What's Your Best Nursing Ghost Story?

Nursing is a profession that often involves long lonely night shifts in eerie hospital wards. It's a perfect breeding ground for ghost stories. These stories often involve sightings of apparitions, strange noises, and unexplained events that are said to have taken place in hospitals, hospices, and other healthcare settings. Some of these stories are believed to be based on true events, while others are purely fictional. Regardless, they continue to captivate and intrigue both nurses and non-nurses alike - providing a spooky glimpse into the world of healthcare after dark.

I know you have seen and heard freaky things. Share your nursing ghost stories...

[SMM8282]

Well, I've been reading these stories for two days now, and since they seem to be in such high demand... I joined to add mine to the mix. I am not a religious or spiritual person, nor am I one to really buy into things that might be considered supernatural. However I can appreciate the entertainment value of the unexplained. I certainly enjoy things that make the mind go "hmm??"

A couple of years ago I was working as a hospice aide, doing in home respite care. I was assigned to gentleman, who I will call "Mr B", with ALS. He was one of those remarkable people that had a positive effect on everyone that met him, myself included. He lived with his wife, who had recently brought her mother to stay with them as she was beginning to struggle living on her own. Originally I was not assigned to care for the mother in law, who I will call "Mrs M". Ultimately her health began to decline, and became bedbound and I was assigned to her care, as well. At this point they were both full assists, hoyer, w/c, the works. After about a year of working with them daily, "Mr B" seemed to be having an exceptionally good day. (Though, honestly, most days were good. He was remarkably positive and just had a great lightness about his personality.) This day was exceptional. The wife/daughter was home that day - but she was doing work out in the yard. Mrs M was napping in her bedroom, Mr B was in his w/c watching TV in their living room. Everything was really quiet and calm when the phone rang for the wife, so I ran to the door and opened it and called for her. She didn't reply, so I took another peek in to make sure everything was okay, and ran the phone out to her. Must have been 30 seconds, max. When I came back in the door, there was Mrs M standing in the kitchen. She was standing up tall and had her hand propped up against the wall very casually. Mind you, this woman hadn't done more than turn onto a commode in probably six months, any weight bearing had probably been equally as long. She had gotten herself out of bed, walked down the hallway, into the kitchen, and was standing there plain as day in the 30 seconds it took me to run the phone out to the yard. I ran over to her, I was petrified! She just had this very bizarre look on her face, much like people describe as "the lights are on, but no one's home", but she had a huge smile on her face. I asked her how she had gotten out of bed, and she told me "well, I walked, of course! I really missed Mr B, and I wanted to come out here to visit him before he leaves. I love him so very much, I want him to know."

Lo and behold, the next day Mr B went from a long plateau to rapid decline. He passed later that week.

As I said, I'm not one to believe in the supernatural, but Mrs M never walked another day in her life. This story is 100% true and I do not have an explanation for what happened in that house that day... but I suspect it will stay with me for the rest of my life.

[lucylu 777]

A pt told me she knew that her baby would not live even though she had an emergency c/s for distress. I asked her how she knew. She had seen a family member in the hallway going to the OR that had recently died and they told her

they would take of the baby, not to worry.

wow, when I was in 4 day coma or comming out of coma or whatnot - the first thing that I remember and that stuck in my memorry right after I heard the nurse screaming my name was my dad holding a hand of a child I have never seen before and have not meeat yet. Now, my dad died a month before my ordeal, I was 15 at the time. When I was 36 I had a rough time during a pregnancy and eventually lost the baby.Today I'm certain that my dad was standing there holding the hand of a child we lost - he's taking care of the baby.:)

[vegas2009]

Hey Lucylu,

Did ya remember anything from your coma? I mean like, bright lights? Floating things? Maybe YOU were floating yourself?

Anything to that effect? What about sounds? Feelings? Is it like a dream, when you're under like that? What does it feel like? Obviously, you were probably loaded with meds. Anything else you wanna share?

Have you ever thought back and try to recall? Aside from what you just stated?

[lucylu 777]

ha, ha, I have been asked this questions a milion times first by the nurses in that took care of me, by the doc's and a priest.Yes I have been loaded with meds at that point so some speculate that the chemical changes that are going on with the brain may bring on the illusion of seeing things from the past. I don't talk about it often because that is not much to say - no I did not float to the light I did not see the tunnel, heared voices and all the things that others report - but what I did see and remember with out a doubt and I can see it clearly like it happend yesterday was my dad and the child. My dad past away from pancriatic cancer he was in great pain before he died and they were pomping fluids in him, so after he died his body swelled up and his face had to be rapped in gause for the funeral service, I was the only one who saw him that way in the cascet because they closed it for the funeral and I put some money in his pocked for the "driver" lol. When I saw him he was standing next to my bed ( I supose I was in the bed because I looked at him like you look at people standing above you) he wore the gause bandaid around his face but it did not covered the whole face like in the cascet, so I know it was after he died, he held a hand of the maybe 2 y/o child I don't if it was a girl or a boy, anyway they were just there standing looking at me, no talking at all but there was a mutual understanding between us without the words spoken, my dad was there healthy,beautiful with out a trace of pain on his face, such peace radiating from his face and the child was just there looking careless and happy, I remembe them just like that, beautiful.I only told my mom and grandma about it because I did not wanted people to think I was a psycho - you know how teenagers can be, but my family was all happy to hear the news. So, no I can't tell you how it is out there, maybe because it was not my time..., today I think they were there to make sure I'm not scarred or something... maybe it was all a dream, I would like to believe not. Another think I noticed that started happening to me was the feeling of picefulness and calm, my life has it challenges but I love the place I'm in and feel that there is still something for me to do here... .I also feel the presence of whatever there is, and when I worked the med/oncology unit ( we had celestial discharegs every other day) I would always "talked to the dead people"lol, while doing the post mortem, the thech's and nurses constantly told me it was akward that I talked to them like that. Like I said maybe it was my brain playing tricks on me.

[carolmaccas66, BSN, RN]

When I was a nursing student I did a clinical placement at Royal Adelaide Hospital (RAH) located in Adelaide, Southern Australia; the largest and oldest teaching hospital in the state. The hospital dates from about 1840 or 1850 I think. Anyway we had handover one evening to the nightshift, and one of the male nurses who had been on a few nights ago told us a story that creeped me out. An elderly man had died not long before night shift was ending, (can't remember the diagnosis), and the doctor came and pronounced him dead. This nurse had been hurrying to get him washed, do the paperwork, etc so the morning staff would not have to do it. Well he did what he could, and was sitting in the nurses' station, head bent down finishing his work, when he felt a sudden presence and cold air. He looked up to the door of the nursing station, and there was this patient, less than a foot away from him, standing there fully dressed, smiling broadly and waving to him. This nurse kind of blinked (he was very tired and trying to stay awake), and the patient was suddenly gone. Of course, he rushed into the room the patient was in and there was the dead man, still laid out and very much dead. When he told us all, everyone was silent and I said it sounded like the patient came in to say goodbye and thank you for the care he had been given. The nurse said the dead man just looked happy and like he was ready to go when he was waving goodbye. So it's kind of a nice story, I like to think, instead of a ghost story.

The next story happened during the day at RAH. I used to work with the head Burns Surgeon there. Well I was all alone in my office (no-one else was in the department), and I heard the door open. I could not see the departmental door from my office door, so had to actually pull the chair over to see who would be walking by. It was the head of the burns unit, and I needed to ask him something fairly urgently re the OR/theatre list. I asked if he was free and he was always willing to talk, and joke around. Well today he just walked on by and kind of grunted, so I decided to leave it till later when he had finished in the OR (I knew that day he was in the OR all day). I thought he had finished or was on a break as he had on casual clothes. These clothes consisted of faded blue jeans, and a yellow/orange/red tie-dye t-shirt. Anyway he went into the back room & I continued working in my office. A bit later, I went in there cos I really had to get this OR/theatre list sent off for the next week. I said I really need to talk to you but he kind of just grunted again, working on the computer so I said will you come see me later and he said 'yeah'. I remember thinking he must be really busy today.

Well, a bit later I went back into the room and he was gone. This puzzled me because to get out the main door, he needed to go by me, but there was an emergency kind of 'old' door at the back of the department which was rarely used, and it didn't lead down to the OR. But I was so busy I didn't dwell on it.

Later in the afternoon, the burns surgeon came in in his green scrubs, obviously from the OR. I said did you go back down to the OR. He was puzzled and said what are you talking about? I relayed how I had seen him in the department, in casual clothes (described them), and had seen him in the other office on the computer. He looked at me strangely and replied: 'Carol, I have not been out of the OR since early this morning'. He was a real joker and I said stop mucking about etc, but he was serious. Later, one of the registrars, who had been with him in the OR, told me he was telling the truth. The burns surgeon could not explain the clothes either; he didn't own a t-shirt like that at all. And he had been so close to me in the other office, I could have touched him; he had looked as real as my own hand.

Explain that one! My gf said it maybe was an out of body experience??

At Royal Perth Hospital (in WA), my very first job there was in the old, original building. Firstly, it was ALWAYS cold in that building. We used to complain about it constantly. Heaters didn't ever seem to banish that cold - it would get into your bones. Everything seemed to be icy to the touch (even on a 40oC+ day, I remember getting chills). I wasn't working as a nurse then, but I did stay back sometimes to finish work so I wouldn't have to do it the next day. It was always SO dark in those rooms and going to the old loos at the back of the building used to creep me out. There used to be creeks out in the hallways, and when I went out to check, no-one was ever there (everyone else would have gone home). I stopped staying back after a while, & ensured I wasn't ever the last one out of the building.

I was also told that some of the old nurses (who trained there and became nurse managers), talked of an old fashioned, grey figured nurse (with the cap, apron & billowing gown) that used to be seen doing the rounds of the wards in the hospital - she was seen during the day and at night. Someone did a bit of digging into the hospital history, and there was a long-dead matron who used to do the rounds of every ward before she started work, and when she finished. What a dedicated nurse she must have been!

[carolmaccas66, BSN, RN]

'Twas a dark and stormy night on the Plastics ward I worked for at the time. Well actually it was about 8.30 pm and I was working the Late shift. But it was winter and it was dark.

Manifesting suddenly in a puff of hellish smoke...AHEM....a patient came on the ward unannounced with a post-op problem with a tendon repair we had carried out some weeks previously. Taking the hellish history we gained the arcane lore that he had attended the outpatients clinic two days previously. From this we deduced that his medical notes would be there.

A strange and foreboding coincidence lay therein...for who should hold the keys to Plastics Outpatients after hours but us?

So it was that I was despatched to unlock the dread portal to seek the precious medical notes. All lay in darkness yet upon entering into that little-known realm not all was still.

Fell voices were upon the air, low they were yet menacing. No sense could I make of the words yet the voices were there in the darkness of the locked, still outpatients.

Gathering my courage I hastened to Reception and the basket contained therein of patients seen within the last two days. Still the voices murmured and I grew afraid but locating my prize i hastened forth from Reception. It was then I saw it.

"Twas a red light glowing with malice in the gloom. I drew breath recognising the malign light of an LED. It was true then. A radio had been left on in Outpatients.

HA HA!! I really enjoyed this story! Some of these ghost stories have been REAL scary (I live on my own), but some have just made me burst out laughing. I like the one with the nurse running screaming down the corridor - just imagine if we all did that, the patients would all be discharging themselves!!

I was having a down day and these have really cheered me up no end!

Thanks you guys & gals.

[sunbug]

These are great!

Im just now starting clinicals and had my first experience this week, just wanted to see if it was normal... I think its normal...if you can call it that..

I have never seen anyone dying before, or been under stressful disconcerting circumstances as my patients were on the floor i was assigned.

My instructor for clincals this week asked us each to "visit" the room of a man CTD, he was younger about the same age as all us.

The others were afraid to go and disturb him.

I just wanted to get what the insturctor told us to do. So they let me go in first by myself!

When I walked in I wasnt expecting anything to different than our other patients.

But, As i turned the corner of the curtain to get to the patient there was a black ether air on his right side. It was thick and waiting.

I tried to ignore it, but the patient who couldnt talk, kept looking at it with a frightend look, then looking back at me.

I wasnt sure what to do, he was obviously in distress about it and couldnt communicate,, finally he got enough strenght to lift his arm point towards it and look at me, then put his hand on his chest as if to say he was afraid(thats how I interpreted it)...he did it twice which seemed like a feat for him with no strenght...

I called the other girls in and they didnt know what I had experienced and that I could still see the ether standing there like it was waiting.

(and Im not about to tell them...dont want to seem crazy to my classmates)

They hurry and listen to breathsounds (what we were sent to the room to listen to) cause they are freaked out..

These are girls that pray often for each other in class...I thought they might pick up and say a quick one for him...but they didnt they were to freaked out.

They left the room....and i was like wait a minute..arent they going to at least say something. I just knew that the thing was waiting for him and that they had not said good bye to the guy they just used!

They said "oh..I didnt even think about that"...

I said I came out here to get you to say bye but if you dont want to, I want to- so I will be back in a miniute.

I went in and held his hand, that thing was still there, I will never forget the creepy feeling of not being able to help him, and knowing that he was going to be alone in that room by himself with that thing waiting to take him;

All I could do was put my hand on his head and use my heart to let him know that he was a precious life that would be missed in the world.

He died about 6 hours later after we had left the clinical.

The next day the girls decided they wanted to say goodbye to him...we found out that he had died, he was a homeless guy that had been found on the steps of a funeral home, in complete liver failure. No one to say good bye to, no one to claim him.

I was searching for what the ether black thing was that was "waiting" for him.

I had heard that you could "feel" death ..but wasnt sure what that ment...

Is this that? ??

From the stories on here it seems like there is more to death than they teach us in the books!

I wonder what else I will get to see or encounter... I love life! but how do you prepare for death..I cant help patients with that... It feels realy bad going against what is inside of me, and I dont know if I can stand seeing that black ether thing again .... I think I understand the cartoons now where the grim reaper looks like a cape with a darkness inside instead of a face!!! its just freakyy

[vegas2009]

I like stories like these... Sometimes though, I can't help to think that -- people who have supernatural experiences were probably dropped more as a child.

Maybe there was something in their brains that were triggered somehow, to be able to see/sense the supernatural? Aside from the head bumps!

[carolmaccas66, BSN, RN]

For everyone's info re demons/spirits/ghosts:

I just read a post where someone said if a person moves, the demon moves with them. Well I have Jehovah's Witnesses in my family. A JW lady told me long ago that a JW girl was constantly being bothered by strange sounds, being touched at night, constant coldness in her house, strange noises such as footsteps and stuff being moved around. She always had her bible with her in the house. Well she had the JW elders come in and have a look & they asked her tons of questions. They finally asked if she had brought anything new into the house, she thought about it and said yes, she'd bought some clothes at an opportunity shop & books I think but nothing else. The JW elders told her to get rid of them (think she burned them). After this, the hauntings ceased completely. Apparently, they believe that anything can have a demon in it, or attached to it, so if you bring the object/s into your house, the demon follows. They also don't believe that the dead can come back in spirit form - it is all demons posing as your loved ones. I used to study with them & they take devils & demons very seriously. They told me Satan is out to get you; he wants as many souls as possible before the world ends, that's why they pose as your loved ones. But the loved ones will stay dead until JC walks the earth again & the earth becomes a paradise kingdom (I don't agree with al they say but it's a nice thought). I do believe in the demons though & still pray occasionally.

I used to talk to this older JW couple, he was an elder too, & he told me he had attended many exorcisms for JWs (don't know the terminology they use) & some of them were just freaky, ie: people's skins turning green & they would have no infections etc; personalities completely changing, shy guys becoming openly sexual; unfortunately was so long ago can't remember them all to tell here but my Mum has some freaky stories I can relate here. She had one after death experience I can post if anyone interested.

[missdeevah, NP]

please do tell about the "after death experience"

[RetRN77]

When I was a student, I had a patient whose first name was a Biblical name, Orpah. He had end-stage pancreatic cancer. His relatives were very compassionate people who would come sit by his bedside and read him encouraging scriptures. For some reason, I got the feeling he didn't share the depth of their faith. When he passed, I was on duty and the first person to discover him right after report. He had an expression of utter shock. His eyes were wide open and so was his mouth. The sight of him gave me chills and made me wonder many times what he had beheld in his last moments on earth.

[carolmaccas66, BSN, RN]

OK here is my Mum's after death experience.

My mum had 6 kids (not always by choice) & she had the last one quite late in life in her 30's in the mid-70's (that was quite old to have a last baby then).

Anyway her pregnancy, from what I can gather, wasn't the greatest & she was weak and sick when she was taken into the delivery room. The story is that the nurse giving her the gases got them mixed up and her heart gave out. She remembers floating above the staff working on her, and could recount exactly what they said. She said it wasn't like a dream, it was crystal clear and very real. Then she went down this long, long tunnel with very bright lights at the end of it, then she saw her mum who had died a few years ago. My Mum said she was screaming and crying that she wanted to go with her Mum into this light; she said the desire was stronger than anything she had ever encountered (even birth pains!) But her Mum just smiled beatifically & said it wasn't time for my Mum to come to her, she had work to finish and had to go back. My Mum was begging, pleading not to go back, but my grandma just kept smiling, & saying no. Mum also said that she had the most incredible sense of calm and peace, & felt that love was all around her-she said you don't feel anything like that in your earthly life. She wasn't concerned about any problems she had either because they all seemed so insignificant; she said you don't worry about anything in this new place; all your sorrows are forgotten. She couldn't emphasise this feeling of peace enough.

Well she remembers going back into her body and she was screaming and fighting to go back. She told the doctors about her experience and about what they said, and the doctor was astounded that she could relate everything they said.

She has never forgotten that experience & it left a big mark on her soul I think. I wondered about it for a long time & if we go to that beautiful place, I will be very glad.

My Mum has seen many ghosts and spirits in her lifetime. Her Mum was 'fay' in gaelic - she could sense things and tell when things were going to happen in advance. She had many premonitions as well that came true.

After death experiences fascinate me, because I have read stories where people go to a dark place, instead of seeing this tunnel of light & they have changed their ways afterwards. Scientists say it's just chemicals in the brain when we are dying, but I've often wondered that people from different cultures, with different religions experience the same, exact thing.

It makes you wonder about it all.