You're not going to pull that on me

Nurses General Nursing

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Specializes in Neonatal.

So, mostly I lurk off an on here on allnurses (as you can tell from my lack of posts yet years of membership) but in the spirit of calling for more threads to share stories with I thought I would start this. In fact, it was my first thought of a story when I saw the title for the Not Today Satan, Not Today thread.

What are your favorite stories of not letting patients and/or their families pull one over on you?

For example, mine:

I was just back from maternity leave so I wasn't familiar to this family (NICU so many with long stays) whose reputation, as I was told, was to try to cause trouble. Clearly all of my coworkers had done their time and as I was back it was my turn. The mother used the morning to feel me out, commenting on how she didn't know me, wondering about my experience (all questions that were easy to answer), etc. Really the usual for a family.

During the morning, we had discussed what labs had been drawn on the infant, including labs to be sent out. It was clear that the family knew all about the labs, they had been well planned in advance, and they were interested in when they would be able to expect results. No big deal. Family goes to lunch and I wonder what all the warnings were about.

When the mom came back to the bedside after lunch, she looked like she was on a mission and confronted me with this statement:

"You know, all those labs that you all took on my baby this morning, I never signed consent for you to do them;" as took a stance that stated she was ready to see me falter and stutter over a reply.

Without I pause, I looked straight at her and stated, "actually you did, as part of the consent for treatment that you signed when your little one was admitted."

Her eyes widened as she let out a little defeated sigh and walked back out of the unit. Nothing else was ever said about that interaction, although there were quite a few others that came from her.

All I could think during that interaction was you're not going to pull that on me.

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.

Great thread! I am off to bed so I will have to think on this tomorrow to contribute, but I just wanted to say congrats on jumping in and good for you for standing up for yourself in that situation. What the heck is wrong with people? Just kidding, I learned to stop asking that question a long time ago. lol

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Specializes in ER.

I was working in the ER and got a sobbing patient in pain. She was taken right back to a room, but had to wait 30minutes to see a doc and get orders. I went in intermittently to check on her, get water and Kleenex. Thirty minutes of sobbing loudly and moaning, not one single tear, no snot, no red eyes. She was as dry and fresh as if she had just come in from outside. Geez lady, you gotta put some effort into this...pull a nose hair out or something.

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Specializes in Trauma, Teaching.

We get a lot in triage; we diagnosis it as "staticus dramaticus".

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Specializes in Medsurg/ICU, Mental Health, Home Health.

"I figured out why my Dilaudid makes me sick to my stomach. It's because you all push it too slowly. If you slam it in, I feel just fine!"

I really hope no one on my floor fell for that line. As she said it, I nodded and pushed slower.

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Specializes in ER.

An ER patient in his 20's with no know medical issues c/o not being able to feel his feet at all. He walked in, but lost the ability to ambulate when he didn't get the requested Percocet. We let him sit there for about an hour looking at four walls, and amazingly, he walked out.(but with a limp)

Actually I have one not nursing related. I was volunteering at the Humane Society and a woman walked in to surrender her small dog. She'd had the animal for a few months, but stated she was unable to take him for walks because she had broken her ankle. No cast, no limp, and no sense of responsibility, apparently.

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Specializes in ER.

Multiple instances of people needing to be bumped ahead in the ER triage because they had an appointment (including a doctor's appointment) or had to go to work. The best one was a lady that needed to get to Walmart before it closed. No one sees the absurdity of needing to bump ahead of a dying ER patient because they HAVE to get to work.

I have a feeling I'll be coming back to this thread, lol!

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Multiple instances of people needing to be bumped ahead in the ER triage because they had an appointment (including a doctor's appointment) or had to go to work. The best one was a lady that needed to get to Walmart before it closed. No one sees the absurdity of needing to bump ahead of a dying ER patient because they HAVE to get to work.

I have a feeling I'll be coming back to this thread, lol!

This reminds me of the time a lady brought her kid into the ER for something ridiculous then was complaining about getting discharge papers because she had to get said kid to a pediatrician's appointment. I really had to keep my tongue in check so that I didn't say something ultra snarky to her. 🙄

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Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).

A patient allegedly popped a hydrocodone in their mouth with the same hand that had a bandaged self-inflicted wound. I requested to examine the wound. When they turned their hand over, there sat the hydrocodone.

"You'll need to take that first", I said.

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Specializes in Medsurg/ICU, Mental Health, Home Health.
A patient allegedly popped a hydrocodone in their mouth with the same hand that had a bandaged self-inflicted wound. I requested to examine the wound. When they turned their hand over, there sat the hydrocodone.

"You'll need to take that first", I said.

MedSurg floor - a lady had someone bring in her home Percocet and she crushed it up and injected it into her PICC with a syringe she dug out of the trash. Would have worked, I guess, but she wasn't too good at crushing, and she also fell asleep mid-injection.

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Specializes in Critical care, ER, stepdown, PACU, LTC.

When I worked ER I had an 18-19 year old male patient come in. Don't remember why he was there, but for some reason we needed urine for a drug screen. Kid said he didn't have to go, so we gave him ice water to drink. A few minutes later he hands us his "sample" of very clear urine complete with ice cubes. It was a slow night, so about 30 minutes later we told him "looks like you tested positive for coke, you're being discharged into police custody!" He of course denied using drugs (doesn't everybody?), asked if he could take the test again. We of course told him yes, but this time, you might want to actually pee in the cup and not just dump ice water in. Do you really think we're that stupid??

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Specializes in ICU, LTACH, Internal Medicine.

Great idea for the post!

Family member called and said that the PCA pump was "leaking and beeping". The pump was indeed beeping "empty" but under it there was a puddle of fluid of the volume obviously much larger that the 30 cc it supposed to be, complete with some ice cubes. Called police found the content of the pump drained in the plastic bag in the family member's pocket. Gosh, if you were smart enough to disconnect, open and reprogram the pump so you could drain it in minutes, then why did you think about such crude and unbelievable substitution?

Regarding unusual requests, I once had daughter of a patient asking nursing staff to "keep always filled and beautifully arranged" candy bowl in the patient's room, complete with buying candy. She argued that nurses were getting enough money to afford that. The same patient complained that she was waiting "for hours" to have her huge set of colored pencils sharpened so that she could enjoy her coloring books.

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