What's Your Best Nursing Ghost Story?

Nurses General Nursing Nursing Q/A

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...

Specializes in LTC, CPR instructor, First aid instructor..
Please make your own thread and share personal ghost stories. I love them and have had a few experiences myself.
I do too.
I do too.

Fran,

FYI, I did start that thread... it's listed above. ;)

Enjoying this topic but also scaring myself silly at the same time if possible.:o

A long while ago I worked in a Nursing Home on the night shift and was in the medication room with my back to the door.I hear this voice whisper right into my ear "say bye bye" I spun around and there was nobody there.

A couple of weeks later I am charting in the T.V room and I hear whispering getting closer and closer.I am just about to turn around to see what was going on when a hand clamps onto my shoulder.Not a soft brush but a full on grip.There was no-one there and it let go when the Nurse sitting across the other side of the room asked me if I heard the whispering.

A lovely resident died and her bed stayed empty for a few weeks which was unusual.A couple of nights after she died her call bell would ring several times a night even when I pulled it out of the wall.While I was up and about answering the phantom bell I would see if the residents were O.K and without fail there was always someone about to fall etc.I'm sure it was a sign from this sweet lady.

Specializes in Med/Surg, DSU, Ortho, Onc, Psych.

Found it first time!! Thanks!

Caza

I graduate from lpn school next year and these stories are making me anxious :D

Ok here's mine- The floor I was working on had a patient, "Mary" that was chronically ill, and therefore would be admitted to our floor a couple times a year. Well one of the last times she was there, she was not doing well at all. But somehow she gained enough strength to to go home with family. Not long after that she was admitted yet again to our floor. But this time she died. Weeks later we found out she was a nurse for 25 years. Now here's what happened after she died that was creepy: On night shift mostly , but also days...some of the patients said a nurse who said she was "Mary" in a whte uniform with a nurse hat came in and said who she was, and that she would be taking care of the patient that night. This scenario started happening more and more often. Along with that, the room she died in, either there was a serious malfunction in equipment or somehow there was something weird going on to make an alarm to go off in an empty room . Several of us would have AAO patients, then all the sudden they would say "Mary" was their nurse. or that she would just stand at the door and not say anything- the patients would say, who is that woman that keeps coming in here? I was like, what woman? They'd say a nurse in a white uniform keeps coming in and just looking at the patient, then leaves without saying anything.

They would all describe her very similar to what she looked like.... I got the creeps when the alarm would go off in that room and someone would run in to see if someone was doing that or it just happened. Well, I saw with my own eyes nothing was happening one day when I was standing by the door, the alarm went off and I go in and noone is there.

Specializes in LTC, CPR instructor, First aid instructor..
ok here's mine- the floor i was working on had a patient, "mary" that was chronically ill, and therefore would be admitted to our floor a couple times a year. well one of the last times she was there, she was not doing well at all. but somehow she gained enough strength to to go home with family. not long after that she was admitted yet again to our floor. but this time she died. weeks later we found out she was a nurse for 25 years. now here's what happened after she died that was creepy: on night shift mostly , but also days...some of the patients said a nurse who said she was "mary" in a whte uniform with a nurse hat came in and said who she was, and that she would be taking care of the patient that night. this scenario started happening more and more often. along with that, the room she died in, either there was a serious malfunction in equipment or somehow there was something weird going on to make an alarm to go off in an empty room . several of us would have aao patients, then all the sudden they would say "mary" was their nurse. or that she would just stand at the door and not say anything- the patients would say, who is that woman that keeps coming in here? i was like, what woman? they'd say a nurse in a white uniform keeps coming in and just looking at the patient, then leaves without saying anything.

they would all describe her very similar to what she looked like.... i got the creeps when the alarm would go off in that room and someone would run in to see if someone was doing that or it just happened. well, i saw with my own eyes nothing was happening one day when i was standing by the door, the alarm went off and i go in and noone is there.

she must have loved her job. that's fascinating!!!

and then there are the human ghost helpers (like hamburger Helper!)

A CNA hid under the bed and waited for the new grad nurse to come in and prep the body for the morgue. The CNA kept her hands icy cold by holding onto a water pitcher, at just the right momment she reached out and grabbed her ankles. It was night shift, the scream was heard by the entire floor, the CNA made her escape and and never fessed up to the haunting for fear of retribution. (and no it wasn't me!) just a late night shift confession.

Specializes in Med/Surg, DSU, Ortho, Onc, Psych.
and then there are the human ghost helpers (like hamburger Helper!)

A CNA hid under the bed and waited for the new grad nurse to come in and prep the body for the morgue. The CNA kept her hands icy cold by holding onto a water pitcher, at just the right momment she reached out and grabbed her ankles. It was night shift, the scream was heard by the entire floor, the CNA made her escape and and never fessed up to the haunting for fear of retribution. (and no it wasn't me!) just a late night shift confession.

Awww, how mean!! I hope the CNA turned up for work the next day!

Specializes in Emergency Department.
and then there are the human ghost helpers (like hamburger Helper!)

A CNA hid under the bed and waited for the new grad nurse to come in and prep the body for the morgue. The CNA kept her hands icy cold by holding onto a water pitcher, at just the right momment she reached out and grabbed her ankles. It was night shift, the scream was heard by the entire floor, the CNA made her escape and and never fessed up to the haunting for fear of retribution. (and no it wasn't me!) just a late night shift confession.

Is it sick that I thought this was brilliant? :devil:

I read alot of these stories way back when and I am coming back to catch up. The one with don't let me die is definately one of the scariest I have read.

I am not a nurse, but I work in two group homes and have worked in 4 others before this. The womans home I work at has had lots of clients live there and has been there a long time. I know of at least one death of a client there, but not much about it. Its had alot of managers over the years too. The agency I work for took over the home about 16 years ago. The current manager says there is a spirit in the home. One of the the old staff ( she is not old,lol, but used to work there and now doesn't) told me and a coworker and her girlfriend that she saw a ghost of a person, presumabley a guy, with a hoodie I beleive when she was out having a smoke break. She looked at him and noticed she could see the trees and house through him. Scared the crap out of the coworker and girlfriend listening, as we were sitting in the dark waiting for my husband to connect the generator during a power failure. The girlfriend was really spooked and said she was going outside. Actually she didn't as we reminded her the ghost was out there. But Sarah the one with the story, was none to joke around so she wasn't much believed. One day I was working and helping a client change into pJ's in her room. I was working with the scared coworker. She was in the kitchen doing dishes, when we heard a loud noise from the bathroom. We went in and found the laundry basket on the floor, when it was firmly placed all the way back on the cupboard. I told her it was the ghost and she was very mad at me.

I have a liking for ghost stories. and Ghost shows. I often watch them at work when the clients are tucked in and we have down time. All the staff know this. i have worked thirds on occasion and one occasion I was working with a staff I was not fond of. I continued to watch my ghost shows. She said she didn't believe in ghosts. I went out for a smoke break and came around and tapped on the glass door right where she was sitting. She jumped a foot, terrified. We had already told her the house had a ghost and a few of our own ghost stories. I said i thought you didn't believe in ghosts.

The last little bit was about two or three months ago. The first stories were about a year ago. Just this last week, a staff for third came in and started talking about the back side of the house, and how she was scared to go back there. She said it's spooky at night. When back there, you can hear tree branches rubbing together. I have heard them, but she says that's not all about the back of the house. Then she told me last week she seen a figure walk from the office to one of the clients rooms in the far side of the house. That client is elderly, and her parents have passed away. Sarah, from the beginning of the story has said she dreamt that that client's mother came to visit her after she died. So it is interesting and hard to know what spirits have visited the home.

Not a ghost story or nursing related, but a parental isntinct story: When I first started working nights at a hospital almost 5 years ago I had two daughters at the time, 2 1/2 and 1. We were living in a 2nd story condo and my girls share a bedroom with a window. My husband, who has always been a much stronger parent than I, was in charge of bedtime because he never wavered when the kids yelled and fussed. He was very firm about bedtime and once the door to the bedroom closed, he never ever ever opened it until morning.

One night I was at work and I called my husband to see how the night was going.

"You'll never believe what just happened." he said. "I was at my computer playing a game and you know how sometimes your imagination wanders? Well I was overcome by a vision in my mind of firetrucks and ambulances and emergency vehicles coming to the house and I just had a strange feeling about the kids falling out the window. I felt like I had to check on the girls and sure enough the girls had somehow gotten the window open and were throwing things out the window."

During this time my oldest daughter was really into Peter Pan and I could easily have seen her creating some pretending game with the younger one where they fly out the window off to Neverland. When I got home from work that morning I was walking under their window on my way from the car to the door and on the bush were tiny little girl socks that they had been throwing out the window. It gave me chills seeing how easily they could have falled. I don't know what it was that prompted my husband to make an exception to his "closed door policy" and check on the girls but I am so grateful every day. There are so many things in this world that we can't explain. Love this thread...

I had a simular experience when my son was about five years old. We lived in the only two story apartment I had ever lived in. He is autistic. I was giving him a bath in the kitchen in his strawberry toy box. ( there was only a shower there, and I did this with him and his sister, usually in the shower.) The phone rang and I answered it, my attention regretfully taken away from my son. I had been talking for several minutes to my friend as she was helping me through a difficult divorce. I suddenly got a bad feeling and told her to hang on. I don't know how he got up to the window which was really small in the kitchen, but he had one leg out the window when I found him. Scared the crap out of me. Guardian angels are all around us. He is now a healthy twenty seven year old living with his dad, after living with me and going back to his dads for years. Whatever that funny feeling was probably saved if not his life, but at least from some serious damage. We have kept to single story homes after that, and not leave him alone while bathing.

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