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Me: I think you already have frank diabetes.

Patient: Who's Frank?

Me: sigh

Reminds me of Airplane.

-- Surely you can't be serious.

I am serious... and don't call me Shirley!

ETA: I'm not laughing at the part about diabetes.

[This message edited by DixieDevastated at 11:04 PM, April 6th (Saturday)]

Reminds me of a Pin I saw on Pinterest:

"If John has 50 candy bars and eats 45, what does John have?

Diabetes, John has diabetes!"

Oh, patients...sometimes I really miss working in a hospital

This woman has to be gotten to a hospital.

A hospital? What is it?

It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now.

=======================================================================

Captain, how soon can you land?

I can't tell.

You can tell me. I'm a doctor.

No. I mean I'm just not sure.

Well, can't you take a guess?

Well, not for another two hours.

You can't take a guess for another two hours?

=======================================================================

Ahhh... Good times!

[This message edited by aesir at 4:57 AM, April 7th (Sunday)]

Today:

Me to college student: So after you cut yourself on Friday what did you clean it with?

Patient: vodka

Realize I could update this DAILY!

[This message edited by purplejacket4 at 5:36 PM, April 8th (Monday)]

This being a student, I have to ask if the vodka was administered topically or internally.

On the outside but he made sure the vodka flamed first!!!

Okay, I have one.

We have a male resident who is VERY unhappy with being in a nursing home. Every afternoon, he starts just screaming at the top of his lungs. Today, to mix it up a bit, he decided to kick and spit, too. There is also usually all sorts of creative profanity.

This afternoon, it was my turn to try to calm him. I started talking to him, and it seemed like it was going to go pretty well. Then he screamed at me, "Why am I here? Why am I here? Why am I here?"

I gave him one of my standard answers, "Because your body is not strong enough right now for you to be able to take care of yourself."

He screamed "F*** my body!!!!!!!!!!"

And I swear, it came out before I could stop myself. I said, "No thanks, I'm trying to quit."

Holy crap. That really didn't help the situation at all. I had to punt it to another nurse.

I had a patient just last Friday ask me for a beer flavored Ensure

Wanna take a guess why he was in the hospital?

((HFSSC))

I almost spit. Thanks.

While I am not in the medical field the financial field had its share of...incidents:

Customer: my card isn't working!

Me: debit or credit card?

Customer: huh? I don't know the difference.

Me: okay let me see the card. Its a debit card let me check your account. Oh my you are overdrawn 500. You have received a total of 6 $34 insufficient funds fees and a $15 extended overdraft fee.

Customer: that's not possible, my card was working.

Me: well ma'am the bank will extend courtesy and allow your account to go negative but you are responsible for knowing your balance and bringing it into the green by the end of the day.

Customer: but I never know my balance. I just keep swiping until it says declined...

Me:

[This message edited by Unagie at 1:33 AM, April 9th (Tuesday)]

In a previous life, I worked at a credit union. A regular feature of my work week was going over account histories with customers who could NOT for the life of them figure out how their account got overdrawn (big college student population).

me: So, your starting balance was $50.

college dude: Yep.

me: Then you took $20 out of the ATM, which left you with $30.

college dude: Yep.

me: Then a check to Pizza Hut for $15, which left you with $15.

college dude: Yep.

me: Then another ATM withdrawal of $25 cleared, which overdrew you by $10.

college dude: but it shouldn't. There should be more money left. It doesn't make sense. Are you stealing from my account?

NIK I have had that convo, it hurt my head a little more each time...oh one of my favs.

Customer: I want to deposit money into my daughter's account.

Me: okay no problem just fill out this deposit slip.

Customer: oh it says account number do I need that?

Me: yes.

Customer: oh can you look it up for me?

Me: are you on her account if not I can't give you her info. I can't even verify if she has an account here actually.

Customer: no I'm not on her account but I'm her mother, I pay all her bills, I pay for her apt, I pay for her groceries and SHE NEEDS THIS SPENDING MONEY. She doesn't know her account number please!!

Me: . Nope.

ETA: I worked in a very high income area. Was surrounded by businesses and million dollar condos. I had this convo on a weekly, almost daily basis.

[This message edited by Unagie at 5:44 AM, April 9th (Tuesday)]

One of my favorite pt moments that I had was a an Elderly man rushed to the ICU from the floor, he was in a fatal arrhythmia (bad heart beat) but he was still kind of awake, the Cardiologist was at the bedside, and said Shock him Tush, we dont have time to sedate him. So I did what was asked. The guy converted back to a normal rhythm, I still have the paddles on his chest, he reaches up grabs my wrist, and says "Please don't EVER do that to me again".

When the X was seriously injured (he was NYPD in Harlem, NY) he was taken to Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center. He didn't know who he was/where he was for 2 weeks and thought he was in Harlem Hospital. The doctors kept asking him questions to gauge his mental state and re-orient him.

One day, after being asked again if he knew where he was and responding "Harlem Hospital", and being told it was Columbia-Presbyterian, he said, "Those are weird groups to be together--the Colombians and the Presbyterians."

I lost it (laughing hysterically) and was asked to leave the room

Oy...fully conscious cardioversion=OUCH, but a fully conscious electrocardioversion=DOUBLE OUCH! My grandpa had the adenosine cardioversion once and said it was the worst feeling he's ever had

Since we're sharing patient stories, here's my funniest one: I used to work on a heart unit and we had a lot of mental health/Alzheimer's patients because we were able to titrate haldol drips, were a "recovery" area for ECT patients, and a step-dwon from ICCU (where all of the more serious patients went, before moving to a regular Med/Surg floor). I worked nights...the shift where Alzheimer's and such can be at it's worst. One patient I took care of was especially difficult, due to the advance stage of Alzheimer's and she would yell out from her mom (keep in mind, she was elderly and her mom had probably been gone for years). The first night I took care of her, I knew I had to come up with a plan to keep her calm/quiet for the night. So, I when she started yelling for her mom, I went into her room and assured her that I had talked to her mom, and that she said it was okay (for the patient) to stay the night at my house (the hospital). The patient said, "Okay! I'm ready for bed now!," and slept ALL night long It didn't work as well the next night, but I was pretty proud of myself for coming up with that plan

Love it Mama, I always disagreed with what i was taught in school to always attempt to reorient confused patients. You are not going to fix dementia or alzheimers. I think the goal should be relieving any anxiety, or concerns they have. I too have done similar things many times.

I used to get asked Tush why are you so good at calming those folks. LOL

Cause I am telling them what they need to hear. DUH

Gotta love those patients!

Had to edit for confused spelling...

[This message edited by girlsbird at 6:56 PM, April 9th (Tuesday)]

Having worked LTC for the past 13+ years, I agree absolutely. Reality orientation is the biggest crock of crap to ever hit long term care. You just have to go where they are.

At my last job, we had a precious, precious man named Leroy. He looked for the bus to Moyock every single day. (We are 2 states away from that town, btw) Every afternoon, we would tell him that the bus had already run, and we'd be happy to put him up for the night so he could catch the bus the next day. It made him happy. He thought we were the nicest, most hospitable bus station he'd ever been in.

I went to see him on Thanksgiving, after I had changed jobs a few weeks earlier. He died the next day, and I told his son I thought he had finally caught that bus to Moyock.

There are many folks at SI afraid that they are going to die on the bus ...

Just sayin'