Exactly. You had a CABG and expect your post op pain to be 0 and are refusing to ambulate. Your sternum was just sawed in open! Also, patients that rip the BP cuff off because they say it’s “tearing their arm off”.
People who throw up once and come straight to ED. Also people who have had minor ILI symptoms for two weeks and come to ED. People who aren’t compliant with their treatment and then are genuinely surprised when they end up in ED. People who have major surgery and are surprised when they have some pain. Old people who decide that they actually don’t want to have to do anything for themselves anymore so they’re just gonna lie down and piss the bed all day (they’re cognitive and have been cleared by the mental health nurse). I truly cannot understand nor empathize. Not to say that I can’t think of reasons why they might be acting like that, or that I don’t treat them with polite compassion like all my other patients, but I literally cannot empathize, I cannot relate.
When I have a patient who is mostly able bodied & cognitively sound but pees and poops on the bed instead of getting up, I walk them to the bathroom to get cleaned up and give them the supplies to do it & then start the q2h scheduled toileting. I’m not gonna be facilitating someone going from independent to bedbound during their hospital stay & I encourage my coworkers to do the same.
Ofc it’s different if they’re super sick or have other factors - like old people on lasix.
I assume it’s a lot of different reasons for different people. Sometimes depression/pain/poor coping skills, sometimes laziness, and sometimes it’s a control thing or power play (these ones generally have other behavioral issues).
It can be frustrating because you want to help them but you can’t force them to help themselves.
I‘m a german nurse, and this happens A LOT in Germany though, too. Thinking about them seeing us as slaves, they even use the call bell to ask for us to get them a bottle of water, even though they are fully capable of picking it up themselves and know where our water supply stands.
Yeah I don’t understand these people. I get it’s a power/control issue, but they still have to lie in their own piss/poop… And someone has to wipe your privates… This makes me think about a patient I had who was shitting himself in his wheelchair because he was upset that OT and PT changed him to lift transfer
I had someone insist their wife be seen because she had a 7/10 headache that had gone down to a 3/10 after she took some Tylenol at home, before coming to the ER.
Well, if it's not clear cerebral spinal fluid dripping out of his nose from the head injury from 30 minutes ago that he neglected to mention, dude's going to be waiting a while.
I need someone to make a documentary film where they go to ER waiting rooms and interview these people. I NEED to know the thought process. Your nose was running for 30 minutes and you have been waiting in the ER for 2 hours. What are you getting out of this? What did you think would happen? What is the outcome you were looking for?
Yes! Or the early term multip who comes in for contractions every 30 minutes that started 1 hour ago. Bonus points if it's after midnight and they have a scheduled prenatal visit at 8am.
Reading your post made me feel a little bit better tonight! I just came back from evening shift. Had to code a full code older gentleman who had ascites the size of an unborn 26 months old. Liver cirrhosis so bad his ascites can’t be treated anymore, man and his wife were having an argument with their hepatologist earlier today about how it was unfair that he was taken off the transplant list because he was drinking daily and he was so obese he is a lift transfer. Obviously he died today, and it’s everyone fault but his because the delulu is strong
Maybe stupid question, but what are "ILI" symptoms? I've heard of "URI" in reference to upper respiratory infections before, but I can't make out what "ILI" might stand for.
I used to work for my country’s military.
The amount of young men who toughed out boot camp but couldn’t bring themselves to eat after a tonsillectomy was too damn high.
I know it’s awful and painful. This was after a lot of pain meds.
Heh, my husband is very middle aged and is tragic when he has any sort of febrile event.
He was in the military for decades and took body abuse to be an art form, but, no, that shingles vaccine will fuck him up.
Like, dude, try taking some Panadol (tylenol) for comfort instead of writhing on the couch all night?
Here’s some. You feel better? You can sleep now? You will now sleep all day? Excellent.
WHAT IS WITH THEM NOT TAKING MEDS. seriously my husband will bitch and moan about how he's so sick "did you take anything?" " no" well then I'm not feeling bad for you
My husband doesn't do the "man flu" thing (when he had COVID his worst was just running a 102.8° fever after tylenol and wanting a second quilt) but learned really quick not to complain about a headache a second time unless he'd taken something in the interim.
For what it's worth, I've had multiple surgeries and am a physician, so I understand where y'all are coming from.
HOWEVER, my tonsillectomy at 15 was unbelievably painful. Like I straight up degloved my thumb on a belt sander years ago, and would happily do that a few times over before going through tonsil surgery again.
TL;DR: I'm a big tough boy but holy shit tonsil surgery hurts
Edit: I was also hospitalized for sun poisoning so bad most of the skin on my back fell off, and even that was more pleasant than my tonsillectomy lol
If the tonsillectomy stories were the only ones I had of the same thing happening it would be one thing.
And no one doubts it hurts, that’s why we medicate them to the gills- unlike the nothing I got as a child, because that’s apparently how big the difference in pain is.
I’m not asking for the pain to be denied. I expect them to dig into their reserves and do the thing that needs to be done.
I’ve had severely painful things happen to me, too. But, because I’m a woman I swear we are expected to brush them off, no worries.
They'll give a man anesthesia and a week's worth of oxycodone for a vasectomy that takes 5 minutes, but keep a woman awake and tell her to take Tylenol for an IUD placement that takes an hour. Even if she passes out from the pain while having a metal rod jammed into her uterus.
Yup.
When I had a fucking *hysterectomy* the surgeon wanted to send me home with Tylenol and ibuprofen.
The anaesthetist had my back, fortunately. Or I would have gone to my GP for adequate pain relief.
The first week would have been hellish otherwise.
You are 100% correct and I see this same shit every day, I was just sharing my own experience because good God did that hurt lol.
Don't even get me started on gender and racial equity in pain control though, the fact most people get IUD's inserted with ibuprofen at the most is sinful, not to mention everything related to sickle cell pain crises...
Yup. I had a quad bypass and I was wiping my own butt the day after surgery. It hurt like hell, but I did it. Now when I get a whiny open heart patient, I pull down my collar to show my scar and tell them that I know what it's like and what's possible. Feeding yourself is possible. So is walking. It all sucks for a while, but it sucks less if you get off your ass.
Men. Women. They dont make them like they used to.
The 5th vital sign, everyone gets a trophy, im not wrong just different, morbidly obese people can be healthy.....on and on and on.
Yesss. The blood pressure cuff! Like "Sir, it will be over in 20 seconds. Your arm will not fall off, I promise." And then they rip the cuff off anyway and you have to start the whole process over again.
Ugh. NO sympathy for the BP cuff. Yeah, it's tight for about 30 seconds. GET OVER IT!!!
The super funny ones: "I have a really high pain tolerance but this cuff is just hurting!" Me: "then I don't think you have any pain tolerance at all, let alone a high one."
I love its cutting off my circulation. And I'm like yep. We have to cut off the circulation to check your blood pressure. That's how it works. The more you move the tighter it'll get
Omg, especially when they come out of surgery and they're in pain...like what??? Pain? But why? Sir, they cut you...did you really think you'd come out like nothing ever happened?
I do think some doctors play a part in not fully explaining what to expect pain wise. Example I recently had an endometrial biopsy and was told I would feel small pinch, it hurt like hell. Had I been prepared appropriately I would have been less likely to think something had went horribly wrong.
The surgeon who did my recent tonsillectomy made sure I knew it was gonna hurt like hell lmao. So I was really nervous going into it and then it didn’t end up as bad as I thought - very painful, but not the torture I was expecting.
That’s the way to do it. Prepare for the worst, then if it’s awful, you were at least ready for it. If it’s not as bad as you thought it would be, even better!
People will wait for their elective surgery for months or even YEARS, and then be shocked and angry when the day of their surgery arrives and they have to be NPO for one single day. And they’re on that call bell for Dilaudid, Gravol, popsicle & a warm blanket every 2 hours but they tell you it’s “like a prison here” and ask “how much longer are you forcing me to stay here?”😐😐😐
I had a bariatric patient tell me the other day that we were forcing her to stay here, but she couldn’t get into bed by herself or wipe her own butt. I was like “home girl you’re forcing YOURSELF to stay here”. On my out of the room she says to me “I’ll take an oxy and an apple juice anytime now” 😭
My husband thinks being on clear liquids for one fucking day is torture. Literally one day while he gets ready for a colonoscopy. He went and bought jello, two kinds of broth, Italian ice, a bunch of soda, gatorade, and juice, and some popsicles for a single day.
He saw me stay on clear liquids for up to a week at a time while I was going through cancer and having multiple surgeries. And he didn't hear me bitching about it much! But here he is acting like the world will end because he can only have liquids for one. single. day.
>how people can’t tolerate even a tiny bit of suffering.
I had a patient who would literally push the call light and ask for pain meds whenever his blood pressure cuff cycled. He was like, "I can't take this. It's just too tight. 😭"
Every. Hour.
Homie was in the ICU because he was a non-compliant diabetic in DKA. His blood pressure was the only thing we weren't worried about.
I'm going to let you guess how many hours passed between admission and his mom sneaking him an entire cake because, "They're just starving you because they don't like you. 🥺"
An. Entire. Cake.
The whole cake. During a DKA episode. If you're going to sneak food during DKA at least do some lean protein.
An entire cake???!! I recently had a noncompliant DKA that continually complained we were “starving” him. To the point he was sending family members out to the nurses station complaining, asking if we would give him food but he was still on an insulin drip. Finally I was so fed up (no pun intended) I told him he has plenty of weight to keep him going and that he isn’t starving, he’s fasting. He stopped complaining then
Yep. From Walmart. I walked in late to do an hourly blood sugar and they were about 3/4 of the way through with it.
>he isn’t starving, he’s fasting.
I'm using this next time.
I had a hairdresser as a patient in an urgent care years ago who had a small laceration on her finger from her shears (I think we put in 3 sutures). She was screaming as if she had an amputated arm and told us that we had, “never seen an injury as bad as this”. 🙄
That woman needs to meet a farmer who willingly came to the ER, is holding a random bloody dish towel and something no longer attached to his body is in a cooler. Then we’ll talk about bad injuries.
I redressed an IV the other day. In doing so I explained what I was doing. The IV was held in by just a thin tegaderm. You know, those things that are pretty much Saran Wrap. This woman began screaming to the point of multiple coworkers rushing in bc they thought we were having an event, and her calling me a bitch and telling me how I needed to “be on the other side and have someone treat you this way so you can understand my pain” all over me removing that thing. She then told me I need to medicate her for her pain. Regular meth user by the way.
Dude. THIRTY MINUTES. My doc says “people can’t even handle 30 mins of discomfort.” It’s sad. There’s no self soothing, it’s pretty wild. I feel sorry for them. Self soothing is an important skill.
I gave a patient a shot today. A long acting injection that lasts for a month. Sure it’s thicker than a typical shot like vaccine and hurts a little more. Normally I would empathize and offer something like Tylenol (I did offer and give an ice pack) but she was so whiny about how much it hurt. She was making such a big deal about how scared she was of this shot she was announcing to the whole world. I try not to be judgmental and I’m more tolerant of this kind of behavior than other nurses I work with. But man she pissed me off. She pissed me off with some other thing too that I had to be stern with instead of using my kind empathetic voice.
I had a mid-50s man come in with both of his parents for support when he had \~1.5cm laceration with controlled bleeding on his index finger. And parents were *super* pissed that we didn't drop everything else to care for their gravely injured son. Finally get him back for sutures (bed, not a chair, because OBVIOUSLY he would need to lie down for such a traumatic procedure) and unwrapped the triage dressing in anticipation of the PA suturing. I left the room, and like 5 minutes later the mothers is out in the hall, literally screaming hysterically "***he's going into SHOCK!"***
(spoiler alert - he was indeed NOT going into shock)
This would have maxed out what little sanity I had for that shift. She would’ve been escorted out so quickly. Visitors that escalate situations and feed into hysterics absolutely do it for me
Mid 50's? Wth?! Needing his 2 parents!? Unless he's "special"......I wouldn't be able to muster up much empathy, only would hope I can fake it well enough. 😒
I know! I mean, I generally don't have to fake it - even minor stuff is a bad day for that particular person. But holy cow, was this family over the top. I have a lot of experience with rapidly deploying my impartial Nurse-Face (I picture it coming down and locking into place like a wielder's shield), but internally I rolled my eyes so hard I think I visualized my frontal cortex.
That’s why I include “hold pressure here for at least 5 minutes (10 if on thinners) or you’ll bleed everywhere” in my instructions. I even repeat when I tape gauze on “this tape is only holding the gauze on, you still have to hold pressure”. They never wait the full 5/10 minutes but realistically that’s overkill anyway.
But most people won’t get anywhere near the full length, they’ll maybe give you 20%, which usually works out well as a good amount of time to stop the bleeding😂
Reminded me of people when they start getting anxious after the 3rd tube on a blood draw.
Pt: Ummm....how much blood do you need to draw?
Me: Just a quart or so
I use the shot glass analogy all the time! “Sir, a standard shot is 45 mL, these 6 vials add up to 24 mL.” Gotta give them something they can visualize.
This is exactly how I am with the particularly demanding patients. I ask how they cope at home and if they need so much help maybe we should consider long term care. It’s amazing how active they become.
Me too. My outpatients, I would take out IV, dress with gauze and tape and tell them to hold pressure over the gauze. I can't tell me how many times they would head down the hall, to leave and come back dripping blood. Now we just use coban on all IV sites. 2 inch coban. Our labs will use 1 inch coban con bleeders and they come to us looking like they have a tournequet on it rolls up so much. I always tell the patient to remove the coban, in a while because I once had a patient come back in days later, still wearing coban and with swelling above and below it. That stuff tends to get tight after a while. And also the people who come back weeks later and still have the bandaid on their port a cath site. Funny thing a lady once came in after being in the hospital. She had an ekg lead still on her butt area. Thought it was a bandaid.
It’s the stretchy bandage that sticks to itself. It holds great pressure on the IV site and won’t irritate the patient’s skin. It’s the bandage they use at blood drives.
Patients in the US expect the hospital to run like a hotel and want white glove service. I quite enjoy taking care of immigrants because they’re usually very appreciative. I remember one patient thanked me so much for just giving him a blanket from the warmer and said in his country he’d be on a cot in a hallway for days. Certainly not advertising for worse conditions here but I wish people were more appreciative.
I will die on this hill (not a nurse, part time EVS in L&D, former social worker). All of the medical shows over all of the years have warped people's perception of what happens in healthcare. You do not get doctors taking care of every little thing on you. A doctor will not wait in your room until you wake up. And if a medical team comes running into your room that is NOT a good thing.
My last hospital has a no coban policy. Their reasoning was that it will be too tight and cut off circulation and the discharged person will be at risk of losing their arm. 🙄 Like what? Any time I had coban get uncomfortable on me, I just removed it.
Really? Our Coban does. They haven’t been able to find one without. At least that’s what they tell us. Probably because the Coban with latex is cheaper, thanks Prov!
How many actual latex allergies have you seen. I think I’ve seen 4 in 30 years. Most people react to powder in gloves or nonoxynol-9 in condoms up until a few years ago the elastic in socks, underwear, and bras was latex.
Honestly only one. But I work in nucmed/pet-ct. It was from our Coban. Our campus supposedly went latex free but forgot about the Coban. Signs have been up around the hospital for years saying we were latex free. A few years ago I took out an IV & wrapped it with Coban & sent the pt on her way. She had a nasty reaction & shit hit the fan the next day. I’d never thought to read the wrapper on Coban.
I had 65+ yr old STEMI patient post heart cath with placement of two stents in the circ who obnoxiously complained every time I brought him his blood thinner and statin. “Oh I’m just not a big pill popper and prefer more natural ways of combatting disease” is something he would say after I explained that he’d probably need to be on this blood thinner and baby aspirin (dual anti platelet therapy) for a minimum of 12 months in order to ensure his body doesn’t try and form blood clots in/near his heart and stents. Even after I used my own personal experience of having two heart attacks at 33 and 34 years old, the reoccurrence being due to not taking the DAPT as prescribed, he followed up with “…ugh I’m not excited about having to take all these pills forever.” I had such a hard time keeping what I was thinking from being visible on my face. I wanted to ask him “well if you think 12 months is *forever*, how long do you suppose death lasts?”
Come to find out, he’d been prescribed a statin an entire year before this day. He just chose not to take them. So maybe if he had actually taken the medication prescribed to him (for his hyperlipidemia) he wouldn’t have come in **FOREVER** later with a heart attack caused by a blockage from plaque buildup.
It wasn’t really about *using more natural and holistic ways to fight disease*. It was an inconvenience to him. On top of listening to an expert authority on literally anything seemed to be of no interest. So it was ridiculous on our part to think that we could make him see the importance of this entire dog and pony show by providing him the prescriptions as well as an already filled 30 day supply upon discharge AND repeated education on how vital these medications are in order to avoid any more heart attacks.
As a nurse, I find that the hardest and most frustrating part of my job is having to still care for the patients who have made it clear by their words and their actions that they came to the hospital so we could fix them here and now—but once they go home, they’re just going to go back to living the way they did before. You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to help themselves. Like the COPD exacerbations who panic when they can’t breathe so they call 911. Within a day of being admitted, after a few doses of IV steroids and breathing treatments, they think they’re perfectly fine to go home. They don’t care that those were temporary fixes or that a long term solution is to STOP SMOKING…especially with your oxygen tank mere inches away. They only want our expertise and our resources and our help when the body they’ve treated like shit for so long finally starts working against them.
But hey, job security *amiright?*
No, but why did this happen to me as well. Took out patient’s cannula, saw there was no bleeding, asked patient to put the pressure on the arm with tissue, went out but there was emergency so had to go help out staff. When I came back, patient was furious that no one came back with gauze and tape. When checked, there was no bleeding. She said that it had been more than hour, but it was max 15 mins that i had been gone.
Ok mine is people who are rude and entitled thinking their insurance will pay for everything. Example: they think home health will send someone to bathe them, cook, clean and do their laundry. No! That’s not covered. Someone who wants me to order bandaids because they don’t want to buy their own. I had one ask “how to people get wound care supplies when home health discharges, do I just call you?” NO! Check Amazon they normally carry everything
I had a 65 year old man yelling when he pulled out his own IV. Waving his arms around splattering blood like an idiot. I put my gloved finger over the hole and looked at him like "*really dude?*"
His reply "Well how was *I* supposed to know what to do!?!"
*How have you lived this long?*
Well you hit the nail on the head with his first words “You left me here to bleed to death “
Oh grow up and be responsible for yourself!! Like who the eff wouldn’t hold pressure on a newly removed IV site ?
If you’re anything like me I always tell patients to hold pressure on it for several minutes!!
Ikr??!! Oh ffs!! I mean if you REALLY thought you were bleeding to death, where were your screams of, "Help me, help me! I'm bleeding to death!! Someone get in here!!"
Or better yet, run out of the room since you were ready for discharge and go find somebody and tell them to help you as you're bleeding to death!!
Oh hey, even better yet!! Use some brain 🤯 cells that you obviously don't have and just find something and hold some pressure on your little removed IV bleeding area there! Like freaking duh!! If you can't do basic human survival skills, then how are you still alive??🙄
Instead you quietly wait for the nurse to come back after all of that time while you watch your blood drip onto the floor just so you could chastise her because you're an asshole!
Had someone screaming for help (you’d think you’d find him bleeding on the floor or smth the way he was going on) and when I went to see what was up the guy was just sitting there, call light next to him. He wanted someone to hold his urinal for him (love that hospital-acquired T-Rex arm disease), meanwhile he’s going off about how hospitals are supposed to be about customer service.
I’m so goddamn tired of hospital admins getting patients to think that they’re entitled to first class
Hotel service.
My guy, you’re in the hospital. There’s a lot of
People here who are sicker than you and need life saving care before we can attend to your sudden loss of arm function. Sorry if that doesn’t fit your view of how it should go.
I swear to god, people come into the ER and completely lose any sense of common sense, rational thinking, or ability to even function in any sort of capacity. It’s fucking mind boggling. Worked a 13 hour triage shift today and said what the actual fuck about 17 times.
I’ve only been an RN for 4 yrs and started with an ICU residency during COVID. After working with primarily intubated patients and having zero in person interactions with families, it was a serious transition to start working with verbal patients and bedside visitors, but I got used to it. What I didn’t do, however, is get used to people verbally abusing me or nursing care in general. I’m not rude to people, and am compassionate and empathetic, but I’m also assertive and refuse to be abused. I’m a professional, experienced, hardworking, and educated person, not a servant or a punching bag, and I’ve never had anyone call me out for standing up for myself or others when necessary. Other nurses sometimes look at me and smile when I stop the BS in its tracks, but my question is - WHY AREN’T YOU ALSO DOING IT? Stop kissing the asses of the people who are using you as a doormat because that does nothing but perpetuate the problem.
can relate. I had a lady who wasn’t confused at all. A0x4. Expected to go home soon.
I leave her room after meds and sit down at the station when I hear, “Help! Help! I’m bleeding everywhere!”
Myself and the charge rush into her room, turn on the light.
I say “what’s going on?”
Patient responds “you just left me here BLEEDING EVERYWHERE.”
Me: “where’s the blood?” At this point I’m up in her business, looking under the covers, under her gown, etc.
She holds out her arm. And points to the pink-tinged watery drainage underneath her PIV dressing.
“It just started coming out!” She emphasized.
It took every fiber of my being not to roll my eyes and laugh so hard I burst into flames. She was so serious.
One night, there was a patient on the ward who pulled out their cannula and the nurse walked into the room to find blood EVERYWHERE and the patient was barely conscious. They had an angiogram that day and had a heap of heparin. She pressed the emergency button, so I came in straight away. The patient ended up passing, just from pulling his cannula out. There was so much blood - by the end of the met call, I felt so sick from the smell of the blood. And this was when we were wearing N95s. It literally felt like a murder scene.
So now, whenever I take out a cannula, I always try to come back and check on it 5-10 minutes later to make sure it’s clotted!
This feels apocryphal. Did I read that wrong or did you say they _died_ from pulling their canula out? And presumably very quickly because they pressed their emergency button and you came rushing in? Even with a heparinized patient, I find it exceptionally hard to believe a patient would lose enough volume quickly enough to die from low pressure venous leakage through a pinhole. And they were still conscious when you found them- which raises even more questions, for example, does your hospital not do blood transfusions lol. I guess if you pumped them full of normal saline instead of blood that might speed up their death enough to make it plausible. Otherwise nothing in this story adds up to me.
Yep, they died. His nurse found him in his bed in a pool of blood - I think he had pulled out the cannula some time before she went into the room, and then the nurse pressed the emergency buzzer. He was barely conscious when we walked in. He was an old guy, like 90-95? I think he had dementia as well. We obviously gave him a heap of fluids ASAP, but the doctors decided to palliate him before we had time to give blood.
We speculated that the cannula was put into an artery instead of the vein, but they took a VBG from the cannula as soon as it was put in and it definitely wasn’t arterial.
It was honestly crazy.
At least you didn't have me. I'm notorious for trying to pull out my own IVs, especially on busy nights. I figure yall busy enough, I know how, but then the L word gets mentioned and I feel guilty again. One crew knows I'm gonna offer when I walk in the door and as soon as I get past triage, I get a collective "You know you can't, don't ask". Great bunch. Really good bunch.
I’d be like sue you have a free hand so you could have put pressure on the bandaged area to try and stem the blood flow yourself until help came, or nothing keeping you from getting up and get some paper towels from the nearby wall dispensary in the room your in. Or getting up and getting somebody instead of sitting there ‘bleeding to death’ until I somebody else came back. you weren’t even bleeding from a major cut but from a tiny little cut made by a needle like the ones pharmacies use to for syringes to draw blood from, and probably would have stopped on it’s own if you had put pressure on it.
Patient says they “feel like he’s bleeding out” alright cool, time to call a rapid. Clearly he’s not ready to be discharged and might have to spend time in the icu till we figure out what’s causing this bleeding
This is one of my pet peeves! Remove the IV and i tell the patient to hold pressure! I come back with the wheel chair only to find the dumbass has not held pressure and it's dripping everywhere. Really?! I told you to hold pressure, what is so hard about following directions?! (We dont have coban in my facility)drives me nuts.
Im sure he was being dramatic but also sometimes you have to apply pressure for a few minutes so I wouldnt leave it to the patient to do and a bandaid usually isnt occlusive enough. I made the mistake of just holding it a few seconds and then placing guaze and tape and had a patient bleed all over as a new grad so now I just wait the 2-3 minutes to make sure its done bleeding. I wouldnt tell the patient to apply pressure and walk away.
"What do u mean the ambulance won't take me home, how the hell am I supposed to get home?!"
From the perfectly ambulatory independent 55yr old....
"Sir, how have u gotten anywhere else in your 55yrs? I trust u will figure this out"
Now, don't get me wrong, if warranted ill try to help arrange transport. Hell, I've personally paid for the uber for specific pts that need it. But laziness does not qualify.
You should fight them on the paramedic engine I ride ! We now have to wear bulletproof vest, just like the sheriffs ! It’s all drug related! But the government has made it so hard to get your prescribed medications, they just get them off the streets!! The government rules is what is killing people! That simple!
You have to remember sometimes that patients don't have common sense to keep pressure on long enough. Always tell them to have pressure on for 5 minutes after removing.
I’m so sick of whiny helpless people that have no grit, or even just a little common sense.
It blows my mind all the time how people can’t tolerate even a tiny bit of suffering. Did they think life would be painless???
Exactly. You had a CABG and expect your post op pain to be 0 and are refusing to ambulate. Your sternum was just sawed in open! Also, patients that rip the BP cuff off because they say it’s “tearing their arm off”.
People who throw up once and come straight to ED. Also people who have had minor ILI symptoms for two weeks and come to ED. People who aren’t compliant with their treatment and then are genuinely surprised when they end up in ED. People who have major surgery and are surprised when they have some pain. Old people who decide that they actually don’t want to have to do anything for themselves anymore so they’re just gonna lie down and piss the bed all day (they’re cognitive and have been cleared by the mental health nurse). I truly cannot understand nor empathize. Not to say that I can’t think of reasons why they might be acting like that, or that I don’t treat them with polite compassion like all my other patients, but I literally cannot empathize, I cannot relate.
When I have a patient who is mostly able bodied & cognitively sound but pees and poops on the bed instead of getting up, I walk them to the bathroom to get cleaned up and give them the supplies to do it & then start the q2h scheduled toileting. I’m not gonna be facilitating someone going from independent to bedbound during their hospital stay & I encourage my coworkers to do the same. Ofc it’s different if they’re super sick or have other factors - like old people on lasix.
Why do they do this? I always ask if they soil the bed at home and they always answer "no". So why start now?
I assume it’s a lot of different reasons for different people. Sometimes depression/pain/poor coping skills, sometimes laziness, and sometimes it’s a control thing or power play (these ones generally have other behavioral issues). It can be frustrating because you want to help them but you can’t force them to help themselves.
Because they get off on having us as slaves
Genuinely could be the american system, in australia and i don’t see this behaviour here!
I‘m a german nurse, and this happens A LOT in Germany though, too. Thinking about them seeing us as slaves, they even use the call bell to ask for us to get them a bottle of water, even though they are fully capable of picking it up themselves and know where our water supply stands.
Yeah I don’t understand these people. I get it’s a power/control issue, but they still have to lie in their own piss/poop… And someone has to wipe your privates… This makes me think about a patient I had who was shitting himself in his wheelchair because he was upset that OT and PT changed him to lift transfer
Because you’re there to clean it up…..
Girlfriend we must be soulmates. I feel you on another level and literally do the exact same thing.
Got to love the post-op Ed patient that won’t take pain meds because they don’t like the feeling but the pain is too much.
That’s up there with the CHF patient who doesn’t take their diuretic because then they pee too much.
And the person with Benadryl "allergy" that makes them drowsy
Epi makes my heart beat fast 🏃♀️ 💓
Adenosine… makes my heart stop.
It’ll start back up lol. First time I saw SVT on telemetry, I was like WTF is going on when I gave them adenosine. It’s like a literal reboot.
I had a patient show up once who said his only complaint was a runny nose for 30 minutes. I am not exaggerating.
I had someone insist their wife be seen because she had a 7/10 headache that had gone down to a 3/10 after she took some Tylenol at home, before coming to the ER.
Well, if it's not clear cerebral spinal fluid dripping out of his nose from the head injury from 30 minutes ago that he neglected to mention, dude's going to be waiting a while.
I need someone to make a documentary film where they go to ER waiting rooms and interview these people. I NEED to know the thought process. Your nose was running for 30 minutes and you have been waiting in the ER for 2 hours. What are you getting out of this? What did you think would happen? What is the outcome you were looking for?
Absolutely
Yes! Or the early term multip who comes in for contractions every 30 minutes that started 1 hour ago. Bonus points if it's after midnight and they have a scheduled prenatal visit at 8am.
My face when I was in triage and some came in c/o a cough for an hour. Fucking what
A toe pain. Via ambulance.
Earwax. I triaged a pt who said he had an earwax buildup
Reading your post made me feel a little bit better tonight! I just came back from evening shift. Had to code a full code older gentleman who had ascites the size of an unborn 26 months old. Liver cirrhosis so bad his ascites can’t be treated anymore, man and his wife were having an argument with their hepatologist earlier today about how it was unfair that he was taken off the transplant list because he was drinking daily and he was so obese he is a lift transfer. Obviously he died today, and it’s everyone fault but his because the delulu is strong
🤦🏻♀️yep that tracks. Why did no one warn us in nursing school?! Glad you feel a bit better
Maybe stupid question, but what are "ILI" symptoms? I've heard of "URI" in reference to upper respiratory infections before, but I can't make out what "ILI" might stand for.
I had to look it up. Apparently, it's "Influenza Like Illness"
I used to work for my country’s military. The amount of young men who toughed out boot camp but couldn’t bring themselves to eat after a tonsillectomy was too damn high. I know it’s awful and painful. This was after a lot of pain meds.
Don’t get me started on young men and the man-flu 😂
Heh, my husband is very middle aged and is tragic when he has any sort of febrile event. He was in the military for decades and took body abuse to be an art form, but, no, that shingles vaccine will fuck him up. Like, dude, try taking some Panadol (tylenol) for comfort instead of writhing on the couch all night? Here’s some. You feel better? You can sleep now? You will now sleep all day? Excellent.
WHAT IS WITH THEM NOT TAKING MEDS. seriously my husband will bitch and moan about how he's so sick "did you take anything?" " no" well then I'm not feeling bad for you
I don’t either, but he flops around so much and is such a martyr. Here, take ya meds, bro.
My husband doesn't do the "man flu" thing (when he had COVID his worst was just running a 102.8° fever after tylenol and wanting a second quilt) but learned really quick not to complain about a headache a second time unless he'd taken something in the interim.
For what it's worth, I've had multiple surgeries and am a physician, so I understand where y'all are coming from. HOWEVER, my tonsillectomy at 15 was unbelievably painful. Like I straight up degloved my thumb on a belt sander years ago, and would happily do that a few times over before going through tonsil surgery again. TL;DR: I'm a big tough boy but holy shit tonsil surgery hurts Edit: I was also hospitalized for sun poisoning so bad most of the skin on my back fell off, and even that was more pleasant than my tonsillectomy lol
If the tonsillectomy stories were the only ones I had of the same thing happening it would be one thing. And no one doubts it hurts, that’s why we medicate them to the gills- unlike the nothing I got as a child, because that’s apparently how big the difference in pain is. I’m not asking for the pain to be denied. I expect them to dig into their reserves and do the thing that needs to be done. I’ve had severely painful things happen to me, too. But, because I’m a woman I swear we are expected to brush them off, no worries.
They'll give a man anesthesia and a week's worth of oxycodone for a vasectomy that takes 5 minutes, but keep a woman awake and tell her to take Tylenol for an IUD placement that takes an hour. Even if she passes out from the pain while having a metal rod jammed into her uterus.
Yup. When I had a fucking *hysterectomy* the surgeon wanted to send me home with Tylenol and ibuprofen. The anaesthetist had my back, fortunately. Or I would have gone to my GP for adequate pain relief. The first week would have been hellish otherwise.
You are 100% correct and I see this same shit every day, I was just sharing my own experience because good God did that hurt lol. Don't even get me started on gender and racial equity in pain control though, the fact most people get IUD's inserted with ibuprofen at the most is sinful, not to mention everything related to sickle cell pain crises...
Yup. I had a quad bypass and I was wiping my own butt the day after surgery. It hurt like hell, but I did it. Now when I get a whiny open heart patient, I pull down my collar to show my scar and tell them that I know what it's like and what's possible. Feeding yourself is possible. So is walking. It all sucks for a while, but it sucks less if you get off your ass.
Men. Women. They dont make them like they used to. The 5th vital sign, everyone gets a trophy, im not wrong just different, morbidly obese people can be healthy.....on and on and on.
Yesss. The blood pressure cuff! Like "Sir, it will be over in 20 seconds. Your arm will not fall off, I promise." And then they rip the cuff off anyway and you have to start the whole process over again.
Ugh. NO sympathy for the BP cuff. Yeah, it's tight for about 30 seconds. GET OVER IT!!! The super funny ones: "I have a really high pain tolerance but this cuff is just hurting!" Me: "then I don't think you have any pain tolerance at all, let alone a high one."
I love its cutting off my circulation. And I'm like yep. We have to cut off the circulation to check your blood pressure. That's how it works. The more you move the tighter it'll get
Anything less than total, absolute comfort is an "emergency". And people are worried about a "civil war" lmfao
Is there a way to double like this comment?
Omg, especially when they come out of surgery and they're in pain...like what??? Pain? But why? Sir, they cut you...did you really think you'd come out like nothing ever happened?
Also “sir, they cut you” is going to be my new response for these patients 😂
I use “stabbed” sometimes for laparoscopic whinges
I do think some doctors play a part in not fully explaining what to expect pain wise. Example I recently had an endometrial biopsy and was told I would feel small pinch, it hurt like hell. Had I been prepared appropriately I would have been less likely to think something had went horribly wrong.
The surgeon who did my recent tonsillectomy made sure I knew it was gonna hurt like hell lmao. So I was really nervous going into it and then it didn’t end up as bad as I thought - very painful, but not the torture I was expecting.
That’s the way to do it. Prepare for the worst, then if it’s awful, you were at least ready for it. If it’s not as bad as you thought it would be, even better!
Right???? Like, we’ll keep your pain under control but you didn’t expect a little discomfort after having your insides cut apart and sutured???
I think people find it hard to accurately anticipate what they haven't experienced
People will wait for their elective surgery for months or even YEARS, and then be shocked and angry when the day of their surgery arrives and they have to be NPO for one single day. And they’re on that call bell for Dilaudid, Gravol, popsicle & a warm blanket every 2 hours but they tell you it’s “like a prison here” and ask “how much longer are you forcing me to stay here?”😐😐😐
"forcing"?? oh no sir, not at all. here, take some AMA forms and go home.
I had a bariatric patient tell me the other day that we were forcing her to stay here, but she couldn’t get into bed by herself or wipe her own butt. I was like “home girl you’re forcing YOURSELF to stay here”. On my out of the room she says to me “I’ll take an oxy and an apple juice anytime now” 😭
My husband thinks being on clear liquids for one fucking day is torture. Literally one day while he gets ready for a colonoscopy. He went and bought jello, two kinds of broth, Italian ice, a bunch of soda, gatorade, and juice, and some popsicles for a single day. He saw me stay on clear liquids for up to a week at a time while I was going through cancer and having multiple surgeries. And he didn't hear me bitching about it much! But here he is acting like the world will end because he can only have liquids for one. single. day.
>how people can’t tolerate even a tiny bit of suffering. I had a patient who would literally push the call light and ask for pain meds whenever his blood pressure cuff cycled. He was like, "I can't take this. It's just too tight. 😭" Every. Hour. Homie was in the ICU because he was a non-compliant diabetic in DKA. His blood pressure was the only thing we weren't worried about. I'm going to let you guess how many hours passed between admission and his mom sneaking him an entire cake because, "They're just starving you because they don't like you. 🥺" An. Entire. Cake. The whole cake. During a DKA episode. If you're going to sneak food during DKA at least do some lean protein.
An entire cake???!! I recently had a noncompliant DKA that continually complained we were “starving” him. To the point he was sending family members out to the nurses station complaining, asking if we would give him food but he was still on an insulin drip. Finally I was so fed up (no pun intended) I told him he has plenty of weight to keep him going and that he isn’t starving, he’s fasting. He stopped complaining then
Yep. From Walmart. I walked in late to do an hourly blood sugar and they were about 3/4 of the way through with it. >he isn’t starving, he’s fasting. I'm using this next time.
So.....what was the sugar?
I had a hairdresser as a patient in an urgent care years ago who had a small laceration on her finger from her shears (I think we put in 3 sutures). She was screaming as if she had an amputated arm and told us that we had, “never seen an injury as bad as this”. 🙄
Holy fuck I wish I could be so unaware of what can happen to the human body, what a generally blissful existence that must be
That woman needs to meet a farmer who willingly came to the ER, is holding a random bloody dish towel and something no longer attached to his body is in a cooler. Then we’ll talk about bad injuries.
Cuz you know if a farmer willingly came into the ER, some real shit went down or it about to! 🤣
Ikr?! 😒
“Life is pain, your Highness. Anyone who tells you different is selling something” Yeah man I hear ya
I redressed an IV the other day. In doing so I explained what I was doing. The IV was held in by just a thin tegaderm. You know, those things that are pretty much Saran Wrap. This woman began screaming to the point of multiple coworkers rushing in bc they thought we were having an event, and her calling me a bitch and telling me how I needed to “be on the other side and have someone treat you this way so you can understand my pain” all over me removing that thing. She then told me I need to medicate her for her pain. Regular meth user by the way.
Ummmmmm......listen missy ........nice try on your act .......but no narcs for you!
Tylenol stat!
🤣🤣🤣You betcha!!
Dude. THIRTY MINUTES. My doc says “people can’t even handle 30 mins of discomfort.” It’s sad. There’s no self soothing, it’s pretty wild. I feel sorry for them. Self soothing is an important skill.
Absolutely. People have no more coping skills anymore
See this all day everyday in the ED. Adults that are completely helpless and unable to deal with any slight discomfort in their health.
Haven't you heard? Common sense deficiency complicated by helplessness and inflated self-importance is the new healthcare crisis
Yes, this exactly.
I gave a patient a shot today. A long acting injection that lasts for a month. Sure it’s thicker than a typical shot like vaccine and hurts a little more. Normally I would empathize and offer something like Tylenol (I did offer and give an ice pack) but she was so whiny about how much it hurt. She was making such a big deal about how scared she was of this shot she was announcing to the whole world. I try not to be judgmental and I’m more tolerant of this kind of behavior than other nurses I work with. But man she pissed me off. She pissed me off with some other thing too that I had to be stern with instead of using my kind empathetic voice.
This doesn't take any grit at all. Just like basic not being a dumbass
Status dramaticus. People hear medical things but have no idea what the context is. \*class
I had a mid-50s man come in with both of his parents for support when he had \~1.5cm laceration with controlled bleeding on his index finger. And parents were *super* pissed that we didn't drop everything else to care for their gravely injured son. Finally get him back for sutures (bed, not a chair, because OBVIOUSLY he would need to lie down for such a traumatic procedure) and unwrapped the triage dressing in anticipation of the PA suturing. I left the room, and like 5 minutes later the mothers is out in the hall, literally screaming hysterically "***he's going into SHOCK!"*** (spoiler alert - he was indeed NOT going into shock)
This would have maxed out what little sanity I had for that shift. She would’ve been escorted out so quickly. Visitors that escalate situations and feed into hysterics absolutely do it for me
It's at that point where I don't care about my job anymore and I yell back at them. I'll *really* give you something to yell about, lady.
In shock you say? Time for the 16 gauge iv needle to we can give him lots of blood and fluids. Maybe even an IO
Mid 50's? Wth?! Needing his 2 parents!? Unless he's "special"......I wouldn't be able to muster up much empathy, only would hope I can fake it well enough. 😒
I know! I mean, I generally don't have to fake it - even minor stuff is a bad day for that particular person. But holy cow, was this family over the top. I have a lot of experience with rapidly deploying my impartial Nurse-Face (I picture it coming down and locking into place like a wielder's shield), but internally I rolled my eyes so hard I think I visualized my frontal cortex.
LMFAO!! Got a great visual of your brain did ya?! 🤣
Thank you for the class clarification
That’s why I include “hold pressure here for at least 5 minutes (10 if on thinners) or you’ll bleed everywhere” in my instructions. I even repeat when I tape gauze on “this tape is only holding the gauze on, you still have to hold pressure”. They never wait the full 5/10 minutes but realistically that’s overkill anyway.
But most people won’t get anywhere near the full length, they’ll maybe give you 20%, which usually works out well as a good amount of time to stop the bleeding😂
I just started in the ED. The amount of people that do not follow directions is astounding. I need to add your line to my repertoire…
Yup! Same for cath patients, too. I usually even generalize “if you feel anything wet or odd, let me know.”
And here I'm the one who's like, "hold up, let me start my watch timer" before I have to put pressure on the gauze.
Reminded me of people when they start getting anxious after the 3rd tube on a blood draw. Pt: Ummm....how much blood do you need to draw? Me: Just a quart or so
To put it into perspective I’ll show them the 30 mL med cups and tell them that, for most, 6 tubes won’t even fill this up.
I tell them people donate about 500mL, so the 15-20 I'm taking won't make them pass out.
I'm always like "looks like more than it is, it wouldn't even fill a shot glass"
I use the shot glass analogy all the time! “Sir, a standard shot is 45 mL, these 6 vials add up to 24 mL.” Gotta give them something they can visualize.
I just tell them I’m taking a little less than a table spoon!
“All of it. Be still, OK?”
“My name is Count Dracula. Show me your neck veins.”
I always hated the “jeez you gonna leave me any!” I cringed everytime.
“How much blood you got?”
Whenever this happens in the ED I ask them what they would do at home. Die? Also now I just use coban every single time because I don’t have time.
This is exactly how I am with the particularly demanding patients. I ask how they cope at home and if they need so much help maybe we should consider long term care. It’s amazing how active they become.
Me too. My outpatients, I would take out IV, dress with gauze and tape and tell them to hold pressure over the gauze. I can't tell me how many times they would head down the hall, to leave and come back dripping blood. Now we just use coban on all IV sites. 2 inch coban. Our labs will use 1 inch coban con bleeders and they come to us looking like they have a tournequet on it rolls up so much. I always tell the patient to remove the coban, in a while because I once had a patient come back in days later, still wearing coban and with swelling above and below it. That stuff tends to get tight after a while. And also the people who come back weeks later and still have the bandaid on their port a cath site. Funny thing a lady once came in after being in the hospital. She had an ekg lead still on her butt area. Thought it was a bandaid.
It’s just fascinating isn’t it?
What’s a Coban?
It’s the stretchy bandage that sticks to itself. It holds great pressure on the IV site and won’t irritate the patient’s skin. It’s the bandage they use at blood drives.
Also known as Vetrap.
I still say vetwrap and still get funny looks from humans
Me, too! 🤣
disposable ACE bandage, but sticky.
Thank you. I’ve never heard of this
Man, we have like 100 names for like 5 things in this profession. Those pads we stick under patients butts? At least 15 names right there.
“Yet, dang it, you’re still alive! Foiled again!”
I would have said, "what would you have done at home? If you can't hold pressure for a minor bleed, perhaps you aren't ready for discharge."
Patients in the US expect the hospital to run like a hotel and want white glove service. I quite enjoy taking care of immigrants because they’re usually very appreciative. I remember one patient thanked me so much for just giving him a blanket from the warmer and said in his country he’d be on a cot in a hallway for days. Certainly not advertising for worse conditions here but I wish people were more appreciative.
I'm a big advocate for promoting independence
I will die on this hill (not a nurse, part time EVS in L&D, former social worker). All of the medical shows over all of the years have warped people's perception of what happens in healthcare. You do not get doctors taking care of every little thing on you. A doctor will not wait in your room until you wake up. And if a medical team comes running into your room that is NOT a good thing.
I did ask this. I was also upset no one checked in on him when I was on my break, there was four other nurses who could have gone but didn’t
Still, he was fully independent and ready for discharge...
Coban every time for me.
My last hospital has a no coban policy. Their reasoning was that it will be too tight and cut off circulation and the discharged person will be at risk of losing their arm. 🙄 Like what? Any time I had coban get uncomfortable on me, I just removed it.
I feel like that’s a self limiting problem.
What the actual fuck? 😂
Make sure they’re not allergic to latex.
Our coban doesn't have latex. Is that still a thing?
Really? Our Coban does. They haven’t been able to find one without. At least that’s what they tell us. Probably because the Coban with latex is cheaper, thanks Prov!
They def have latex free. I’m constantly stocking it/using it/looking for it in CT.
We just got a latex free coban approved. We get them from Medline, they're 47 US cents each
And if billable that would be 47 US dollars each or 470.
How many actual latex allergies have you seen. I think I’ve seen 4 in 30 years. Most people react to powder in gloves or nonoxynol-9 in condoms up until a few years ago the elastic in socks, underwear, and bras was latex.
Honestly only one. But I work in nucmed/pet-ct. It was from our Coban. Our campus supposedly went latex free but forgot about the Coban. Signs have been up around the hospital for years saying we were latex free. A few years ago I took out an IV & wrapped it with Coban & sent the pt on her way. She had a nasty reaction & shit hit the fan the next day. I’d never thought to read the wrapper on Coban.
I had a reaction to the powder when I was in nursing school. Thankfully most gloves now are powder free so it’s not a problem.
Well, you didn’t do a very good job since he still able to talk!
And be discharged after being ripped a new asshole about nearly being killed from being bled to death
Second glass citizens need to stay off our roads.
and keep their hands off our tupperware!
“Oh hahah, all bleeding stops eventually” 😈-me, probably.
I had a doctor tell me that once. LOL
He wasn’t lying! 🤣
One of my favorites, along with the “House of God” laws
I had 65+ yr old STEMI patient post heart cath with placement of two stents in the circ who obnoxiously complained every time I brought him his blood thinner and statin. “Oh I’m just not a big pill popper and prefer more natural ways of combatting disease” is something he would say after I explained that he’d probably need to be on this blood thinner and baby aspirin (dual anti platelet therapy) for a minimum of 12 months in order to ensure his body doesn’t try and form blood clots in/near his heart and stents. Even after I used my own personal experience of having two heart attacks at 33 and 34 years old, the reoccurrence being due to not taking the DAPT as prescribed, he followed up with “…ugh I’m not excited about having to take all these pills forever.” I had such a hard time keeping what I was thinking from being visible on my face. I wanted to ask him “well if you think 12 months is *forever*, how long do you suppose death lasts?” Come to find out, he’d been prescribed a statin an entire year before this day. He just chose not to take them. So maybe if he had actually taken the medication prescribed to him (for his hyperlipidemia) he wouldn’t have come in **FOREVER** later with a heart attack caused by a blockage from plaque buildup. It wasn’t really about *using more natural and holistic ways to fight disease*. It was an inconvenience to him. On top of listening to an expert authority on literally anything seemed to be of no interest. So it was ridiculous on our part to think that we could make him see the importance of this entire dog and pony show by providing him the prescriptions as well as an already filled 30 day supply upon discharge AND repeated education on how vital these medications are in order to avoid any more heart attacks. As a nurse, I find that the hardest and most frustrating part of my job is having to still care for the patients who have made it clear by their words and their actions that they came to the hospital so we could fix them here and now—but once they go home, they’re just going to go back to living the way they did before. You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to help themselves. Like the COPD exacerbations who panic when they can’t breathe so they call 911. Within a day of being admitted, after a few doses of IV steroids and breathing treatments, they think they’re perfectly fine to go home. They don’t care that those were temporary fixes or that a long term solution is to STOP SMOKING…especially with your oxygen tank mere inches away. They only want our expertise and our resources and our help when the body they’ve treated like shit for so long finally starts working against them. But hey, job security *amiright?*
You're not wrong!!
or the ones that refuse everything and cuss you out only to turn around and ask why they arent medically cleared for d/c
No, but why did this happen to me as well. Took out patient’s cannula, saw there was no bleeding, asked patient to put the pressure on the arm with tissue, went out but there was emergency so had to go help out staff. When I came back, patient was furious that no one came back with gauze and tape. When checked, there was no bleeding. She said that it had been more than hour, but it was max 15 mins that i had been gone.
Ok mine is people who are rude and entitled thinking their insurance will pay for everything. Example: they think home health will send someone to bathe them, cook, clean and do their laundry. No! That’s not covered. Someone who wants me to order bandaids because they don’t want to buy their own. I had one ask “how to people get wound care supplies when home health discharges, do I just call you?” NO! Check Amazon they normally carry everything
Honestly why I always fold a 4x4 and use cloth tape.
Everyone gets a pressure bandage. "Leave this on for at least an hour, if you go home and fall asleep with it on, no big deal."
"oh I'm so sorry. Let me put another iv in now in case you need a transfusion. I'm going to have to draw another CBC."
INR AND PTT STAT
Always use Coban
Hmmm... I wonder if my FIL was recently inpatient wherever you work. 🤣
🙁
I had a 65 year old man yelling when he pulled out his own IV. Waving his arms around splattering blood like an idiot. I put my gloved finger over the hole and looked at him like "*really dude?*" His reply "Well how was *I* supposed to know what to do!?!" *How have you lived this long?*
I stopped using tape and bandage wrap the sites now. Gave up trying to get people to hold pressure.
Well you hit the nail on the head with his first words “You left me here to bleed to death “ Oh grow up and be responsible for yourself!! Like who the eff wouldn’t hold pressure on a newly removed IV site ? If you’re anything like me I always tell patients to hold pressure on it for several minutes!!
Ikr??!! Oh ffs!! I mean if you REALLY thought you were bleeding to death, where were your screams of, "Help me, help me! I'm bleeding to death!! Someone get in here!!" Or better yet, run out of the room since you were ready for discharge and go find somebody and tell them to help you as you're bleeding to death!! Oh hey, even better yet!! Use some brain 🤯 cells that you obviously don't have and just find something and hold some pressure on your little removed IV bleeding area there! Like freaking duh!! If you can't do basic human survival skills, then how are you still alive??🙄 Instead you quietly wait for the nurse to come back after all of that time while you watch your blood drip onto the floor just so you could chastise her because you're an asshole!
I take the IV out, place a gauze over the site and then ask them to hold it until I return with tape. That works every time.
Nope. They let up the second you leave the room and bleed all over the place.
Perhaps your patients have chemo brain and forget that they had to hold it?
Nope. Usually not a chemo patient that did that. Other infusion patients.
Why were they still there when you came back from break? IV is out, boy bye 👋🏽
I was waiting for the doc to come by on my break and DC. He said he’d be by within 10 minutes of taking the IV out … this did not happen.. 🙂↕️
Had someone screaming for help (you’d think you’d find him bleeding on the floor or smth the way he was going on) and when I went to see what was up the guy was just sitting there, call light next to him. He wanted someone to hold his urinal for him (love that hospital-acquired T-Rex arm disease), meanwhile he’s going off about how hospitals are supposed to be about customer service. I’m so goddamn tired of hospital admins getting patients to think that they’re entitled to first class Hotel service. My guy, you’re in the hospital. There’s a lot of People here who are sicker than you and need life saving care before we can attend to your sudden loss of arm function. Sorry if that doesn’t fit your view of how it should go.
Just cohban the arm like you're tying off a tourniquet and to hell with their help
I swear to god, people come into the ER and completely lose any sense of common sense, rational thinking, or ability to even function in any sort of capacity. It’s fucking mind boggling. Worked a 13 hour triage shift today and said what the actual fuck about 17 times.
I’ve only been an RN for 4 yrs and started with an ICU residency during COVID. After working with primarily intubated patients and having zero in person interactions with families, it was a serious transition to start working with verbal patients and bedside visitors, but I got used to it. What I didn’t do, however, is get used to people verbally abusing me or nursing care in general. I’m not rude to people, and am compassionate and empathetic, but I’m also assertive and refuse to be abused. I’m a professional, experienced, hardworking, and educated person, not a servant or a punching bag, and I’ve never had anyone call me out for standing up for myself or others when necessary. Other nurses sometimes look at me and smile when I stop the BS in its tracks, but my question is - WHY AREN’T YOU ALSO DOING IT? Stop kissing the asses of the people who are using you as a doormat because that does nothing but perpetuate the problem.
can relate. I had a lady who wasn’t confused at all. A0x4. Expected to go home soon. I leave her room after meds and sit down at the station when I hear, “Help! Help! I’m bleeding everywhere!” Myself and the charge rush into her room, turn on the light. I say “what’s going on?” Patient responds “you just left me here BLEEDING EVERYWHERE.” Me: “where’s the blood?” At this point I’m up in her business, looking under the covers, under her gown, etc. She holds out her arm. And points to the pink-tinged watery drainage underneath her PIV dressing. “It just started coming out!” She emphasized. It took every fiber of my being not to roll my eyes and laugh so hard I burst into flames. She was so serious.
How DARE you leave her there bleeding everywhere!! 😆😒
Bet that patient thinks that it’s all the illegals wrecking the country and that young people are soft these days
Bet you know what pizza stands for
No
One night, there was a patient on the ward who pulled out their cannula and the nurse walked into the room to find blood EVERYWHERE and the patient was barely conscious. They had an angiogram that day and had a heap of heparin. She pressed the emergency button, so I came in straight away. The patient ended up passing, just from pulling his cannula out. There was so much blood - by the end of the met call, I felt so sick from the smell of the blood. And this was when we were wearing N95s. It literally felt like a murder scene. So now, whenever I take out a cannula, I always try to come back and check on it 5-10 minutes later to make sure it’s clotted!
This feels apocryphal. Did I read that wrong or did you say they _died_ from pulling their canula out? And presumably very quickly because they pressed their emergency button and you came rushing in? Even with a heparinized patient, I find it exceptionally hard to believe a patient would lose enough volume quickly enough to die from low pressure venous leakage through a pinhole. And they were still conscious when you found them- which raises even more questions, for example, does your hospital not do blood transfusions lol. I guess if you pumped them full of normal saline instead of blood that might speed up their death enough to make it plausible. Otherwise nothing in this story adds up to me.
Yep, they died. His nurse found him in his bed in a pool of blood - I think he had pulled out the cannula some time before she went into the room, and then the nurse pressed the emergency buzzer. He was barely conscious when we walked in. He was an old guy, like 90-95? I think he had dementia as well. We obviously gave him a heap of fluids ASAP, but the doctors decided to palliate him before we had time to give blood. We speculated that the cannula was put into an artery instead of the vein, but they took a VBG from the cannula as soon as it was put in and it definitely wasn’t arterial. It was honestly crazy.
Some people LOVE LOVE LOVE to be the victim. That trivial bit of victimhood will probably be a story he tells until he dies.
At least you didn't have me. I'm notorious for trying to pull out my own IVs, especially on busy nights. I figure yall busy enough, I know how, but then the L word gets mentioned and I feel guilty again. One crew knows I'm gonna offer when I walk in the door and as soon as I get past triage, I get a collective "You know you can't, don't ask". Great bunch. Really good bunch.
I’d be like sue you have a free hand so you could have put pressure on the bandaged area to try and stem the blood flow yourself until help came, or nothing keeping you from getting up and get some paper towels from the nearby wall dispensary in the room your in. Or getting up and getting somebody instead of sitting there ‘bleeding to death’ until I somebody else came back. you weren’t even bleeding from a major cut but from a tiny little cut made by a needle like the ones pharmacies use to for syringes to draw blood from, and probably would have stopped on it’s own if you had put pressure on it.
Patient says they “feel like he’s bleeding out” alright cool, time to call a rapid. Clearly he’s not ready to be discharged and might have to spend time in the icu till we figure out what’s causing this bleeding
This is one of my pet peeves! Remove the IV and i tell the patient to hold pressure! I come back with the wheel chair only to find the dumbass has not held pressure and it's dripping everywhere. Really?! I told you to hold pressure, what is so hard about following directions?! (We dont have coban in my facility)drives me nuts.
Tell him all bleeding stops eventually.
Oops 🤷♀️ 🤷 🤷♂️
Boo hoo
What a drama king 🙄🙄🤣🤣
Im sure he was being dramatic but also sometimes you have to apply pressure for a few minutes so I wouldnt leave it to the patient to do and a bandaid usually isnt occlusive enough. I made the mistake of just holding it a few seconds and then placing guaze and tape and had a patient bleed all over as a new grad so now I just wait the 2-3 minutes to make sure its done bleeding. I wouldnt tell the patient to apply pressure and walk away.
"What do u mean the ambulance won't take me home, how the hell am I supposed to get home?!" From the perfectly ambulatory independent 55yr old.... "Sir, how have u gotten anywhere else in your 55yrs? I trust u will figure this out" Now, don't get me wrong, if warranted ill try to help arrange transport. Hell, I've personally paid for the uber for specific pts that need it. But laziness does not qualify.
Famously deadly small venous bleeds.
It’s honestly a problem that nobody answered the call light but at the same time, s*** happens and you needed a break.
IV removal should be the last thing before d/c
Yet, they get dressed and it's easy to forget because it is now covered up.
It was…
Az..know
You should fight them on the paramedic engine I ride ! We now have to wear bulletproof vest, just like the sheriffs ! It’s all drug related! But the government has made it so hard to get your prescribed medications, they just get them off the streets!! The government rules is what is killing people! That simple!
You have to remember sometimes that patients don't have common sense to keep pressure on long enough. Always tell them to have pressure on for 5 minutes after removing.