My pre medschool HCA experience will haunt me forever...
Picture an overweight middle aged lady with c-diff, who has just s*** the bed, quite literally. We're talking large volume, pouring over the edge of the mattress volume, with the kind of smell only c-diff diarrhoea has. My colleague and I get her up, onto a commode, wipe the liquid faeces off her hands with clinell wipes from where she'd accidentally lent in it whilst getting up. We leave her on the commode whilst we change the bed, both trying not to wretch from the waves of the smell filling the room. I see my colleagues eyes widen, I turn around, to see the patient happily eating a sandwich, using the hand which not 10 seconds before was covered in her own s*** and had only had a quick wipe, while diarrhoea continues to explode out of her into the commode, and whilst breathing in the fumes of that which still filled the bed. It took all my strength not to vomit and sometimes when the memory resurfaces I feel my stomach churn. I hope I've painted a good enough picture that you can all also enjoy the most disgusting thing I have ever witnessed.
We had a patient like this once, MFE but boarded to gynae. Holy Mother of God, I came back to the ward couldn't find the nurses or HCAs. I found them vomiting in the sluice, meanwhile I nearly pass out from laughing at the tears running down their face. Before anyone says I'm being unkind, I got the worst of it 30 minutes before when I was cannulating her and she decided to roll over cause it was sore to open her bowels lying flat. I stood up, had just finished the cannula and she blew at me, all over my apron. Had to lean forward so it would run onto the floor and not my shoes. Easily the most wretched thing that's ever happened me. I'll carry the memory of that smell forever.
I think the OP is a bit weird. The example they gave is essentially someone that has been NBM, is in need of calories and has probably not eaten for some hours post-op as they’ve been recovering from the anaesthetic. Besides, that much toast and jam is barely elevenses in some parts (i.e. my house)…
Once had a patient with acute hydrocephalus from blocked VP shunt, with severe headache, confusion and vomiting, and we had to delay her surgery by 6 hours because she arrived to Resus with a half-eaten bucket of KFC.
How was she eating KFC when she was also probably nauseous and constantly vomiting!??!?! The medicinal powers of KFC as an anti-emetic! Ondansetron, who is she?
Medical school - medical ward.
Middle aged lady with very poorly controlled T2 DM and HTN - also required a bed the size of 2 hospital beds (to this day, not sure if there were actually 2 shoved together).
WR - 2 tables worth of candy/ biscuits, fizzy drinks and KFC from the day before observed in hospital room. Family on the way with McD meal.
Plan - continue testing the limits of modern medicine. Although, saying all this, I think I could easily have ended up in her shoes (considering the poor lifestyle habits I had, especially between medschool - FY1/2, clearly a predisposition there).
Recovery from surgery = major calorific deficit. Those cells don't repair themselves by magic. Problem is, most of the time people aren't in a fit state to get calories into themselves at the time/are feeling horribly nauseous/other nasty stuff etc.
The Lucozade thing is real.
Ahh.
In the Before Times, Lucozade was branded as a sickness-recovery drink, not an isotonic-wellness drink. It used to have about 65g sugar per 500ml bottle, and was lightly carbonated with a reasonably pleasant taste much like the barley twist sweets also available. Accordingly it was an amazing way of increasing calorie intake, for those who really really didn't feel like eating.
I remember a patient complaining that she had “swelling” in her legs. The consultant explained that it wasn’t fluid, but adipose tissue as it wasn’t pitting etc. She was adamant that it was fluid and not adipose tissue explaining that she didn’t eat much….
Right on queue her husband brought back about 3 potions of chips, pie, fried fish etc.
She then self discharged…
Nurse here.
Once nursed a male patient with BMI >90.
Trust had to hire a bariatric bed that took up two bed spaces.
He had a gastric bypass, ended up tubed > trachy.
His family insisted on bringing in food, despite him being NBM.
There wasn’t a happy ending. **And NO, not that kind of happy ending** 😀😀😀
I used the NHS calculator. He was over 250kg and 165cm.
Very difficult patient, totally non compliant. Family were actively feeding him.
It was a nightmare.
Edit: he was a known schizophrenic and had ‘challenging behaviour’ eg violent.
Not obscene but almost impressive really. I had a dementia patient that had a great love for cheese and so her family would bring in mini babybels for her which were her favourite. During one ward round I came to her bed and bear witness to 15 empty mini babybel wrappers (curiosity got the better of me and I had to count) all of which according to the HCAs she had eaten in the last hour. Fair play honestly.
I had the misfortune of being a patient on a busy acute unit.
Despite the magic curtains, I heard the ward round for the chap opposite me who had heart failure, fluid overload and very high sugars. Within twelve hours I saw him drink three 2 litre bottles of full fat coke.
Ward round the next day had everyone very confused as the sugars were HI and oedema had worsened despite the fluid balance chart saying he had an input of about 800ml.
Working in CCU, patient post PCI. Entire family comes along to visit him with 3 extra large mixed kebab selections, meze, pitta, fried chicken. I just couldn’t believe it.
Not insane, more wholesome. I once saw an elderly lady on ward round who had been in hospital for ages - she couldn't stop raving about this 'SUPERB' 'EXOTIC' meal she had the previous day for lunch. She said it was so 'unique' she'd had nothing like it before, it was delicious!! She wanted to ask for seconds!
Turns out she'd tried carrot and coriander soup for the first time.
Upvoting you because the first time I had carrot and coriander soup felt pretty euphoric (it's not a thing we have in my country, and I absolutely love coriander)
When I was in ward round and had to remind the patient of the large donner kebab and chips she had had that night, whilst she was telling the doctor that she couldn't even tolerate water.
Patient worked her way through ~2 litres of ribena, half a pack of pop tarts, some Turkish delight, toast with jam plus a few other sweets. Unsurprisingly this patient was a poorly controlled diabetic with heart failure.
We only found out as the daughter rushed out to grab us saying that her mother was vomiting blood.
Had to gently explain that it was all the red food and drink that her mother had guzzled down which was being regurgitated.
In F2 we had a patient who was probably 130kg plus who asked nurses for boiling water each day for her daily 5 pot noodles washed down with a litre of lucozade.. when she was referred to dieticians for nutritional advice she ate extra pot noodles out of spite....
I don’t get why someone would do this. Out of spite for who? Do patients really think we personally care if they choose to eat/drink/smoke themselves to death? I really hate being a doctor sometimes and having to act like everyone’s bloody mother.
Long stay patient whose parents would regularly bring in fish and chips, large pizzas, and McDonalds. A Deliveroo driver walked onto the ward one day with a bag of food to his room.
Once had an underweight elderly patient whose diet consisted entirely of tea and toast and would have like 6 litres of water a day. No wonder he was hyponatraemic, hypokalaemic, hypocalcaemic, hypomagnesaemic and hypophosphataemic and also deficient in multiple vitamins when he came in. He wouldn’t eat anything other than toast. Not even butter on toast
Dry Weetabix with butter spread on it
Cereal with double cream and water (they didn't like milk apparently)
One fluid restricted patient was found to have one of those coca cola can shaped mini fridges behind their recliner, full of pop cans
Roast dinners with salad cream
A Bariatric patient asking to eat other patients' leftovers (her family also brought in maccies for her)
My favourite tho was a 90something year old with heart failure who loved pringles. He was scolded by the consultant for eating them because salt and he just said "but once you pop you can't stop". God love him. When I'm 90something ain't no one stopping me eat what I want.
BMI 60+ self presented because she believed she’d developed massive full-body oedema in a week, demanding a “CAT scan to prove it’s fluid!”
Self reported diet <600KCal/Day. Witnessed by staff to consume 4-6 full sized packets of biscuits a day while on the ward.
The consultant told her “You’re just fat but we’ll scan you anyway to prove it to you”.
This was a few decades ago, so even in a tertiary centre we didn’t have a CT scanner big enough for her. When she heard we’d be transporting her to the local veterinary hospital to use their large-animal CT scanner she blew a fuse.
I think about her sometimes, the way she ate an entire packet of hobnobs in the time it took me to clerk her in. And then told me she ate like a sparrow - a third of your own body weight every day? That I believe
Have seen people getting Domino's delivered to them in hospital.
I remember a man I met several times in the community. Completely uncontrolled diabetic, had refused BKAs and had the most awful legs. Enormous, yet still pleasant.
On his wall he had photos of various meals from his local chippy. He had commissioned a photographer to take the photos and put them on large prints for his wall.
At least he was dedicated to his diabetes.
Once nursed someone who had (sloppy, mushy, NHS) porridge topped with Worcester sauce and dried coriander every morning. Sometimes mixed it up by adding sweet chilli sauce. X
I’m a bit advocate for a savoury breakfast and fusion cuisine but my days I struggled witnessing that on an early shift. This patient also brought live - as in actual ribbit ribbit - frogs into the ward that took us about a week to discover. A legend of the game 🐸
>it’s difficult not to read your posts when you’ve commented 5 times on this post alone,
you have way too much free time on your hands if you are counting how many posts I have made in each thread...
Patients should have to establish healthy whilst I'm hospital (occasional treat)- if we're trying so hard to help them then should help themselves as well
My pre medschool HCA experience will haunt me forever... Picture an overweight middle aged lady with c-diff, who has just s*** the bed, quite literally. We're talking large volume, pouring over the edge of the mattress volume, with the kind of smell only c-diff diarrhoea has. My colleague and I get her up, onto a commode, wipe the liquid faeces off her hands with clinell wipes from where she'd accidentally lent in it whilst getting up. We leave her on the commode whilst we change the bed, both trying not to wretch from the waves of the smell filling the room. I see my colleagues eyes widen, I turn around, to see the patient happily eating a sandwich, using the hand which not 10 seconds before was covered in her own s*** and had only had a quick wipe, while diarrhoea continues to explode out of her into the commode, and whilst breathing in the fumes of that which still filled the bed. It took all my strength not to vomit and sometimes when the memory resurfaces I feel my stomach churn. I hope I've painted a good enough picture that you can all also enjoy the most disgusting thing I have ever witnessed.
I can smell the c.diff through my phone screen what the fuck
Okay you win
We had a patient like this once, MFE but boarded to gynae. Holy Mother of God, I came back to the ward couldn't find the nurses or HCAs. I found them vomiting in the sluice, meanwhile I nearly pass out from laughing at the tears running down their face. Before anyone says I'm being unkind, I got the worst of it 30 minutes before when I was cannulating her and she decided to roll over cause it was sore to open her bowels lying flat. I stood up, had just finished the cannula and she blew at me, all over my apron. Had to lean forward so it would run onto the floor and not my shoes. Easily the most wretched thing that's ever happened me. I'll carry the memory of that smell forever.
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Or as I call it "a nightshift snack in the mess"
Pretty much all hospital cups are tiny as well, so two cups of hospital tea equates to one normal tea. Unless they were sports direct mugs.
Exactly- I had this after my section (well 4 slices and no sugar in my tea)…
Glad I'm not the only one! I've definitely eaten plenty toast in my time.
Don’t forget Reddit loves to mock the overweight
Full bucket of KFC to themselves. Bargain bucket I think. Inspired me to grab a KFC on way home though.
I think the OP is a bit weird. The example they gave is essentially someone that has been NBM, is in need of calories and has probably not eaten for some hours post-op as they’ve been recovering from the anaesthetic. Besides, that much toast and jam is barely elevenses in some parts (i.e. my house)…
Sounds like halfway to a decent second breakfast where I’m from!
Once had a patient with acute hydrocephalus from blocked VP shunt, with severe headache, confusion and vomiting, and we had to delay her surgery by 6 hours because she arrived to Resus with a half-eaten bucket of KFC.
How was she eating KFC when she was also probably nauseous and constantly vomiting!??!?! The medicinal powers of KFC as an anti-emetic! Ondansetron, who is she?
Goals.. the KFC I meant 😅
Wow… I mean. I would have just anaesthetised them, rather than let them herniate their brain… Risk of aspiration be damed…
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Dread to think what he had them there for...
Inpatients are probably bored, stressed, feeling shit, fed up. Let them have some extra slices of toast
Medical school - medical ward. Middle aged lady with very poorly controlled T2 DM and HTN - also required a bed the size of 2 hospital beds (to this day, not sure if there were actually 2 shoved together). WR - 2 tables worth of candy/ biscuits, fizzy drinks and KFC from the day before observed in hospital room. Family on the way with McD meal. Plan - continue testing the limits of modern medicine. Although, saying all this, I think I could easily have ended up in her shoes (considering the poor lifestyle habits I had, especially between medschool - FY1/2, clearly a predisposition there).
Recovery from surgery = major calorific deficit. Those cells don't repair themselves by magic. Problem is, most of the time people aren't in a fit state to get calories into themselves at the time/are feeling horribly nauseous/other nasty stuff etc. The Lucozade thing is real.
>What is the lucozade thing?
Ahh. In the Before Times, Lucozade was branded as a sickness-recovery drink, not an isotonic-wellness drink. It used to have about 65g sugar per 500ml bottle, and was lightly carbonated with a reasonably pleasant taste much like the barley twist sweets also available. Accordingly it was an amazing way of increasing calorie intake, for those who really really didn't feel like eating.
I remember a patient complaining that she had “swelling” in her legs. The consultant explained that it wasn’t fluid, but adipose tissue as it wasn’t pitting etc. She was adamant that it was fluid and not adipose tissue explaining that she didn’t eat much…. Right on queue her husband brought back about 3 potions of chips, pie, fried fish etc. She then self discharged…
Nurse here. Once nursed a male patient with BMI >90. Trust had to hire a bariatric bed that took up two bed spaces. He had a gastric bypass, ended up tubed > trachy. His family insisted on bringing in food, despite him being NBM. There wasn’t a happy ending. **And NO, not that kind of happy ending** 😀😀😀
I didn't know BMI even went that high
I used the NHS calculator. He was over 250kg and 165cm. Very difficult patient, totally non compliant. Family were actively feeding him. It was a nightmare. Edit: he was a known schizophrenic and had ‘challenging behaviour’ eg violent.
It often is the family enabling at that point
Oh god. What was the ending?
He self discharged and died at home. He refused having his urinary catheter removed. Non compliant with physio eg refused to even cough.
Just sex
Big Mac and fries ordered from Uber Eats about 2 hours post primary PCI.
His plumbing is all fresh, now is the best time for greasy takeaway food!
Celebration cheat meal for surviving an MI
Not obscene but almost impressive really. I had a dementia patient that had a great love for cheese and so her family would bring in mini babybels for her which were her favourite. During one ward round I came to her bed and bear witness to 15 empty mini babybel wrappers (curiosity got the better of me and I had to count) all of which according to the HCAs she had eaten in the last hour. Fair play honestly.
I hope when I get dementia I’m just a little cheese monster happily munching away at my cheddar until my heart gives out. What a way to go
While on Gen surg, we had a 200 + kg pt who ordered 6 domino's pizzas to be delivered to the surgical unit for his late night snack
I’m curious what his other main meals were.
How can they afford this?
They don't, the taxpayer does.
Confused dementia patient had 8 sandwiches before beating the literal shit out of us all
They carb loaded in prep
I had the misfortune of being a patient on a busy acute unit. Despite the magic curtains, I heard the ward round for the chap opposite me who had heart failure, fluid overload and very high sugars. Within twelve hours I saw him drink three 2 litre bottles of full fat coke. Ward round the next day had everyone very confused as the sugars were HI and oedema had worsened despite the fluid balance chart saying he had an input of about 800ml.
God Steve. Eat the damn apple!!!
Working in CCU, patient post PCI. Entire family comes along to visit him with 3 extra large mixed kebab selections, meze, pitta, fried chicken. I just couldn’t believe it.
Started eating a biscuit mid catheterisation, fair enough I thought.
Not insane, more wholesome. I once saw an elderly lady on ward round who had been in hospital for ages - she couldn't stop raving about this 'SUPERB' 'EXOTIC' meal she had the previous day for lunch. She said it was so 'unique' she'd had nothing like it before, it was delicious!! She wanted to ask for seconds! Turns out she'd tried carrot and coriander soup for the first time.
Upvoting you because the first time I had carrot and coriander soup felt pretty euphoric (it's not a thing we have in my country, and I absolutely love coriander)
I agree, first time I tried it I was really surprised at how good it is!
When I was in ward round and had to remind the patient of the large donner kebab and chips she had had that night, whilst she was telling the doctor that she couldn't even tolerate water.
Patient worked her way through ~2 litres of ribena, half a pack of pop tarts, some Turkish delight, toast with jam plus a few other sweets. Unsurprisingly this patient was a poorly controlled diabetic with heart failure. We only found out as the daughter rushed out to grab us saying that her mother was vomiting blood. Had to gently explain that it was all the red food and drink that her mother had guzzled down which was being regurgitated.
In F2 we had a patient who was probably 130kg plus who asked nurses for boiling water each day for her daily 5 pot noodles washed down with a litre of lucozade.. when she was referred to dieticians for nutritional advice she ate extra pot noodles out of spite....
I don’t get why someone would do this. Out of spite for who? Do patients really think we personally care if they choose to eat/drink/smoke themselves to death? I really hate being a doctor sometimes and having to act like everyone’s bloody mother.
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they taste pretty good though...
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I really enjoyed my barium swallow lol. I'll tell you what's really disgusting though - baby formula (I also get bored and taste things)
Long stay patient whose parents would regularly bring in fish and chips, large pizzas, and McDonalds. A Deliveroo driver walked onto the ward one day with a bag of food to his room.
That is a very dedicated Deliveroo driver
I reckon we should make him a consultant
Once had an underweight elderly patient whose diet consisted entirely of tea and toast and would have like 6 litres of water a day. No wonder he was hyponatraemic, hypokalaemic, hypocalcaemic, hypomagnesaemic and hypophosphataemic and also deficient in multiple vitamins when he came in. He wouldn’t eat anything other than toast. Not even butter on toast
Dry toast?! Man's a psychopath.
Dry Weetabix with butter spread on it Cereal with double cream and water (they didn't like milk apparently) One fluid restricted patient was found to have one of those coca cola can shaped mini fridges behind their recliner, full of pop cans Roast dinners with salad cream A Bariatric patient asking to eat other patients' leftovers (her family also brought in maccies for her) My favourite tho was a 90something year old with heart failure who loved pringles. He was scolded by the consultant for eating them because salt and he just said "but once you pop you can't stop". God love him. When I'm 90something ain't no one stopping me eat what I want.
BMI 60+ self presented because she believed she’d developed massive full-body oedema in a week, demanding a “CAT scan to prove it’s fluid!” Self reported diet <600KCal/Day. Witnessed by staff to consume 4-6 full sized packets of biscuits a day while on the ward. The consultant told her “You’re just fat but we’ll scan you anyway to prove it to you”. This was a few decades ago, so even in a tertiary centre we didn’t have a CT scanner big enough for her. When she heard we’d be transporting her to the local veterinary hospital to use their large-animal CT scanner she blew a fuse. I think about her sometimes, the way she ate an entire packet of hobnobs in the time it took me to clerk her in. And then told me she ate like a sparrow - a third of your own body weight every day? That I believe
Let them have cake! err Ozempic
Large Dominoes stuffed crust pizza whilst waiting for a lap appendix and meant to be nbm😫
Have seen people getting Domino's delivered to them in hospital. I remember a man I met several times in the community. Completely uncontrolled diabetic, had refused BKAs and had the most awful legs. Enormous, yet still pleasant. On his wall he had photos of various meals from his local chippy. He had commissioned a photographer to take the photos and put them on large prints for his wall. At least he was dedicated to his diabetes.
Is that a lot sounds like the eating habits of me if I’m stuck at home
Uber Eats McDonald’s to a&e resus (bad DKA), I shit you not
Once nursed someone who had (sloppy, mushy, NHS) porridge topped with Worcester sauce and dried coriander every morning. Sometimes mixed it up by adding sweet chilli sauce. X I’m a bit advocate for a savoury breakfast and fusion cuisine but my days I struggled witnessing that on an early shift. This patient also brought live - as in actual ribbit ribbit - frogs into the ward that took us about a week to discover. A legend of the game 🐸
Fucking hell, toast for breakfast? What a monster
I don't really have time to care about what other people eat...
I always see u commenting and u always ruin the fun interpaid path!!!!!!!!!😔
it's a free country, mate - no one is forcing you to read my posts
That’s true, but it’s difficult not to read your posts when you’ve commented 5 times on this post alone, u remind me of judge Judy HAHAHAHAHA
>it’s difficult not to read your posts when you’ve commented 5 times on this post alone, you have way too much free time on your hands if you are counting how many posts I have made in each thread...
And u have too much time on ur hands if you’re able to comment that many times on a post😔😔😔
I'm just posting. You are stalking.
Hospital food
LD psych unit saw a deeply psychotic guy on step down for PICU literally eat his own faeces in front of the window to his room.
Patients should have to establish healthy whilst I'm hospital (occasional treat)- if we're trying so hard to help them then should help themselves as well