As promised, here it is. Post your bonehead moments in nursing.
1. I'm a community psych nurse and I have more than once gotten to my patient's house and realized I had forgotten to bring the needle for injection. Had to drive 25 minutes back to the office and then right back to patient's house. Sorry for wasting state funds for gas and travel time guys. I'm a bonehead.
2. Could not remember "QTC" while talking to the ICU nurse taking care of my patient. Just brain farted. My mind just locked up. Stood there and said "NP discontinued the seroquel because of prolonged Q... prolonged Q... uhhhh.... abnormal ekg."
3. As a nursing student I squirted a patient in the face with saline. Duh.
4. One of our checklist assessments has a typo on it that says cynotic instead of cyanotic. I got so used to it that I thought cyanotic was the wrong spelling and cracked a joke about someone being the color cyan when I saw the correct spelling. Derpity derp.
Back when I did home care for a while, I was changing an IV on a bedridden patient. I had fitted the IV bag to the administration set and was flowing the fluid into the tubing. I like to have everything ready to go before I approach the patient. Well I'm holding the bag up with one hand and watching the tubing with the other ready to cut off the flow before it drips on the floor when WHAP WHAP WHAP... what? I look up and I'm standing under a low ceiling fan and I've just stuck the bag into the fan blades. Fortunately, nothing broke.
Pt had a mastectomy. Someone had taped the crap out of the JP tube. I mean there were layers upon layers of tape. JP was not draining so I tried to remove the tape. Too many layers. So I got some scissors and started to cut away the tape, figured I knew what I was doing and I would be careful. Yep, I nicked the JP. Had to tell the surgeon. He was pretty good about it. Said eventually, drainage would be reabsorbed. Pt was discharged on time, with extra follow up.
He told me later that she came to a follow up appointment and said “Look! It’s regrowing! Yep, the area was swollen with the drainage that did not come out of the JP drain.
learned my lesson, I have never used scissors around a drain ever again.
Dumb question here - why would it not drain? clots? taped too tight? up against fat or other matter? other?
Doctor with heavy accent is dressed in sterile garb at the bedside in ICU, hands gloved and up in the air, gown on, yelling “Pants! Pants” Everyone tries to figure out what he wants.
Finally the nurse comes up behind him, reaches around, unties the drawstring, and yanks his scrub pants down to his ankles in one motion.
I’m sorry, I don’t know what he was really saying but this is a true story as every nurse in my community will attest to.
Before I had much experience with various tubing coming out of various body parts I was administering liquid tylenol via G-tube. Only problem was I grabbed the wrong darn tube and put the entire dose in the foley cath tube. Poor lady looked like she was voiding bright red blood. Scared the daylights out of me until I realized what I had done.
Emptied a foley n forgot to clip it. So the floor was covered in urine the next time I went back in the room
I did that not long ago with tube feeding. Spiked the bag of formula, primed the pump, took the cap off the tubing, turned it on. Only problem was I kind of forgot to actually attach it to the resident. That stuff is sticky! Housekeeping was not impressed.
I was in clinicals, first rotation, and I was helping a post surgical patient try and get comfortable. The man was moving around, and complained the bed did not fit him. I nodded, and said "you are a tall man no wonder the bed doesn't fit! How tall are you?" He looked at me and busted out laughing and said "not as tall as I was when I came in!"
He was there for his second AKA ?? ...I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me. He thought it was hilarious and told everyone who would listen the story. Including my proctor and the Charge.
OMG, that made me laugh out loud and almost aspirate my tea!!!!
I once thought about describing a pt's bowel movement in the progress notes as, "BM appears consistent with the chili they are serving for lunch in the cafeteria today."
- Once spiked through a bag of blood and ended up with blood on the floor, my shoes, infusion pump...pretty much everywhere besides in the patient where it should be.
- During nursing school prior to reading the chart, I told a double AKA to "hop out of bed," so I could change his linens.
- Forgot about the opening at the top of the bags we use for milk and molasses enemas. Went to remix and splooshed milk and molasses all over the floor. Like another poster, housekeeping was not impressed.
- Accidentally cannulated an artery with an IV while fishing for a deep vein. Didn't realize I had done this until I let go of the apparatus to grab gauze and a syringe, and the pressure of the artery blew the IV right out of the patient's arm and on to the floor. Blood was everywhere.
I can't count how many times I tripped, smashed my hand in things, or hit my head. Honestly a wonder I wasn't fired or killed during the first part of my nursing career.
Tenebrae, BSN, RN
2,021 Posts
Asking one of my retired nuns if their visitor was their daughter....?