Worst doctors orders ever received

Specialties Emergency

Published

I have a two nursing degrees, going for a third and have a whole lotta common sense. When I see stupid or hear stupid orders I may or may not carry them out..here are my all time favorites:

1) Male patient with active lower GI bleed...HGB of 5...Hypotensive and tachycardic..has 2 large bore IVs running with NS wide open as fast as it will go...blood bank working as fast as possible to get me my units of PRBCs ASAP...BP barely 90 systolic.

Order from resident: "We need orthostatic vitals on this patient"

Specializes in Pedi Rehab,Pediatrics, PICU.

*****!!! This %^&$ is seriously funny, but SCARY too!! I can only HOPE that when I start work I don't get some of these orders...Though it is enivitable... Maybe I'll get some good ones to post without actually having to almost kill a pt before I realize it...

:smiletea2:

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I remember this from a long time ago "Please make clear liquid diet more appetizing"

Well, at least he said please...:chuckle

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Specializes in Med/Surg ;Neuro/Tele; Stress testing;OB.

A scheduled c-section pre-op order for serum HCG......MD must have been really, really tired or something when writing this order!!!! We still give him a hard time about that order.

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Just yesterday, written by a new intern for a patient who was unresponsive, unable to swallow, and being considered for intubation: "Hard candies to suck on."

[sheesh, and what did the poor guy ever do to you, doc?]

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my favourite was not so long ago we had a chronic renal failure patient admitted to our high care unit for hypotension and ? sepsis, she started to code, we phoned her physician and his reply was...no new orders????whats that supposed to mean?must we stop the resus carry on what, we eventually phoned him back two more times, and he then decided she should go to icu to be ventilated, she died 2 days later

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Specializes in Acute,Subacute,Long-term Care.
what's the "hmm" for? are you judging me because i didn't know what that meant? i've been a nurse for three years too and have never seen that as an order before.

i was thinking pretty much the same thing when i read that post. i've been a nurse for almost 11 years and this is the first time i have seen that order.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
my favourite was not so long ago we had a chronic renal failure patient admitted to our high care unit for hypotension and ? sepsis, she started to code, we phoned her physician and his reply was...no new orders????whats that supposed to mean?must we stop the resus carry on what, we eventually phoned him back two more times, and he then decided she should go to icu to be ventilated, she died 2 days later

I would think that during a code you would get orders from the doctor running the code. yes, the primary physician needs to be aware of the situation, but the code doctor is on site and running things until the crisis is over.

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Specializes in Neuro ICU and Med Surg.

I received these orders for a dilaudid PCA.

Dilaudid 2mg bolus dose . Dilaudid 5mg demand with 10 minute lockout. 150mg 4 hour limit. The nurse set the pump and then told me what the orders were but didn't start it yet (thank God!). I told the resident on call to rewrite the orders and he told me it was fine. I told him he needs to rewrite the order. I didn't feel like coding anyone that night. It was finally changed, and then lowered later that day by the NP.

Another dumb order. We had a pt go into SVT so we got the crash cart and gave the 6mg of adenosine. Pt HR slowed down and then changed to A Fib with RVR. Resident at bedside tells us to give her some more adenosine, her HR is 155. We told her no, you can't do that. Do you want cardizem? She says yes, I want cardizem, but in the meantime give her some more adenosine. We again told her NO, we can't do that. Finally gave the cardizem and start drip after waiting for it to come from pharmacy. Pt HR goes down. I think there was 4 or 5 of us telling her she couldn't do that. I would think an anesthesia resident would know better. I guess not.

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Specializes in Emergency/Trauma/Critical Care Nursing.

This is more of a dumb doc story: I come on shift in ER, get report on this 22yr old guy with chest pain, sats 89-91% on a 50% venti, getting 1mg dilaudid qhr, Dx: pneumonia... so i check the kid, he's labored breathing, severe chest pain, diaphoretic, HR 120, resps 30/min.. so first of all i get rid of this venti mask business and pop him on a NRB, find out he has AICD, pacer, hx 2 MIs, multiple PEs (cardiomyopathy since birth), so i go to check his labs.. no troponin done in the 6hrs hes been there, so i just order and sent it myself, then go to the resident and say as politely as i can "i noticed there wasn't a troponin sent on him with active chest pain so i just did one", he then says "why? they worked him up for that last time he was here", i'm kind of stunned at that point and tell him that i don't care if he got worked up for it last night, he has chest pain, we send a troponin. he gets mad and walks away. So guess what that troponin was? 2.95.. MAJOR jump from the 0.08 he had "last time" lol so i make sure to tell this resident loud enough for staff MD to hear about this troponin, he goes "oh really, wow, um lets get another ekg", already done, here you go, and by the way the first one you have in his chart isn't even his.. you didn't notice the fact that it didnt show his pacer/AICD??, "Oh well lets start him on a heparin drip stat", I tell him, that would be a great idea if he wasn't allergic to it! but don't worry i've already talked to pharmacy and they're taking care of it"..... oh yeah and by the way you might wanna change that gpu bed order too..

Not only was i agitated at him but the previous nurse didn't catch any of this either?? for 6hrs? UGH Kid ended up going to CICU, don't know what happened with him..

To make it worse, I later overhear this moron resident taking credit for "catching this MI" bla bla If i wasn't so busy running around keeping him from killing my pts maybe i would've corrected him :devil:

Same resident, separate occasion... "lets give mrs so and so 5mg metoprolol ivp for her HTN".. umm her BP is 150/90 and her HR is 45!!! I don't think so! :confused:

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Specializes in peds and med/surg.

We have this one resident that thinks he's God in a white coat. The first run in I had with him we had a 24 y.o female postop pt who was tachy in the 140-150 but her pressures were barely 100-110/50-60 so there wasn't a whole lot I could give her. The doctor came and wrote to start Labetalol 200mg PO BID first now AND Metoprolol 5mg Q2H...just like that...no route....I called him and said I knew he meant IV, but I needed a verbal for it and was he sure he wanted me to give it scheduled or could I make it PRN b/c if I gave her the PO Labetalol and gave her IV Lopressor Q2, she'd bottom out....he said..."uh, your right, lets make it PRN." DUH!!

Third time, another hospital to hospital transfer arrived so I called to tell him the pt was there. He said, "ok, we need a cbc, bmp, mg, phos, NGT, blah blah blah. I politely told him that he needed to come assess the pt and write the orders and I'd do all the above. He said "can't you just take a verbal?" NO, you LAZY A$$, not for admission orders!

Next run in, we rec'd a pt from an outside hospital with a Groshong catheter the day before my shift. He was on TPN and when I went in to check him beginning of shift, his TPN was leaking all over from the site. I got a flush and flushed it and as you pushed it, you could see it leak from the site, so I stopped the TPN and the leak stopped. I called the same guy and told him I needed a CXR...he said "I don't see why you think you need a CXR, take a verbal for TPA, he obviously has a clot" I told him that if there was a clot, I wouldn't be able to push anything through, but I could, it was just leaking at the site and that I wanted the CXR to verify placement. He got an attitude and repeated that he didn't see why I thought I needed one....then said fine, I'll come check the pt....2 HOURS later, he showed and said that maybe it just needed another stitch to secure it, but he looked at my expression and said he'd get me the CXR....and you know what.....catheter was only in 2 INCHES. I wanted to smack him. He pulled it. Later I was wondering out loud why the pt didn't notice that it was much longer than usual...he'd had it for several days....and this jerk had the audacity to tell me he shouldn't have to, that we were in the hospital and we should have known! WTH....what was I supposed to compare it to, I'd just met the guy.

Later in conversation I was talking to one of the nice residents and come to find out, this guy was a surgeon in Ireland and came to the States a few years ago and he's been an INTERN for 3 years. Get a new attitude and maybe someone will pick you up.

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pretty sad when docs wont listen to the people who are taking care of their patients 24/7.

frustrating!

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Specializes in Medsurg/ICU, Mental Health, Home Health.
I remember this from a long time ago "Please make clear liquid diet more appetizing"

Well, at least he said please...:chuckle

Vanilla Vodka & Ginger Ale IS a clear.

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