lunar supermoon everyone went crazy up in here and tried to take me with them... other than that, just the "Q" word, but I fully believe that. We had a hospitalist back in the ICU who used to stand at the central station and say "Aren't you lucky, it's been a quiet night" and we'd all curse her name because by dawn we'd have new admits and someone trying to leave the world.

[Orca, ADN, ASN, RN]

5 hours ago, ruby_jane said:

On the day after the giant lunar supermoon everyone went crazy up in here and tried to take me with them... other than that, just the "Q" word, but I fully believe that. We had a hospitalist back in the ICU who used to stand at the central station and say "Aren't you lucky, it's been a quiet night" and we'd all curse her name because by dawn we'd have new admits and someone trying to leave the world.

The "full moon" legend is alive and well on mental health units. There are those who swear that this is when the wombats are out.

[Night__Owl, BSN, RN]

When I was working ICU, there was a strong, unit-wide superstition about flies. More than once in the years I worked there, we would see a big, nasty house fly that had somehow found its way inside, and that was a clear sign that somebody in the unit was gonna make a celestial departure that night. Although we did avert it once or twice by hunting the fly down and killing it, if the fly got away it was game on. Every time.

[catsmeow1972, BSN, RN]

I was once working in a small town ER on a night where fell a full moon, on the summer soltisce and close enough to a Friday the 13th. Sho’nough...every frequent flyer came in. We were harboring a few BAs waiting for psych beds and the routine BS that should have been able to just see thier doc or the urgent care clinic. (Though in all fairness, we served a very poor, mostly uninsured or Medicaid, mostly low on the formal education scale type of clientele. People that used the ER for care because they had no where else to go.)

That night was memorable due to the way higher than normal ‘crazy factor’. So nobody can tell me those occurances don’t contribute. If someone had dared utter the Q word, I think they’d have been in 4 point leathers And stuffed into the supply closet.

[Davey Do]

On 2/20/2019 at 5:12 AM, TriciaJ said:

On psych, you never say a frequent flyer's name out loud, because that person will be back in within 24 hours.

Just last week, a former patient called to tell me that they had an epiphany and would not be back. I wished the patient well and they asked me if I would tell some other nurses of our conversation.

When I told my work wife Eleanor of what the former patient had said, Eleanor replied, "Oh great. (They) will be back in a couple of days!"

Sure enough, when I returned to work that following Friday, the patient had been admitted during the week!

[TriciaJ, RN]

1 hour ago, Davey Do said:

Just last week, a former patient called to tell me that they had an epiphany and would not be back. I wished the patient well and they asked me if I would tell some other nurses of our conversation.

When I told my work wife Eleanor of what the former patient had said, Eleanor replied, "Oh great. (They) will be back in a couple of days!"

Sure enough, when I returned to work that following Friday, the patient had been admitted during the week!

Of course. It just wouldn't be an epiphany without a readmission. (Because the epiphany wasn't just about not coming back; it probably involved cold turkeying off all psych meds.)

[Knight2Nurse, BSN]

I always bring two IV catheters with me when I start an IV. If I bring two, I get it on the first try. The few times I only bring one, I usually end up having to look for one more!

Of course there's all those taboo words not to say on the floor like "slow", "quiet", "easy", etc. They're always bringing trouble...

I worked for years at a rural hospital on an Indian reservation, and the natives have a saying: "If you talk about someone enough they just show up." This is especially true about the problem patients you were hoping not to see again!