Worst/silliest/are you serious pt complaint you've received?

[odaat]

I don't know if this has been done before but I was thinking today about the one and only time I have ever been pulled into the office to be read the riot act by a manager....my patient complained that the hot water I brought her for her tea at 3am wasn't hot enough. Mind you this is after spending a lengthy amount of time straightening out legit medical issues pt had including 3am phone calls to the doctor. I'm still flabbergasted over that one, more that my manager saw fit to pull me into the office over it!

The worst one I remember is that I talk with my hands a lot, like majorly, and I was communicating a deaf patients concerns to the ER doc within visual sight of the patient. Pt thought I was making fun of him, I ended up being banned from the room and the pt advocate had to get involved 😕

[chicookie, BSN, RN]

I had a patient that was on the add-on schedule for surgery. As the shift progressed, the parent was getting angry because the patient was hungry. I told the family that if we hadn't seen the surgeon by noon then I would call but to please remember that if the surgeon was in surgery and got tied up that it might be a little while before they came. The patient advocate came by and wrote me up for being rude, arrogant and not doing ANYTHING for them. Also the parent said I was letting her child suffer because I wasn't letting her eat.

I didn't even know this was happening because while the patient advocate was there I was having a pow-wow with the charge nurse, attending NP and clinical nurse navigator in figuring out what to do because a certain surgeon wasn't returning my pages. It wasn't even noon. Why do I remember this, because guess who strolls onto the unit at 12:10 with her nose in the air, demanding to know why we were paging her so much?

Fortunately for me when my manager got the complaint, he was like there was no way this was about chicookie. When he found out what happened he told me not to worry about it. I love awesome managers!

[madwife2002, BSN, RN]

Moved thread to Nurse Patient relationships

[calivianya, BSN, RN]

I had family members hovering all around me as I admitted a patient one night. They were trying to look over my shoulder to read what was on the computer screen - legit hanging over my shoulder. I could feel one family member's breath on the back of my neck. The patient was vented and sedated so I didn't know who all he'd want reading his chart, so I kept suggesting they go sit down and relax on the couch instead of saying, "GTFO out of your family member's personal medical information, I don't have his permission to share it with you."

I got accused of "forcing" them to go sit down and then towering over them to show my dominance. LOL. Now I know if I let a family member know they can go relax on the couch I had better sit down too lest I start throwing my incredible 5'4" around and intimidating them.

[justavolunteer]

I am 'justavolunteer' & once a pt even complained about ME! He had been hollering all morning (on a weekend) about having to wait for his tests. He finally went AMA (said "I have to be elsewhere NOW!). I wheeled him out & half way to the door, he wanted me to take him to the hospital president's office so he could complain. He said then, "I'm an important person, I shouldn't have to wait". I told him the president wasn't there on weekends & took him to the door instead. He filed a complaint against me. I told the volunteer head what happened. She just said that people who scream about how important they are usually aren't. That was the end of that

[adventure_rn, MSN, NP]

I was once told that I have the tenacity of a cockroach.

But that was actually meant as a compliment...

[adventure_rn, MSN, NP]

Not me personally, but the department: The patient whose elective surgery was cancelled because he injected heroin in the parking garage before going to preop. Not a happy camper.

Also fun when they get mad because their friends aren't allowed to sneak them heroine through their IVs.

Not cool, man. Not cool.

[xoemmylouox, ASN, RN]

Also fun when they get mad because their friends aren't allowed to sneak them heroine through their IVs.

Not cool, man. Not cool.

You are such a square.. They just wanted a fun time with friends.

[adventure_rn, MSN, NP]

You are such a square.. They just wanted a fun time with friends.

I see your point.

Heroine all around!

[Here.I.Stand, BSN, RN]

I had one complain that I wouldn't take her outside for a smoke, and one that I wouldn't give her visiting sister a hospital gown and toiletries. It never progressed beyond the complaint though, because my manager doesn't support nonsense. The only reason I knew about the complaints were because the pts told me they were going to. Go for it.

[FineAgain]

We had a patient write a letter of complaint about the "vegebal [sic]" soup she was served. Apparently she had never had "vegebal" soup with PICKLES in it. Errm...it was zucchini.

This hotel mentality needs to go. away.

[SubSippi]

The worst complaint that I have had is that after taking a patient to CT in the middle of the night, the patient and his daughter reported my coworker and myself for being drunk on the job. My coworker was one of those loud hypertalkative disorganized people with poorly controlled ADHD so they thought she was on something and in their minds I was guilty by association. Management came in early to question us separately. It is funny now but it wasn't at the time.

The most ridiculous complaint was : "the fish was dry and the nurse didn't care." when in fact I had politely listened to her griping, offered to order another entree and provided ketchup and tartar sauce. Yes, I had to provide a written statement and hear her complain about the dry fish yet again the following night. Awesome.

But she didn't want you to FIX her dry fish, she wanted you to CARE that her fish was dry. Where is your compassion?

[WKShadowNP, DNP, APRN]

Multiple times I've had people leave without treatment in my ER because of their wait times. I told one kid (17?) after 15 minutes and he's storming my triage desk, "Son, this isn't McDonald's, you'll have to wait." He sat down.