Funniest Chief Complaints

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When I was on consult psych we got consulted on a patient who wouldn't eat his hospital meals.

This was a young guy who told us he liked to smoke marijuana almost daily when he could afford it, and who only liked to eat things such as fruit loops, pixy stix, and the like. No SI, HI, AVH, euthymic, goal oriented, logical, all that good stuff. He said he didn't like the hospital food and that his girlfriend was bringing him his favorite snacks. The attending left a note and we signed off on him.

A week later, we were reconsulted. Same reason. Nothing had changed with him.

I WAS PUZZLED.

Originally Posted by Slevin

CC: When I was little my mom had me hold the metal prongs and plug in the vacuum cleaner. Do you think this could have caused an artery to pop off of my heart?

lol wut

CC: "a cow trampled my girlfriend."

what really happened - the DD accompanying the unfortunate victim said victim went too far into a field to take a whiz, and kicked the newborn calf.

Originally Posted by CharleyVCU1988

CC: "a cow trampled my girlfriend."

what really happened - the DD accompanying the unfortunate victim said victim went too far into a field to take a whiz, and kicked the newborn calf.

Was the calf OK?

Never heard about the calf - me and the rest of the team went a little haywire trying to suppress guffaws and thinking about our next move.

Originally Posted by CharleyVCU1988

Never heard about the calf - me and the rest of the team went a little haywire trying to suppress guffaws and thinking about our next move.

LOL, I'm sure! Poor little newborn baby calf, though!

Originally Posted by lacrosse87

Holy crap

"I'm gonna be honest with you. I did a lot of coke with this girl the other night, And there's a shampoo bottle in my rectum" ... W. t. F.

Originally Posted by olemissbabydoc

"I'm gonna be honest with you. I did a lot of coke with this girl the other night, And there's a shampoo bottle in my rectum" ... W. t. F.

Mad props to the guy for keeping it real.

Fact.

Not exactly a chief complaint (well not for the team I was with anyway), I'm just after finishing a rotation with the HIV and Infectious diseases teams in a hospital with a large proportion of IV drug users living in the area. This guy was admitted with PCP due to his not taking his ART (15 year history of HIV).

We referred him to psych because he said he's not eating any food prepared in this hospital building (large hospital campus spread over 8-10 buildings) because there are HIV patients in this hospital, we were tempted to stick a mirror in front of him....

"some cracka shot me in the balls!"

Just wanted to say, as a creeping premed lurker, awesome thread Keep it coming!

Best one I heard was on family rotation: "My pee be sticky... ya know sticky like liquor."

CC: "Wound that don't heal right"

CC: "Disequilibriated" (Denied dizziness, light headedness, nausea, etc...)

Sodium level: 101

CC: "We found some mushrooms growing in our yard, so I cooked them and now me and my husband are sick"

Not funny but bizarre.

CC: "Ear ache, hearing loss" ~8 y/o child. Third world country.

Light shined into the ear canal via otoscope returned and would nearly blind you. It was almost like there was a mirror in his ear. Took us forever to figure out what to do. What if it's literally a broken shard of mirror - there's no pulling it out without destroying the kid's ear canal. We're in a third world country so there was nothing to do but either lev it or try to remove it.

Eventually probed at it with a loop tool (long thin plastic tool with an angled loop on the end - no idea what it's called) to reposition it. Otoscope brought back out - still shiny but now looks stainless steel and curvy... a bullet? Seriously?

Nearby oral maxillofacial surgeon on a mission trip came by and brought his tool kit. Some local anesthetic and an hour later we pulled a watch battery out of this kid's ear.

Mother had no idea how it got there. Child claimed no knowledge of it. Older brothers looked nervous as hell through the entire ordeal. Left mom to sort it out.

CC: "I need a ****ing blanket." [pt sprawed on the floor vomiting profusely into a trash can]

No biggie. When we run out of styrofoam cups during night shift at my hospital, and I'm desperate for some caffeine, I'll resort to drinking tea from an (unused) urine specimen cup.

CC: "Found in an hotel room naked with an empty spoon."

- Written on the chart as quoted by paramedics

Originally Posted by daddycat

CC: "Found in an hotel room naked with an empty spoon."

- Written on the chart as quoted by paramedics

Am I the only one wondering where that spoon was?

Me: So, Ms. Smith you came in tonight because your "snatch be itchin'"?

Originally Posted by mmmcdowe

Am I the only one wondering where that spoon was?

As amusing as "misplaced" spoons may be, generally, in this context, spoons are a sign of drug overdose...

Originally Posted by VenusinFurs

When I was on consult psych we got consulted on a patient who wouldn't eat his hospital meals.

Reminds me of what was certainly the weirdest chief complaint I've ever seen, which was "I can't eat." This got him admitted to the hospital, but it turns out to be more subtle and complicated than that.

Me: "So, is the problem that you have no appetite?"
Him: "No no, I'm starving."
Me: "Does it hurt when you eat?"
Him: "Probably not. It never used to. But I don't know about now, because I can't eat."
Me: "What do you mean? You can't chew? You can't swallow?"
Him: "I don't know. I don't get that far."
Me: "You don't have food at home?"
Him: "I have lots of food. I just can't eat it."
Me: "Do you want to eat?"
Him: "I'm desperate to eat."
At this point I needed a demonstration. I got a meal delivered to him.

Me: "Okay, let me see you eat that."
Him: "I can't."
Me: "Why?"
Him: "I can't eat."
Me: "Pick up the fork."
Him: "Okay." (he does)
Me: "Get some mashed potatoes on the fork."
Him: "Okay." (he does)
Me: "Bring the fork up to your mouth."
Him: "Okay." (he does)
Me: "Put it in your mouth."
Him: "Can't."
Me: "WHY?"
Him: "I can't eat."

He subsequently demonstrated that he could put an empty fork in his mouth, just not one that had food on it.

This did, in fact, generate a psych consult.

...yikes

"Last time I was here I had sepsis... I think I'm getting that again."

(he was septic)

Originally Posted by Depakote

"Last time I was here I had sepsis... I think I'm getting that again."

(he was septic)

Pt comes to ED for knee pain. When I asked about history, he said he had gout attacks 2 times before, this is exactly the same, and wanted to get the knee tapped cause that's what he had done before. I love it when Pt's know the diagnosis and the treatment. The attending joked knee tapping is now the new treatment for gout in the Bronx.

Cc: I was but by a crackhead. I work in Newark nj anything is possible

CC: chest pain

ROS + for "my butt hurts because I put a pipe bomb in my anus."

xray shows pipe bomb lodged in pts rectum, bomb squad called, half of hospital shut-down.. schizophrenia wtf?

Originally Posted by Natatiap

Cc: I was but by a crackhead. I work in Newark nj anything is possible

Aww that's like a little poem

Originally Posted by sacrament

Reminds me of what was certainly the weirdest chief complaint I've ever seen, which was "I can't eat." This got him admitted to the hospital, but it turns out to be more subtle and complicated than that.

Me: "So, is the problem that you have no appetite?"
Him: "No no, I'm starving."
Me: "Does it hurt when you eat?"
Him: "Probably not. It never used to. But I don't know about now, because I can't eat."
Me: "What do you mean? You can't chew? You can't swallow?"
Him: "I don't know. I don't get that far."
Me: "You don't have food at home?"
Him: "I have lots of food. I just can't eat it."
Me: "Do you want to eat?"
Him: "I'm desperate to eat."
At this point I needed a demonstration. I got a meal delivered to him.

Me: "Okay, let me see you eat that."
Him: "I can't."
Me: "Why?"
Him: "I can't eat."
Me: "Pick up the fork."
Him: "Okay." (he does)
Me: "Get some mashed potatoes on the fork."
Him: "Okay." (he does)
Me: "Bring the fork up to your mouth."
Him: "Okay." (he does)
Me: "Put it in your mouth."
Him: "Can't."
Me: "WHY?"
Him: "I can't eat."

He subsequently demonstrated that he could put an empty fork in his mouth, just not one that had food on it.

This did, in fact, generate a psych consult.

I just had an office patient with this complaint. He was terrified of choking and even wasn't sleeping, afraid he'd choke on his spit and die in the night. He's always had some OCD but it had gotten out of hand and now included this swallowing issue. He had lost 30 pounds in 6 weeks. There isn't a whole lot I could do, just set up a psych visit, but with Medicaid, the options are slim.

Originally Posted by coldweatherblue

CC: chest pain

ROS + for "my butt hurts because I put a pipe bomb in my anus."

xray shows pipe bomb lodged in pts rectum, bomb squad called, half of hospital shut-down.. schizophrenia wtf?

Originally Posted by Roguelyn

I just had an office patient with this complaint. He was terrified of choking and even wasn't sleeping, afraid he'd choke on his spit and die in the night. He's always had some OCD but it had gotten out of hand and now included this swallowing issue. He had lost 30 pounds in 6 weeks. There isn't a whole lot I could do, just set up a psych visit, but with Medicaid, the options are slim.

That's interesting. It's been a long time, but I don't recall my patient actually being afraid to eat, just that psychologically he couldn't make himself.

Originally Posted by Sureshot83

I hope the TV writers of "House" stumble across this thread. Watching House get some of these cases in the hospital clinic would be absolutely hilarious.

Originally Posted by Tic

Along the same lines, we had a guy admitted for like his 12th asthma exacerbation this year. Turns out he was using his inhaler like I use my cologne, spraying it in the air and walking into it.

We had another guy come into the ED for a 3-day history of hiccup. Well, his CBC was all jacked up, and long story short he was in CML blast crisis. the hiccups were totally coincidental as far as we could tell. Anyway, this doesn't totally fit into the theme of the thread, just thought I'd share. Imagine going to see someone about your hiccups and finding out you have less than 2 months to live .

There was an episode of House where an old female patient comes in and complains how her inhaler isn't working. She was spraying the inhaler in the same fashion you described. Of course, House ridicules the woman. So I guess the writers do troll around these threads. A lot of their early cases were modified cases from NEJM.

@ 0:21 Seconds.

Chuckled when I saw this today:

CC: "I have poop in my stool."

A few of the top of my head: (Caveat: I work in an ED)

"Need to talk"
"I poop once a day on the hour"
"It's too hot outside"

And the last one is a triage note: "Pt was having dinner, steak with a side of cocaine, when he experience chest pain" I lost it..

CC: decreased libido

Me: So you feel like you have decreased sex drive?
Patient: Yeah I just don't feel the same and my gf is upset that we're having less sex
Me: How much less?
Patient: I used to be able to go 8x/night... now I can only go 6x

Sat speechless for a minute while I overcame my envy and tried to put on a show of compassion and sympathy.

CC: Sometimes, I get mad at myself, cuz people are just saying things and talking, and then I have to hit me. Can I have another Sprite?

Originally Posted by Crajee

These posts are truly precious! :')

Not a CC (difference between a Yank and a Brit, I guess... we say 'Presenting Complaint' instead of chief complaint and I got completely and utterly confused by this thread title, thinking it was the funniest complaints chiefs made about medical care... 'Chief' of course, being somewhere between a resident and an attending, in my head... um, don't ask! Still trying to get my head around the American system! ) - but something hilarious on the wards all the same:

So we're taking a Hx from a darling, demented old lady, and whilst doing the AMT, we asked her if she could tell us the name of the Queen. So she looks at us calmly, pausing for effect for a second and then declares in a soft-yet-confident voice: "Tennis"

It was all my hospital partner and I could do to not laugh out loud, Lord bless her. :')

During rounds we were trying to assess the mental status of a patient whom we were concerned might be developing hepatic encephalopathy.

Q: Who is the president?

A: (mumbled) oh, he's that black hero, says he's gonna save us all.

Got a good complaint today:

"I am sick to my core, and can feel it in my bones at this point, of people like you and American patients are sick of your type of attitude too. I represent and am seen often as a mediator because I am good and ethical doctor who care about my patients' lives. Go into something else quickly because your attitude is not welcome. You have no charity of spirit and do not belong in medicine, you ungrateful brat."

Originally Posted by GuyWhoDoesStuff

Got a good complaint today:

"I am sick to my core, and can feel it in my bones at this point, of people like you and American patients are sick of your type of attitude too. I represent and am seen often as a mediator because I am good and ethical doctor who care about my patients' lives. Go into something else quickly because your attitude is not welcome. You have no charity of spirit and do not belong in medicine, you ungrateful brat."

Originally Posted by GuyWhoDoesStuff

Got a good complaint today:

"I am sick to my core, and can feel it in my bones at this point, of people like you and American patients are sick of your type of attitude too. I represent and am seen often as a mediator because I am good and ethical doctor who care about my patients' lives. Go into something else quickly because your attitude is not welcome. You have no charity of spirit and do not belong in medicine, you ungrateful brat."

Haha, I see what you did
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/show...=599536&page=2
I actually though it was a patient until I saw that, now it's even funnier

Originally Posted by CharleyVCU1988

CC: "a cow trampled my girlfriend."

what really happened - the DD accompanying the unfortunate victim said victim went too far into a field to take a whiz, and kicked the newborn calf.

Bovine related injuries are no joke!

Originally Posted by Disinence2

Bovine related injuries are no joke!

Last Saturday evening in the ED... Pig bite.

If bovine are not to be messed with, porcine are even worse!

dsoz

CC: "I have trouble breathing after I smoke a cigarette"

Originally Posted by dsoz

Last Saturday evening in the ED... Pig bite.

If bovine are not to be messed with, porcine are even worse!

dsoz

I have had my left hand bitten all to hell when I foolishly seized a feral kitten by the scruff of her neck with my right hand.

That feral kitten is now the kitty in my icon, and she's the sweetest, tamest, most darling cat you can imagine.

But... yeah. Kittens may look harmless, but seriously, under the right (or wrong!) circumstances, they're little tornados with teeth and claws!

...

Cat bites are baaaad.

Originally Posted by VenusinFurs

Cat bites are baaaad.

They certainly can be; I've never actually had a problem with one, and I've been bitten by many cats in my day. I generally keep Neosporin and a Band-Aid on them, and they're fine.

I know a vet who got bitten really badly and had to go on IV antibiotics!