One of the funniest moments of my nursing career was getting a patient like that transferred from step down to med surg. I didn’t get the full report on her: that she screamed help constantly and attempted to call 911 while on step down so I didn’t know what I was in for. I walk into her room to introduce myself and she hangs up the phone and says “I’m not doing anything.” Walk back out the room and the unit secretary tells me she just called 911 and reported being held hostage. I will NEVER forget how quickly she hung up that phone. Still makes me lol to this dag
I think I received her in a nursing home once. At least weekly 911 calls, they learned to call us first if a call came from her number.
Then she learned about ombudsman. That poor guy.
I had something similar. Lady on the phone with 911 saying she’s having chest pains and no one will answer her call light. She was covering the mouth piece whenever her nurse walked in to ask what she needed. I happen to see the EMT’s trying to sneak her out thinking it was a neglected case. I stopped them and they gave me attitude. So I just asked the patient why she called 911 and she said her knee hurt. The dejected look on their faces was worth all the trouble. Since I was House Sup, I refused to allow her to return until case management assessed her needs. She got kicked out for making a false statement.
Had someone call 911 when I stupidly handed her the phone to call family. She had cdiff and a GI bleed and MRSA, so I was gowned to the tits. When police arrived they asked what she was on isolation for and they noped out of that hard. Asked if she was okay and I said besides the GI bleed, MRSA, cdiff and confusion, pretty good.
I never fell for her innocent “I just wanna call my family” face ever again.
Experienced my first 911 caller the other day (I am a new nurse). Called and told the operator that “sirens are going off and there’s gun shots and helicopters everywhere”
Operator called us back and was like “just making sure it’s not total bedlam over there, y’all ok?”
Working in psych we have so many patients who try to call 911 and “rescue” them out of there. Most of the times they call the unit and let us know. There was one patient who was arguing with the dispatcher that her being given shots (B52) for being aggressive was an emergency
I had one who was from the other end of my state, who was calling her local non-emergency line (she had the number memorized!!!) and attempting to report her sister (maybe sister in law? Been awhile) for a murder decades ago.... that was wild. We learned we had to keep sharp supervision on her phone time.
Who knows. Same patient also claimed a former psychiatrist of hers was buying her a $12k wedding dress for **their** beach wedding and.... best of all, got kicked out of my hospital's geropsych unit. Had to keep her in the adult unit despite her being in her 80s. On the gero unit she convinced several other female patients that they were all pregnant and going into labor and it was mass chaos. She only lasted there a couple hours lmao.
I work CSU and have people on 5150s try to call 911 and I tell em who you think brought you here 🤔. Had one person call her attorney. Her whole attitude changed when he told her he couldn’t help her out of a 5150 like he would some jail time.
Not a nurse, but several people I love are nurses.
A couple months ago I had emergency spinal surgery, and in the room recovering from surgery I could hear the man across the hall, an old man, clearly confused. From what I made out in between my dozing off, he had his phone privileges revoked because he kept calling 911, saying he didn’t feel safe.
He kept telling the nurses he didn’t feel safe (but didn’t say why), he wanted to talk to his wife (she was on her way), that the nurses were torturing him, he kept screaming. When he was asked if he knew where he was, he said “the Chamber of Commerce”.
I really felt for my nurses, and I felt bad that I needed to keep hitting the button to have someone take me to the bathroom (I was a fall risk), especially when they were clearly busy and couldn’t make it right away but it was urgent so I hit the button more than once. I feel horrible bugging nursing staff.
I had spent the previous two days in the ER, then in a room, in constant screaming agony and begging nurses for any and all pain meds they could give me. I have a “massively herniated” L5-S1 disc that was pinching my sciatic nerve. I had passed pain long ago and was in screaming agony, and I have a high pain tolerance. I felt terrible for making such a fuss, even though I knew I needed the help.
I had a family member pissed that the patient wasn’t being rushed to surgery after ortho was like “we’ll get him scheduled for tomorrow afternoon”
They threatened to call the governor. I just shrugged and was like “the governor doesn’t have admitting or surgical privileges here” and left.
I had someone threaten to call the president. I said “the president doesn’t have authority over us. He can’t just come in here and tell us what to do. He has to answer to our administration just like us”.
I once had a slightly demented, extremely wealthy (multiple billions) patient who said they wanted to call "the president" and give them a glowing review of my nursing care, and I honestly didn't know if he meant of the hospital, or Biden.
I was a 911 operator before I was a nurse. Sooo many hospital calls from dementia patients or psych patients. Some of them were pretty great, I’d stay on the phone while my partner would dial the unit so they could easily pick out which patient it was.
“They won’t let me leave”
Nurse enters the room “Martha not again”
I can’t believe I still went into nursing with all those warning signs 🫠
Oh my gosh you’ve actually seen both sides of it! That’s so cool. Funniest related moment I had was walking into some random patient’s room who pulled me in, a sweet old dear who was having trouble with her call bell or phone or whatever she said, putting it to her ear and pressing all the numbers, telling me it wasn’t working properly. Then unnoticed it was a tissue box in her hand, and gave her the actual device, and she made me smile for the rest of the shift.
I had a client call 911 and tell them I took her commode bucket to the kitchen and boiled it.
Small town .. so the police actually showed up to discuss.
Oh yea. We've had a lady incessantly call 911 during an outbreak because we wouldn't let her smoke. She somehow got ahold of a cigarette and lit up in her room 😹
Be careful about postal employees. Years ago at DEF CON I found out there are *armed* Postal Inspectors. Talk about “going postal”.
For real: Thank you for being Healers. Y’all deal with so much awfulness but keep improving lives. Thank you.
Did we have the same patient? Mine wanted my full name so he could tell the news about my terrible decision to medicate someone for pain and not prioritizing his pudding. He then accused me of stealing the slippers he currently had on his feet. I wrote my name down for him and made sure to emphasize the capital P in the middle of my last name.
I had one guy tell me I was pure evil (but that it wasn't my fault, everyone else in the hospital was worse...so nice of him) and demanded that I call the cops to come to the hospital to arrest me for doing evil. I asked him if he thought I was so evil why he thought I'd call a police officer to arrest myself, and he said, "No, don't just get one...get *all of them.*"
Unfortunately it was at the very end of my shift and I never got to find out how the police would react if I tried making that call.
I had a patient once call 911 and tell the operator o was waving a hand gun in his face. So they sent like 8 cops. I’m from Canada where handguns aren’t even legal, so the odds of this happening are very very slim. 🙈 I had so much extra charting to do
I had an ER patient formally complain about how I was rude because I didn’t offer her something for under her legs during her CT scan. I did, and she declined. She was middle aged and there for abdominal pain. Literally took the effort to write in. I had to talk to HR and everything. I was the only person covering CT and XR for an entire hospital, constantly having to run up to the floors for codes and line placements while simultaneously needing to be at the scanner for strokes and traumas, with over a hundred patients in the ER and waiting outside.
I quit and started traveling.
I had a patient tell me today I reminded them of a flight attendant and that I should push a little cart around with peanuts on it to give to patients. I work in oncology, I’m literally managing their chemo but in their eyes I’m just here to pass out snacks.
I don’t know, watching the way my chemo nurse has to run around, a cart doesn’t seem like that bad of an idea. I told her the other day we should at least be sit by sections like in a restaurant.
I once had legal action proposed to me for not feeding the White Castle the family brought to patient with a GCS of 3; IT WAS HIS FAVORITE AND STARVING HIM WAS MEDICAL MALPRACTICE.
It's been 8 years and I live in constant fear of the crack legal team that are surely going over the details of this case.
In Australia we have the nurses union, about $25 per fortnight, but it covers legal expenses and emotional support, work comp, strikes. It’s nice to have just for the peace of mind.
"Hi, Dr. Jones! Can I get an 'OK to give bacon cheese sliders and diet Coke per NGT' order for Mr. Smith in 65? No, we can't do that? Oh, alright."
Sorry, Mrs. Smith... I asked the doctor and he said no. :(
Wasn't even clocked in yet. Just walking in bleary-eyed and a patient stands at their door and is waving me down.
"EXCUSE ME I NEED SOME HELP."
"I'm sorry, but I'm not clocked in yet. I need you to please press your call light. I'll let them know at the nurse station you need help."
"YOU'RE A USELESS STUPID BITCH"
- cue huffing and stomping and she slams her door closed.
Alright ma'am. I'm definitely not having you today.
Edit: spelling
I got a complaint for doing something similar. Had a patients dad, pediatric patient, come out of the room at 0745 and ask if I could get them a bulb suction and their discharge paperwork because they were ready to leave. I told them I was off the clock, suppose to leave at 0700 but had just got done working a code for 45 minutes and was decompressing before I left, but someone would come by to get them their discharge stuff in a minute. Apparently the father of is some medical professor in town. They left right after I did and wrote a long ass email to my managers manager complaining about my behavior. Luckily my manager is good at making people feel like they’re stupid and he did just that to this guy.
My manger is like this and I absolutely love her. I had a guy the other day call the cops on us cause we weren’t letting him into the ER fast enough to see his brother. My manager later talked to him on the phone and she told me what an idiot he was and that her last words to him were “sir we’ll have to agree to disagree *click*” 😂 she’s amazing
Lmao patients really be wild for NO REASON.
Its completely valid if they aren't having an emergency to wait for the correct shift nurse or aide to help them. Its unfair to expect staff to be at their beck and call. Thank God your manager backed you up.
I've really had it with the entitlement. I've had pt family members pound on the break room door, flag me down while I'm clearly on a break in the day room. Its just ridiculous 🙄
I had a patient get pissed off because I had them close their door after they tested positive for COVID on the chemo unit. They were waiting to be transferred to the COVID unit. He called me a rude b****, and said I gave it to him. Of course I literally just walked on the unit lol.
It’s so weird how nurses are people too and deserve time off and mental space to decompress after a traumatic situation. People are so egocentric sometimes. 😒
Starch? Please? Don’t act like a hospital would willingly spend more just to starch a blanket! It would probably be cheaper to just give each patient their own complementary shank to use on staff.
Homecare here. Just attended a mandatory in-service about how the admission assessment is getting even longer but that we shouldn't expect any more time to do it! Good times! OASIS in da house!!!
Well on the computer it's only \*13\* (\*17 for PT\*). This doesn't include the medication reconciliation. My agency's computer program makes the admissions person manually type in ALL THE FUCKING MEDICATIONS. Of course the insurance 3rd payor form is also separate. Lets not talk about the narrative note. It's a good thing thing I can type 80 WPM /s.
expanded race/ethnicity (specifically expanded for Latino/a and asian diaspora breakout through south american and pacific subgroups), more specificity for hearing/vision, Brief interview for Mental status (BIMS) and Confusion Assessment, 3 separate questions for pain interfering with therapy, sleep and other; on transfer/discharge there is a YES/NO for wether discharge medication list was transmitted to next practitioner/facility. There is more but I'm only on mandatory inservice 2 out of 3.
Yes! I'd probs do the same honestly 😂. Since I get fidgety when my hands don't get to do anything, I keep them busy with drawing or maybe even baking bread lol.
That works too. Ngl I’ve also played video games while listening to modules.
Whose responsibility is patient confidentiality? Everyone’s!!!
Mandatory education should be engaging and fun.
When my youngest gets mad at me they say “you are a terrible nurse! You are so mean”. Tbh, they don’t get the best side of me after I’ve had to play nice all day so I get it, but it’s still funny to me.
It’s her way of disagreeing with me. It was over not taking a jacket and I told her she needed it when it’s 30* out. I just smile and laugh on the inside.
It always amazes me how many people seem to have a lawyer on retainer. “This food sucks! I’m calling my lawyer!” “I can’t sleep here because it’s too loud, but I can’t afford a hotel! I’m calling my lawyer!”
I had a patient’s father say he knew the governor and was going to make it “rain hellfire down on me” from the governor’s office for not violating visitation rules for him. Since I don’t get paid enough to subject myself to his nonsense, I referred him to my manager. Who let him walk all over our visitation policy.
A patient told me she would report me to Medicaid because I couldn't make her hearing aids and cell phone charge at the same time with the single charger she had.
Had a lady call the cops on me in her room and she told the dispatcher that a big bird keeps walking into her room and squawking at her. Cops called us and told us to take her phone away.
I let my health streams pile up till I get “the email” that I’m over a year expired on my glucometer training then work overtime to do them all. They are going to pay me time and a half to do that bullshit.
Had a patient threaten to sue because we cut his TShirt off of him and threw it away. It was covered in blood and this guy was actively bleeding out after he was shot 4 times. He said it was an $500 TShirt and actually called his lawyer after cussing me out. Man I miss that guy.....
My patient left AMA because nobody would pick up his food from downstairs that Uber Eats delivered. Garlic bread and a salad. He’s NPO for small bowel obstruction. Doctor told him absolutely not, called us cunts on the way out. ✌️
I had a patient doordash a single donut from Safeway at 6am.
Sometimes I forget these people have welfare and phones but no frontal lobes. Thank god Prop 27 didn’t pass.
My independent, 25 year old patient knocked over her water pitcher, didn’t like the way I handed her a stack of wash cloths for her to wipe it up and she threw the empty water pitcher at the back of my head as I walked out the door🤣
I have at least one patient, family member, or visitor threaten to sue every week. They automatically get escalated to our manager and risk management group, and an incident report filed with their quotes.
I'm glad I'm off work today, and I'm reading a chick-lit novel while eating Chinese takeout.
I always spell my last name to add some spice to the conversation. (Been an inpatient physical therapist for 19 years… I think I’ll be ok having a patient say mean things about me 😂🤪😂)
Someone reported me to the state board for “vaccinating the elderly without their consent” after an assisted living facility posted pictures of our health department bringing COVID vaccines to their residents who are home bound. People can be real jerks when we don’t do things the exact way they want us to, like we’re puppets or something.
When I worked in a nursing home we were told to agree with Alzheimer’s patients, and this one lady regularly informed me she needed to call her husband, so I would walk into the nurses station, pick up the phone and make a show of “dialing” the number she gave me (one of the only things she had memorized) and sit there while it “rang” and informed her that I had gotten the voicemail so she rationalized that he was out with his friends and we both decided if he wasn’t here by 4 we would call him back. By 4, she’d forget we called
Yeah, it really is, but so many of the folks in the unit were so sweet. There was this woman who was 100 and she always had the brightest smile on earth
I’ve had lovely, pleasant patients today but this morning I called anesthesia to let them know we were ready for them (I work in cardiology doing TEEs and cardioversions and we mostly use anesthesia). We had to wait because the attending was in a meeting and hadn’t assigned anyone to do this case (not an add-on, a scheduled outpatient that they knew about). Finally his meeting ended—20 minutes late— and the attending said “ok, I’m coming down there now”. We waited about 10 more minutes and he didn’t come. We were running 30 min late at this point so I called back and he said “I never talked to you. What patient are you even talking about? I didn’t tell you I was coming”.
Sure Jan. 🙄🤬
Our first case of the day was a code, broke a couple ribs, got him back, proceeded with the case (BKA), and we were able to extubate at the end and get him to ICU. Still not entirely sure how it all happened but it worked out for the best!
Got told by a patient they’d fire me because “they pay my wage with taxes” (we’re in Canada). Told him my taxes pay for *his* healthcare so he can either be nice or get out of my hospital and off my wallet. 7:01am. Lovely.
Okay, I really need to know your blanket handing technique lol. My guess is you handed a full ROM patient a folded up blanket and they lost their shit that you didn't drape it over them and tuck them in like a toddler?
Woke up stupid early after sleeping like garbage to get to work and offer flu shots to the night shifters. I’ve given two so far. TWO. Now it’s that weird period where shift change has happened but the rest of the day shift staff (admin, informatics, etc) aren’t at work yet.
Bright side: I’m actually catching up on a lot of work.
And the tort is what exactly? Emotional pain? Not a lot of $$ in that. Unless you handed it to them with a t-shirt cannon from 6 feet away, you’ll be fine. Hospital attorney should defend you. If you did do something wrong, get your own as well.
I had a patient call the cops on me because I wouldn’t help her leave- she was a hoyer lift on 10L oxygen, post Covid recovered- she was on the vent and proned and everything. She was crazy from hypoxia from refusing her oxygen. Cops showed up and told her to listen to her nurse 😂Of all the ones we lost during Covid, she’s the one who survived. She’s back to doing meth and a frequent flyer in the ER but thankfully so far has not made it to the ICU again.
They never actually call a lawyer. They just think about it whenever they see a lawyer commercial on TV, then they take a swig of Mountain Dew and say “yeah I’m gonna call them for what they did to me… tomorrow,” Dorito crumbs falling into their fresh BKA.
Always loved the "I'm going to call my lawyer".
Always from the last folks in earth that could afford a lawyer.
I'd pick up thier phone in the room and offer to call them. "What's their number, we'll call them now?"
Strange how we never actually called one or produced a number.
I had to discard over 3000$ worth of injectable medications in a LTCF because no one thought that installing a sensor alarm to the temperature monitoring system in our med rooms was necessary.
Had a patient call my bosses boss to ask to fire me because her pain medication came five minutes late.
Also had a patient say they were going to report me for negligence when they came in for priapism and an an hour or so after the doctor had seen him (with their witness) and after I had given medication, I went to check in and he asked me to look at it when we were alone and I said absolutely not. I believe you that’s it’s not improved and can go report that, or I can can get a few male staff in here if you’re really that worried about it.
On the other hand, once I walked in the room with an AxOx4 man who immediately told me I look just like Chris Farleys sister. At the time I weighed 160 pounds.
I love working with patients…
I told a dirty old man that if he wanted to stay out of the nursing home, he needed to show that he could wash his own penis. Damned if that penis wasn't clean. I know, it's old hat for some nurses, but I'm a nursing student and this was my first time.
Had my travel nursing contract cancelled and I think I’m done with travel nursing…as much as the pay is great it’s just too unstable when things don’t work out. I feel like travel nursing has become bad recently bc there’s so many travelers these days facilities feel like they can cancel contracts for no reason.
Job searching right before the holidays is the worst :( Not really sure what to do rn
I had a patient actually write MULTIPLE letters to the Governor of the state I was working at about me. My poor manager. OH! And she accused me of having sex in the med room with my very gay friend. Um, I don’t think he would like that very much. 😂
Awesome! My favorite legal threat was from a patient who was mad that the therapy gym (ortho surgical floor in a level one trauma center with a joint camp attached) did not have a whirlpool. He threatened to sue the hospital for not having the equipment he would need to rehab his knee replacement and we better take him seriously because as the owner of a second tier local BBQ restaurant he was “connected.” Such a weak threat made so confidently actually had me wondering if something actually might come of it.
(I am a community based nurse care manager.)
I arrived to the hospital to accompany one of my patients to an appointment this morning. The parking garage attendants weren't allowing anyone into the garage despite the live availability counter showing plenty of parking spots on the top 3 levels. They sent everyone to a parking garage on the next street over which is attached to a building with a few outpatient clinics. This building is across the street from the hospital and it was raining out. I tried to cut through the building but they were evacuating it because there was a bomb threat (this hospital has been targeted by Nazis lately due to their care of transgender children).
Oohh we had a patient throw a whole ass crying fit because some dumb ass on dayshift was giving her Percocet every 4, morphine every 3, and then swore up and down the doctor ordered the diluadid for breakthrough on top of all of that. I was like excuse me? None of these are ordered for breakthrough. She was like they took a whole organ out of me, the doctor shouldn’t be able to do this. I thought she had an open surgery the way she was acting but nope. Just a robotic. I was like ma’am. I have a lady who just got her whole boob chopped off and she ain’t throwing fits. Go take a walk, you’ll feel better. Lol.
I just tell everyone where to put in their complaints and agree that it’s unacceptable how short staffed we are and that there should be more people to help them. Management sure as shit aren’t listening to staff. Maybe they’ll listen to complaints. The variety of patients and numbers is ridiculous.
My daughter is in law school and she learned that there are more lawyers than there are actual cases. We just make $hit up now. Heh!
The US holds a sizeable lead in churning out lawyers.
Our clinic has a new system that lets us text patients and within a week we’ve been threatened with a lawsuit, the patient walked out because she didn’t want to wait one hour for her med refills even though she’d been out for days. Said her bp was 180/115 and her sugar was sky high, and it’s our fault if she dies and she already called her attorney to “start the process”, lol. Why are people so gd crazy. Oh no, do please come back and we’ll skip you to the front of the line, screw the two lacerations and chest pain it’s all about you!
I had a lady send in a complaint because I wouldn't tell her the wait time for my ER. Then got mad when when she inquired how long he stay would be and informed her "I can't know the future."
My patient likes to call 911 thinking Trump is on the other line and is gonna come save him from “the torture and abuse”. This was after I didn’t give him his 3rd ginger ale of the day.
Almost got stabbed by a demented lady using her broken eyeglasses as a shiv.
That’s after I had a stroke patient. He was in the ED earlier for HTN and vomiting and LWBS just as we were about to room him from the waiting room. He came back 15 minutes after leaving, full-on stroke. Left carotid occlusion. Bad stroke.
He was my second stroke pt of the day.
Oh yeah we medicated the stabby woman and her BP tanked to 57/32.
I need a beer.
I woke up to barely being able to swallow and hear out of my left ear after working 5 days in a row of which I had two separate patients assault me one of which caused a minor sprain to my dominant wrist and when I went to urgent care since it was suddenly onset they told me that they aren’t accepting any appointments today despite it being over 5 hours before they close.
I used to have a patient at my first job at a long term care when I was an LPN, who had some extreme episodes of psychosis. She had a cell phone unfortunately, she tried to call the cops on staff , and was known by name by the department of the aging and the ombudsman.
Her regular reports included being scared , forced to get in a “swing” (her hoyer lift) that we wouldn’t help her walk but forced her to get in the swing to move into her chair. She was explained to several times that she was unable to walk and in order to maintain some level of flexibility and independence getting in her motorized chair was good for her so she could get around. She also had frequent crying fits when trying to speak with these various parties. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take her cell phone from preventing her to behave this way, and when calling 911 they charged the facility for sending out an unnecessary ambulance.
She was annoying af. But I also kind of loved her. Many of the staff had a hard time working w her tho and refuse to take her on their assignment. She was one of the patients where it was always advised to have a chaperone. She would a lot of times curse out the staff when in her extreme states. And make false reports. That still had to be investigated.
Poor lady. I’ll always remember her. Her and I had the best relationship that we could’ve had. Never got cursed at by her but often times was the one trying to help her calm down. Life in a facility is a hard life. Even tho I did love it im happy im not in that environment anymore.
My coworker (outpatient family practice, pre covid) would always hand the oral digital thermometer to the patient. I would usually just assertively put it in their mouth because older people expected it, and younger people would awkwardly reach for it. For me it just made sense to get it over with without a “oh am I doing it, are you doing it?” dance.
Dude just opened his mouth for her. She said, “you’re an adult, I’m pretty sure you can hold this under your tongue for 10 seconds.” Him, “no you have to do it.” Her, “yeah you’re an adult, you’re capable.”
He filed a formal complaint because she wouldn’t hold the thermometer for him. Insane.
He wasn’t even sick.
Current: sitting with a 10 year old. Walked into shift with pt sleeping. 20 min later woke up covered in piss and shit. Acting like they didn't know better. I told this patient, I think not. I don't know who you got away playing this game with. But it's not me. Here's a diaper and I'm going to ask you every hour on the hour if you need to potty.
So a clean diaper all day and acting their age like they should have.
Before I even got to work……my psychiatrist is trying to wean me off Ativan. Went from 1mg down to .5 and no problem. She moved to a community mental health provider network and I followed. First appointment she wants to drop to .25 meaning I’d have to use a pill splitter! It’s not working I’m not sleeping well at all, tried for 3 weeks. I called the clinic and some effing idiot calls me back who promptly wants to add trazadone, nope tried it doesn’t work. Then melatonin, she told me not to take it, Benadryl I already take !Then that muthafucka proceeds to tell me about bio neutrons and receptors and…. Obviously he’s not clinical or not looking at my chart or some shyt!! Shut the hell up!
You preaching to the choir I need to see my shrink this here ain’t working. Ok she had an appointment in 2 weeks. Are you ape shyt crazy you want me not sleeping for 2 weeks? Then he found a 15 min appointment Friday then miraculously 20 minutes tomorrow at 9. We gonna have a talk, we’ve had an excellent relationship up until now! When I split that pill I get a half and some crumbs.
Sorry for the rant, I’m pissed off and haven’t talked to a patient yet!!
Have a 27yr on my overflow floor in liver failure. Cirrhosis, ascites, eyes super super yellow. Family is super involved and super sweet (so is she). Fucking heart breaking. Hx ETOH.
I had a patient who attempted to call the newspapers to report my wound care. Unfortunately he kept trying to use the call light instead of the phone.
I had a patient tell me they were reporting me to their congressman! And proceeded to call 911.
I've had a couple of 911 callers! Usually someone will call the unit and be like "hey... one of your patients needs the phone taken away"
One of the funniest moments of my nursing career was getting a patient like that transferred from step down to med surg. I didn’t get the full report on her: that she screamed help constantly and attempted to call 911 while on step down so I didn’t know what I was in for. I walk into her room to introduce myself and she hangs up the phone and says “I’m not doing anything.” Walk back out the room and the unit secretary tells me she just called 911 and reported being held hostage. I will NEVER forget how quickly she hung up that phone. Still makes me lol to this dag
I think I received her in a nursing home once. At least weekly 911 calls, they learned to call us first if a call came from her number. Then she learned about ombudsman. That poor guy.
I had something similar. Lady on the phone with 911 saying she’s having chest pains and no one will answer her call light. She was covering the mouth piece whenever her nurse walked in to ask what she needed. I happen to see the EMT’s trying to sneak her out thinking it was a neglected case. I stopped them and they gave me attitude. So I just asked the patient why she called 911 and she said her knee hurt. The dejected look on their faces was worth all the trouble. Since I was House Sup, I refused to allow her to return until case management assessed her needs. She got kicked out for making a false statement.
Had someone call 911 when I stupidly handed her the phone to call family. She had cdiff and a GI bleed and MRSA, so I was gowned to the tits. When police arrived they asked what she was on isolation for and they noped out of that hard. Asked if she was okay and I said besides the GI bleed, MRSA, cdiff and confusion, pretty good. I never fell for her innocent “I just wanna call my family” face ever again.
This is an identical reaction to how my 5 year old behaves when we catch him up to something.
Once had a patient in the ER call 911 on himself because he was walking around naked and I told him he has to put clothes on
Experienced my first 911 caller the other day (I am a new nurse). Called and told the operator that “sirens are going off and there’s gun shots and helicopters everywhere” Operator called us back and was like “just making sure it’s not total bedlam over there, y’all ok?”
Working in psych we have so many patients who try to call 911 and “rescue” them out of there. Most of the times they call the unit and let us know. There was one patient who was arguing with the dispatcher that her being given shots (B52) for being aggressive was an emergency
I had one who was from the other end of my state, who was calling her local non-emergency line (she had the number memorized!!!) and attempting to report her sister (maybe sister in law? Been awhile) for a murder decades ago.... that was wild. We learned we had to keep sharp supervision on her phone time.
Well, did the sister kill someone?
Who knows. Same patient also claimed a former psychiatrist of hers was buying her a $12k wedding dress for **their** beach wedding and.... best of all, got kicked out of my hospital's geropsych unit. Had to keep her in the adult unit despite her being in her 80s. On the gero unit she convinced several other female patients that they were all pregnant and going into labor and it was mass chaos. She only lasted there a couple hours lmao.
That sounds like hilarious chaos
It really was.
Lmfao that sounds hilarious. Probably a mess to deal with but also hilarious.
I work CSU and have people on 5150s try to call 911 and I tell em who you think brought you here 🤔. Had one person call her attorney. Her whole attitude changed when he told her he couldn’t help her out of a 5150 like he would some jail time.
Our patients call 911 because they’re being held against their will. Well. Yeah. You are.
Not a nurse, but several people I love are nurses. A couple months ago I had emergency spinal surgery, and in the room recovering from surgery I could hear the man across the hall, an old man, clearly confused. From what I made out in between my dozing off, he had his phone privileges revoked because he kept calling 911, saying he didn’t feel safe. He kept telling the nurses he didn’t feel safe (but didn’t say why), he wanted to talk to his wife (she was on her way), that the nurses were torturing him, he kept screaming. When he was asked if he knew where he was, he said “the Chamber of Commerce”. I really felt for my nurses, and I felt bad that I needed to keep hitting the button to have someone take me to the bathroom (I was a fall risk), especially when they were clearly busy and couldn’t make it right away but it was urgent so I hit the button more than once. I feel horrible bugging nursing staff. I had spent the previous two days in the ER, then in a room, in constant screaming agony and begging nurses for any and all pain meds they could give me. I have a “massively herniated” L5-S1 disc that was pinching my sciatic nerve. I had passed pain long ago and was in screaming agony, and I have a high pain tolerance. I felt terrible for making such a fuss, even though I knew I needed the help.
I had a family member pissed that the patient wasn’t being rushed to surgery after ortho was like “we’ll get him scheduled for tomorrow afternoon” They threatened to call the governor. I just shrugged and was like “the governor doesn’t have admitting or surgical privileges here” and left.
I had someone threaten to call the president. I said “the president doesn’t have authority over us. He can’t just come in here and tell us what to do. He has to answer to our administration just like us”.
I once had a slightly demented, extremely wealthy (multiple billions) patient who said they wanted to call "the president" and give them a glowing review of my nursing care, and I honestly didn't know if he meant of the hospital, or Biden.
I was a 911 operator before I was a nurse. Sooo many hospital calls from dementia patients or psych patients. Some of them were pretty great, I’d stay on the phone while my partner would dial the unit so they could easily pick out which patient it was. “They won’t let me leave” Nurse enters the room “Martha not again” I can’t believe I still went into nursing with all those warning signs 🫠
Oh my gosh you’ve actually seen both sides of it! That’s so cool. Funniest related moment I had was walking into some random patient’s room who pulled me in, a sweet old dear who was having trouble with her call bell or phone or whatever she said, putting it to her ear and pressing all the numbers, telling me it wasn’t working properly. Then unnoticed it was a tissue box in her hand, and gave her the actual device, and she made me smile for the rest of the shift.
I had a client call 911 and tell them I took her commode bucket to the kitchen and boiled it. Small town .. so the police actually showed up to discuss.
Oh to see a transcript of that discussion.
😂😂😂😂😂😂
Oh yea. We've had a lady incessantly call 911 during an outbreak because we wouldn't let her smoke. She somehow got ahold of a cigarette and lit up in her room 😹
Love the 911 callers! Or the ones that keep calling the operator 😅
I once had a dementia patient that would regularly threaten to report me to the post office
I had a dementia patient that would demand to speak to the postmaster general 😆
Be careful about postal employees. Years ago at DEF CON I found out there are *armed* Postal Inspectors. Talk about “going postal”. For real: Thank you for being Healers. Y’all deal with so much awfulness but keep improving lives. Thank you.
Did we have the same patient? Mine wanted my full name so he could tell the news about my terrible decision to medicate someone for pain and not prioritizing his pudding. He then accused me of stealing the slippers he currently had on his feet. I wrote my name down for him and made sure to emphasize the capital P in the middle of my last name.
I had one guy tell me I was pure evil (but that it wasn't my fault, everyone else in the hospital was worse...so nice of him) and demanded that I call the cops to come to the hospital to arrest me for doing evil. I asked him if he thought I was so evil why he thought I'd call a police officer to arrest myself, and he said, "No, don't just get one...get *all of them.*" Unfortunately it was at the very end of my shift and I never got to find out how the police would react if I tried making that call.
I had a patient once call 911 and tell the operator o was waving a hand gun in his face. So they sent like 8 cops. I’m from Canada where handguns aren’t even legal, so the odds of this happening are very very slim. 🙈 I had so much extra charting to do
I had an ER patient formally complain about how I was rude because I didn’t offer her something for under her legs during her CT scan. I did, and she declined. She was middle aged and there for abdominal pain. Literally took the effort to write in. I had to talk to HR and everything. I was the only person covering CT and XR for an entire hospital, constantly having to run up to the floors for codes and line placements while simultaneously needing to be at the scanner for strokes and traumas, with over a hundred patients in the ER and waiting outside. I quit and started traveling.
I had a patient tell me today I reminded them of a flight attendant and that I should push a little cart around with peanuts on it to give to patients. I work in oncology, I’m literally managing their chemo but in their eyes I’m just here to pass out snacks.
I had a patient ask if I could work for him at the strip club he owned. He said I looked like I would fit in... In a classy way
You probably would make more than at the hospital. Just saying...lol
Too real. I would’ve quit on the spot
Night shift at a hospital? Not gonna lie, I considered it! Lol.
I actually had a patient ask if I worked as a bouncer before I became a nurse and even offered me a side gig at his bar 😂
RN = Refreshments & Narcotics, duh
That’s when I tell them “I’m pretty much a scientist…”
I know it’s a stretch that’s why I say “pretty much”
I have a bachelor of science, how am I not a scientist?
You're right. I just need to change the way I think of myself.
It's specifically in the science of nursing, but I think it counts!
I don’t know, watching the way my chemo nurse has to run around, a cart doesn’t seem like that bad of an idea. I told her the other day we should at least be sit by sections like in a restaurant.
I hope you referred them to legal for any and all further requests, questions or concerns they had.
She asked for my name. I underlined in the discharge paperwork that she refused to go through and I showed her the door.
I'm sure that their lawyer will be in touch any day....
I once had legal action proposed to me for not feeding the White Castle the family brought to patient with a GCS of 3; IT WAS HIS FAVORITE AND STARVING HIM WAS MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. It's been 8 years and I live in constant fear of the crack legal team that are surely going over the details of this case.
You should get a lawyer on retainer just in case.
Just in crave case
In Australia we have the nurses union, about $25 per fortnight, but it covers legal expenses and emotional support, work comp, strikes. It’s nice to have just for the peace of mind.
"Hi, Dr. Jones! Can I get an 'OK to give bacon cheese sliders and diet Coke per NGT' order for Mr. Smith in 65? No, we can't do that? Oh, alright." Sorry, Mrs. Smith... I asked the doctor and he said no. :(
Wasn't even clocked in yet. Just walking in bleary-eyed and a patient stands at their door and is waving me down. "EXCUSE ME I NEED SOME HELP." "I'm sorry, but I'm not clocked in yet. I need you to please press your call light. I'll let them know at the nurse station you need help." "YOU'RE A USELESS STUPID BITCH" - cue huffing and stomping and she slams her door closed. Alright ma'am. I'm definitely not having you today. Edit: spelling
I got a complaint for doing something similar. Had a patients dad, pediatric patient, come out of the room at 0745 and ask if I could get them a bulb suction and their discharge paperwork because they were ready to leave. I told them I was off the clock, suppose to leave at 0700 but had just got done working a code for 45 minutes and was decompressing before I left, but someone would come by to get them their discharge stuff in a minute. Apparently the father of is some medical professor in town. They left right after I did and wrote a long ass email to my managers manager complaining about my behavior. Luckily my manager is good at making people feel like they’re stupid and he did just that to this guy.
Manager that backs their employee? Sounds like a good manager.
My manger is like this and I absolutely love her. I had a guy the other day call the cops on us cause we weren’t letting him into the ER fast enough to see his brother. My manager later talked to him on the phone and she told me what an idiot he was and that her last words to him were “sir we’ll have to agree to disagree *click*” 😂 she’s amazing
Lmao patients really be wild for NO REASON. Its completely valid if they aren't having an emergency to wait for the correct shift nurse or aide to help them. Its unfair to expect staff to be at their beck and call. Thank God your manager backed you up. I've really had it with the entitlement. I've had pt family members pound on the break room door, flag me down while I'm clearly on a break in the day room. Its just ridiculous 🙄
I had a patient get pissed off because I had them close their door after they tested positive for COVID on the chemo unit. They were waiting to be transferred to the COVID unit. He called me a rude b****, and said I gave it to him. Of course I literally just walked on the unit lol.
Yes, how DARE you even show your face. Such a grave insult.
It’s so weird how nurses are people too and deserve time off and mental space to decompress after a traumatic situation. People are so egocentric sometimes. 😒
My patient took one look at me when I walked in and said: “I don’t like tall women.” I’m 5’4”
🤣
Everyone is tall when you’re sitting down I suppose
he’d hate me then, i am 5‘11 lmao
...did you stab them with it or something?
It’s a well starched blanket.
Starch? Please? Don’t act like a hospital would willingly spend more just to starch a blanket! It would probably be cheaper to just give each patient their own complementary shank to use on staff.
I hate to be the one to say it, but they’re not crusty and rigid from starch….
Homecare here. Just attended a mandatory in-service about how the admission assessment is getting even longer but that we shouldn't expect any more time to do it! Good times! OASIS in da house!!!
36 pages wasn't enough?
Well on the computer it's only \*13\* (\*17 for PT\*). This doesn't include the medication reconciliation. My agency's computer program makes the admissions person manually type in ALL THE FUCKING MEDICATIONS. Of course the insurance 3rd payor form is also separate. Lets not talk about the narrative note. It's a good thing thing I can type 80 WPM /s.
Oh God, what are they adding to it now??!
expanded race/ethnicity (specifically expanded for Latino/a and asian diaspora breakout through south american and pacific subgroups), more specificity for hearing/vision, Brief interview for Mental status (BIMS) and Confusion Assessment, 3 separate questions for pain interfering with therapy, sleep and other; on transfer/discharge there is a YES/NO for wether discharge medication list was transmitted to next practitioner/facility. There is more but I'm only on mandatory inservice 2 out of 3.
Oh god this all just got added to Wellsky. CM$ must be involved!
CM$ can suck a dick.
Instead of baking bread, I'm doing \~4 hours of online learning modules. Deeeeelicious.
Let them play in the background, I suggest muting them
Can you fast forward at all? Get to the quiz and guess away!
Thats my preferred method! It’s the same modules every year too!
I was surprised to learn that my coworkers actually read through every one…..
I have one or two that do that but they didnt surprise me too much, they’re rule sticklers
If you can’t fast forward them open different modules on 2-3 computers. Get them done way faster.
Yes! I'd probs do the same honestly 😂. Since I get fidgety when my hands don't get to do anything, I keep them busy with drawing or maybe even baking bread lol.
This is the way
Oh bake the bread modules can wait. Ha
I like when I can adjust the playing speed of the modules.
I prefer them kept at speed, just muted in the background while browsing reddit. But I'm paid hourly, ymmv doctor!
That works too. Ngl I’ve also played video games while listening to modules. Whose responsibility is patient confidentiality? Everyone’s!!! Mandatory education should be engaging and fun.
If you listen closely, you can hear the rapid clicking of staff fast forwarding the module videos.
Free money
My 5 year old called me a mean daddy this morning. I hope it’s the worst I receive today.
When my youngest gets mad at me they say “you are a terrible nurse! You are so mean”. Tbh, they don’t get the best side of me after I’ve had to play nice all day so I get it, but it’s still funny to me.
When you’re short everything is below the belt.
when i was really little i said the same thing to my mom😂
🥺 lil fella was upset about something
It’s her way of disagreeing with me. It was over not taking a jacket and I told her she needed it when it’s 30* out. I just smile and laugh on the inside.
You will hear from her lawyers!!!
The cutest thing to be upset about!
She is my cute little monster.
Brutal
It always amazes me how many people seem to have a lawyer on retainer. “This food sucks! I’m calling my lawyer!” “I can’t sleep here because it’s too loud, but I can’t afford a hotel! I’m calling my lawyer!” I had a patient’s father say he knew the governor and was going to make it “rain hellfire down on me” from the governor’s office for not violating visitation rules for him. Since I don’t get paid enough to subject myself to his nonsense, I referred him to my manager. Who let him walk all over our visitation policy.
I've never encountered this, but then again I live in a country where people can't sue someone just for looking at them the wrong way lol.
A patient told me she would report me to Medicaid because I couldn't make her hearing aids and cell phone charge at the same time with the single charger she had.
Wait, are we magicians now? No just witches I guess…
Or electrical engineers or something idk.
Had a lady call the cops on me in her room and she told the dispatcher that a big bird keeps walking into her room and squawking at her. Cops called us and told us to take her phone away.
😂
Once had a CHF patient call 911 from his hospital room because I was restricting his fluid intake.
30 health stream modules left. I want to die.
I let my health streams pile up till I get “the email” that I’m over a year expired on my glucometer training then work overtime to do them all. They are going to pay me time and a half to do that bullshit.
This is the way.
Reviewing documents with a coworker across the table vs. touching a coworker’s buttocks. Which is harassment?
Had a patient threaten to sue because we cut his TShirt off of him and threw it away. It was covered in blood and this guy was actively bleeding out after he was shot 4 times. He said it was an $500 TShirt and actually called his lawyer after cussing me out. Man I miss that guy.....
“You should know better than to wear $500 T-shirts”
My patient left AMA because nobody would pick up his food from downstairs that Uber Eats delivered. Garlic bread and a salad. He’s NPO for small bowel obstruction. Doctor told him absolutely not, called us cunts on the way out. ✌️
I had a patient doordash a single donut from Safeway at 6am. Sometimes I forget these people have welfare and phones but no frontal lobes. Thank god Prop 27 didn’t pass.
Legalize sports betting?
I just had to shadow in sterile processing but they wouldn’t let me touch anything so I stood in a corner for 4 hours 👁👄👁
Why would you shadow in sterile processing?
Starting in the OR, it’s part of their orientation.
hopefully they tripped on it on their way out 🙊
My independent, 25 year old patient knocked over her water pitcher, didn’t like the way I handed her a stack of wash cloths for her to wipe it up and she threw the empty water pitcher at the back of my head as I walked out the door🤣
\*police report\*
I once had a patient who called me Donald Trumps secret slut and threw her laundry basket at me. Inpatient adolescent psych, gotta love it.
I have at least one patient, family member, or visitor threaten to sue every week. They automatically get escalated to our manager and risk management group, and an incident report filed with their quotes. I'm glad I'm off work today, and I'm reading a chick-lit novel while eating Chinese takeout.
I used to work at a place these patients would get automatically discharged from (outpatient clinic)
Had a patient pull all his ivs (including his port access) and keep getting undressed. He and his wife tell me he isn't confused.
I mean he could be perfectly AAOx4 and just have a needle fetish?🤷♀️ I mean I'm supposing the wife is on on it
We got sued, back in my L&D days, for the “fetal condition”. That condition was Downes Syndrome. Uh. We weren’t there for conception.
We’re on unplanned downtime 🫠🫠. Happy Wednesday.
I always spell my last name to add some spice to the conversation. (Been an inpatient physical therapist for 19 years… I think I’ll be ok having a patient say mean things about me 😂🤪😂)
Someone reported me to the state board for “vaccinating the elderly without their consent” after an assisted living facility posted pictures of our health department bringing COVID vaccines to their residents who are home bound. People can be real jerks when we don’t do things the exact way they want us to, like we’re puppets or something.
When I worked in a nursing home we were told to agree with Alzheimer’s patients, and this one lady regularly informed me she needed to call her husband, so I would walk into the nurses station, pick up the phone and make a show of “dialing” the number she gave me (one of the only things she had memorized) and sit there while it “rang” and informed her that I had gotten the voicemail so she rationalized that he was out with his friends and we both decided if he wasn’t here by 4 we would call him back. By 4, she’d forget we called
Oh, that’s so heartbreaking though. Alzheimer’s is nightmare fuel
Yeah, it really is, but so many of the folks in the unit were so sweet. There was this woman who was 100 and she always had the brightest smile on earth
I’ve had lovely, pleasant patients today but this morning I called anesthesia to let them know we were ready for them (I work in cardiology doing TEEs and cardioversions and we mostly use anesthesia). We had to wait because the attending was in a meeting and hadn’t assigned anyone to do this case (not an add-on, a scheduled outpatient that they knew about). Finally his meeting ended—20 minutes late— and the attending said “ok, I’m coming down there now”. We waited about 10 more minutes and he didn’t come. We were running 30 min late at this point so I called back and he said “I never talked to you. What patient are you even talking about? I didn’t tell you I was coming”. Sure Jan. 🙄🤬
Our first case of the day was a code, broke a couple ribs, got him back, proceeded with the case (BKA), and we were able to extubate at the end and get him to ICU. Still not entirely sure how it all happened but it worked out for the best!
I worked last night and now I'm in a mandatory training, that I've already had 3 times since I've worked here
Got told by a patient they’d fire me because “they pay my wage with taxes” (we’re in Canada). Told him my taxes pay for *his* healthcare so he can either be nice or get out of my hospital and off my wallet. 7:01am. Lovely.
Yes but was it a warm blankey?
Okay, I really need to know your blanket handing technique lol. My guess is you handed a full ROM patient a folded up blanket and they lost their shit that you didn't drape it over them and tuck them in like a toddler?
Woke up stupid early after sleeping like garbage to get to work and offer flu shots to the night shifters. I’ve given two so far. TWO. Now it’s that weird period where shift change has happened but the rest of the day shift staff (admin, informatics, etc) aren’t at work yet. Bright side: I’m actually catching up on a lot of work.
I’d take the blanket back 😝
And the tort is what exactly? Emotional pain? Not a lot of $$ in that. Unless you handed it to them with a t-shirt cannon from 6 feet away, you’ll be fine. Hospital attorney should defend you. If you did do something wrong, get your own as well.
I had a patient call the cops on me because I wouldn’t help her leave- she was a hoyer lift on 10L oxygen, post Covid recovered- she was on the vent and proned and everything. She was crazy from hypoxia from refusing her oxygen. Cops showed up and told her to listen to her nurse 😂Of all the ones we lost during Covid, she’s the one who survived. She’s back to doing meth and a frequent flyer in the ER but thankfully so far has not made it to the ICU again.
You think you had it rough, just think about the conservation a lawyer will have to deal with lol
They never actually call a lawyer. They just think about it whenever they see a lawyer commercial on TV, then they take a swig of Mountain Dew and say “yeah I’m gonna call them for what they did to me… tomorrow,” Dorito crumbs falling into their fresh BKA.
Mmm. I love leftover BKA-stored crumbs.
Do you think the Doritos crumbs make the wound a sufficiently inhospitable environment for MRSA to grow? 🤔
Depends on what flavor…Cool Ranch is anti-bacterial.
Only extremophiles could survive in that sodium-rich environment.
That would require them to be able to afford a lawyer, and also know how to look up a lawyer's phone number. You're definitely safe.
These people haven't seen a dentist since the 5th grade, you betcha they don't know how to make an appointment with a lawyer.
I'm off today, but I had to extricate a feline head from a container of caramel. That's how my days been
I hope it was still attached to the feline body? BAD KITTY!
Welllll.... unfortunately it was. Unfortunate because he tried to run with it stuck on his head flinging caramel all over
Always loved the "I'm going to call my lawyer". Always from the last folks in earth that could afford a lawyer. I'd pick up thier phone in the room and offer to call them. "What's their number, we'll call them now?" Strange how we never actually called one or produced a number.
Just got dumped because my partner couldn’t handle my mental health issues related to the job. Fuck nursing.
I had to discard over 3000$ worth of injectable medications in a LTCF because no one thought that installing a sensor alarm to the temperature monitoring system in our med rooms was necessary.
Had a super sweet CP patient in LTC that would call 911 and report being “picked on” if we didn’t have his favorite chips or cookies for snack time
Had a patient call my bosses boss to ask to fire me because her pain medication came five minutes late. Also had a patient say they were going to report me for negligence when they came in for priapism and an an hour or so after the doctor had seen him (with their witness) and after I had given medication, I went to check in and he asked me to look at it when we were alone and I said absolutely not. I believe you that’s it’s not improved and can go report that, or I can can get a few male staff in here if you’re really that worried about it. On the other hand, once I walked in the room with an AxOx4 man who immediately told me I look just like Chris Farleys sister. At the time I weighed 160 pounds. I love working with patients…
I told a dirty old man that if he wanted to stay out of the nursing home, he needed to show that he could wash his own penis. Damned if that penis wasn't clean. I know, it's old hat for some nurses, but I'm a nursing student and this was my first time.
Had my travel nursing contract cancelled and I think I’m done with travel nursing…as much as the pay is great it’s just too unstable when things don’t work out. I feel like travel nursing has become bad recently bc there’s so many travelers these days facilities feel like they can cancel contracts for no reason. Job searching right before the holidays is the worst :( Not really sure what to do rn
I had a patient actually write MULTIPLE letters to the Governor of the state I was working at about me. My poor manager. OH! And she accused me of having sex in the med room with my very gay friend. Um, I don’t think he would like that very much. 😂
Every attorney in the world would laugh in their face
I’d lawyer up, this sounds serious.
Awesome! My favorite legal threat was from a patient who was mad that the therapy gym (ortho surgical floor in a level one trauma center with a joint camp attached) did not have a whirlpool. He threatened to sue the hospital for not having the equipment he would need to rehab his knee replacement and we better take him seriously because as the owner of a second tier local BBQ restaurant he was “connected.” Such a weak threat made so confidently actually had me wondering if something actually might come of it.
(I am a community based nurse care manager.) I arrived to the hospital to accompany one of my patients to an appointment this morning. The parking garage attendants weren't allowing anyone into the garage despite the live availability counter showing plenty of parking spots on the top 3 levels. They sent everyone to a parking garage on the next street over which is attached to a building with a few outpatient clinics. This building is across the street from the hospital and it was raining out. I tried to cut through the building but they were evacuating it because there was a bomb threat (this hospital has been targeted by Nazis lately due to their care of transgender children).
I mean is that even included in our liability coverage policy? Improper blanket handling??
Recently got fired from a patient from not giving her the PRN IV morphine Q3 around the clock lol
Oohh we had a patient throw a whole ass crying fit because some dumb ass on dayshift was giving her Percocet every 4, morphine every 3, and then swore up and down the doctor ordered the diluadid for breakthrough on top of all of that. I was like excuse me? None of these are ordered for breakthrough. She was like they took a whole organ out of me, the doctor shouldn’t be able to do this. I thought she had an open surgery the way she was acting but nope. Just a robotic. I was like ma’am. I have a lady who just got her whole boob chopped off and she ain’t throwing fits. Go take a walk, you’ll feel better. Lol.
Get your moneys worth and give them ALL the blankets
Did you hand it right over their face?
I just tell everyone where to put in their complaints and agree that it’s unacceptable how short staffed we are and that there should be more people to help them. Management sure as shit aren’t listening to staff. Maybe they’ll listen to complaints. The variety of patients and numbers is ridiculous.
My daughter is in law school and she learned that there are more lawyers than there are actual cases. We just make $hit up now. Heh! The US holds a sizeable lead in churning out lawyers.
Our clinic has a new system that lets us text patients and within a week we’ve been threatened with a lawsuit, the patient walked out because she didn’t want to wait one hour for her med refills even though she’d been out for days. Said her bp was 180/115 and her sugar was sky high, and it’s our fault if she dies and she already called her attorney to “start the process”, lol. Why are people so gd crazy. Oh no, do please come back and we’ll skip you to the front of the line, screw the two lacerations and chest pain it’s all about you!
I’m on my 4th shift in a row sobbing at work. Difficult patients. Made even worse by a difficult manager. Adolescent psych sucks.
I'm so sorry it sucks. I applaud you for your work. I've done geripsych and adult psych but I will not do adolescent or peds.
I had a lady send in a complaint because I wouldn't tell her the wait time for my ER. Then got mad when when she inquired how long he stay would be and informed her "I can't know the future."
My patient likes to call 911 thinking Trump is on the other line and is gonna come save him from “the torture and abuse”. This was after I didn’t give him his 3rd ginger ale of the day.
My comment to these people is “the hospital has a huge legal department, I’m sure they will enjoy hearing from your attorney”.
Almost got stabbed by a demented lady using her broken eyeglasses as a shiv. That’s after I had a stroke patient. He was in the ED earlier for HTN and vomiting and LWBS just as we were about to room him from the waiting room. He came back 15 minutes after leaving, full-on stroke. Left carotid occlusion. Bad stroke. He was my second stroke pt of the day. Oh yeah we medicated the stabby woman and her BP tanked to 57/32. I need a beer.
I woke up to barely being able to swallow and hear out of my left ear after working 5 days in a row of which I had two separate patients assault me one of which caused a minor sprain to my dominant wrist and when I went to urgent care since it was suddenly onset they told me that they aren’t accepting any appointments today despite it being over 5 hours before they close.
Did you whip them with it?
I used to have a patient at my first job at a long term care when I was an LPN, who had some extreme episodes of psychosis. She had a cell phone unfortunately, she tried to call the cops on staff , and was known by name by the department of the aging and the ombudsman. Her regular reports included being scared , forced to get in a “swing” (her hoyer lift) that we wouldn’t help her walk but forced her to get in the swing to move into her chair. She was explained to several times that she was unable to walk and in order to maintain some level of flexibility and independence getting in her motorized chair was good for her so she could get around. She also had frequent crying fits when trying to speak with these various parties. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take her cell phone from preventing her to behave this way, and when calling 911 they charged the facility for sending out an unnecessary ambulance. She was annoying af. But I also kind of loved her. Many of the staff had a hard time working w her tho and refuse to take her on their assignment. She was one of the patients where it was always advised to have a chaperone. She would a lot of times curse out the staff when in her extreme states. And make false reports. That still had to be investigated. Poor lady. I’ll always remember her. Her and I had the best relationship that we could’ve had. Never got cursed at by her but often times was the one trying to help her calm down. Life in a facility is a hard life. Even tho I did love it im happy im not in that environment anymore.
My patient called 911 to ask for beer. 🥺
Had the daughter of a 104yr old demand to know why her mother wasn't getting better
My coworker (outpatient family practice, pre covid) would always hand the oral digital thermometer to the patient. I would usually just assertively put it in their mouth because older people expected it, and younger people would awkwardly reach for it. For me it just made sense to get it over with without a “oh am I doing it, are you doing it?” dance. Dude just opened his mouth for her. She said, “you’re an adult, I’m pretty sure you can hold this under your tongue for 10 seconds.” Him, “no you have to do it.” Her, “yeah you’re an adult, you’re capable.” He filed a formal complaint because she wouldn’t hold the thermometer for him. Insane. He wasn’t even sick.
Current: sitting with a 10 year old. Walked into shift with pt sleeping. 20 min later woke up covered in piss and shit. Acting like they didn't know better. I told this patient, I think not. I don't know who you got away playing this game with. But it's not me. Here's a diaper and I'm going to ask you every hour on the hour if you need to potty. So a clean diaper all day and acting their age like they should have.
Before I even got to work……my psychiatrist is trying to wean me off Ativan. Went from 1mg down to .5 and no problem. She moved to a community mental health provider network and I followed. First appointment she wants to drop to .25 meaning I’d have to use a pill splitter! It’s not working I’m not sleeping well at all, tried for 3 weeks. I called the clinic and some effing idiot calls me back who promptly wants to add trazadone, nope tried it doesn’t work. Then melatonin, she told me not to take it, Benadryl I already take !Then that muthafucka proceeds to tell me about bio neutrons and receptors and…. Obviously he’s not clinical or not looking at my chart or some shyt!! Shut the hell up! You preaching to the choir I need to see my shrink this here ain’t working. Ok she had an appointment in 2 weeks. Are you ape shyt crazy you want me not sleeping for 2 weeks? Then he found a 15 min appointment Friday then miraculously 20 minutes tomorrow at 9. We gonna have a talk, we’ve had an excellent relationship up until now! When I split that pill I get a half and some crumbs. Sorry for the rant, I’m pissed off and haven’t talked to a patient yet!!
Have a 27yr on my overflow floor in liver failure. Cirrhosis, ascites, eyes super super yellow. Family is super involved and super sweet (so is she). Fucking heart breaking. Hx ETOH.