What's your nursing kryptonite?

Nurses General Nursing

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It goes without saying that to be a nurse, you need to have (or quickly develop) a strong stomach. But even with a stomach of steel, nursing kryptonite can leave you nauseated and gagging, even if only on the inside. ;)

I'm only starting clinicals next semester, so granted, I still have much to see... but thus far in my life, the thing that disgusts me the most is, oddly enough, tonsil stones! How can something so small be so repulsive?

What's your nursing kryptonite?

i have to agree that c.diff stools and gi bleeds are especially sickening. but, i can't believe no one has mentioned the abscess with thick discharge that explodes out as soon as the scalpel touches it! and that smell.....i would totally rather smell necrotic wound than abscess funk!

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Specializes in Management, Emergency, Psych, Med Surg.

Spit does it for me... mouth care. I just hate it when people spit into a cup or into an emesis basin. I can take vomit, GI bleeds, gun shot wounds, open fractures, poop, people vomiting into my shoe (or into the handbag of the social worker), pus, maggots, etc but spit... Just hate it. One thing that kind of grossed me out once was placing a foley into a lady and getting nothing but pus back.

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Specializes in Dementia.
Spit does it for me... mouth care. I just hate it when people spit into a cup or into an emesis basin. I can take vomit, GI bleeds, gun shot wounds, open fractures, poop, people vomiting into my shoe (or into the handbag of the social worker), pus, maggots, etc but spit... Just hate it. One thing that kind of grossed me out once was placing a foley into a lady and getting nothing but pus back.

Maggots??? Whats the story w/ that?

One thing that grossed me out was snot from this one persons nose. I think its because it was so unexpected. :confused:It was green and thick... and wouldnt stop coming out. By this I mean every time I wiped, then came back, it was there waiting for me, and only me to wipe.... And I'm pretty sure the stuff was inside the back of the throat too even though I couldnt see it. :uhoh3:

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Specializes in ED.

Maggots... I've seen pts come in with bedsores with maggots in them... REALLY BAD CARE AT HOME!!!!!

Personally, I haven't found my "thing" yet... I actually enjoy and volunteer for those huge stage 4 dressing changes... I'm kinda grusome like that...

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I agree, give me a good wound any day. But I just really can't stand feet. If it has a wound on it I can deal with it. But just plain ordinary stinky feet bug me. I shouldn't have to deal with those.

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One thing that kind of grossed me out once was placing a foley into a lady and getting nothing but pus back.

:eek: :barf02:

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Specializes in Psychiatry.

Broken bones or broken teeth (rotting/missing teeth are ick, but not so bad as broken). Snot, urine, feces, vomit, pus, anything like that doesn't make me bat an eye. But seeing an arm or leg at an unnatural angle sends a jolt of revulsion from someplace deep inside me!

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Specializes in Geriatrics.

SPUTUM!!!:bugeyes:

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Trauma and Psychiatry.
It goes without saying that to be a nurse, you need to have (or quickly develop) a strong stomach. But even with a stomach of steel, nursing kryptonite can leave you nauseated and gagging, even if only on the inside. ;)

I'm only starting clinicals next semester, so granted, I still have much to see... but thus far in my life, the thing that disgusts me the most is, oddly enough, tonsil stones! How can something so small be so repulsive?

What's your nursing kryptonite?

What creeps me out big time is magots in a wound; what amplifies my feelings of disgust is 'magots in a wound coupled with leech therapy." Hope I didn't gross anyone out or cause you to gag. I really don't think it gets worse than this!

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We had a pt with a peritonsillar abcess that broke through the soft palate...the smell was like a combination of gangrene and halitosis.

Wet gangrene...

I once had to put a NG tube down a pt who had an ileus, she then started vomiting, and liquid stool came out her mouth and the end of the NG tube. Fecal emesis...yechh.

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Projectile trach goobers. LOL Anything else is "game on" except those lovely airborne goobers....you know, the ones that end up on the ceiling! Blech!!:barf01:

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Specializes in Med nurse in med-surg., float, HH, and PDN.
What creeps me out big time is magots in a wound; what amplifies my feelings of disgust is 'magots in a wound coupled with leech therapy." Hope I didn't gross anyone out or cause you to gag. I really don't think it gets worse than this!

The maggots at least are cleaning the dead stuff off! What I don't like are leeches on ME! I know the lab-grown leeches do good stuff for wounds that need'em....but when I was young we used to go swimming in a lake that had leeches during certain times of the year. And call'em what they were....BLOOD-SUCKERS. It would freak me out so bad when people would come out of the water with those slimy black things glommed onto their skin. I think they were worst when the weather was hot and dry. ICK!

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