interns...the things they do and ask

[bivwack]

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So I am now a PGY-II, work in a busy iner-city IM program and get to run my own team of interns, SubI-I's and students. I am the first to admit as an an intern I was as inept as anyone and may have done some questionable things and asked some painfully obvious questions to my resident...hell, we are all learning right?
Anyway, just finished a floor month with a intern who.....

while at a nursing station the 6th floor i explain that Mr. Pt had X and Y just happen, please go tho the 8th floor and do A, B then C. After several seconds the intern then nods with a blank look on her face and says 'OK .........how do I get to the 8th floor?

or

on day 3 of said interns rotation I was shown a pager and asked " this thing keeps going off what should I do"

I am pretty laid back, do my best to teach and not to scold, which is probably why this particular inter was assigned to my team. She has a good knowledge base and clinical intuition but , OMFG realy?

anyone else have anything else to add, i need to laugh to keep from crying

 

[RussianJoo]

hahha thanks for the laugh early this morning... is she an FMG? maybe they don't have pagers in her country. Also maybe she just ment where are the stair located, not how would one get to the 8th floor when they can't fly.

but thanks really funny stuff.

 

[drfunktacular]

My God... I hope none of my upper-levels post any of my multitude of asinine questions...

 

[iMD]

set the bar low and your superiors will be delighted when you simply complete a task.

but that pager comment had me rollin'

 

[SoCuteMD]

while at a nursing station the 6th floor i explain that Mr. Pt had X and Y just happen, please go tho the 8th floor and do A, B then C. After several seconds the intern then nods with a blank look on her face and says 'OK .........how do I get to the 8th floor?

I'm sure you think that's a pretty odd question, and it is if the hospital is straight up and down. The hospital I work at has 3 or 4 different wings, however, and I've yet to determine exactly how to connect, except that while standing in the "South" wing I have to walk through the "East" wing to get to the "West" wing. That makes a LOT of sense.

 

[michaelrack]

I'm sure you think that's a pretty odd question, and it is if the hospital is straight up and down. The hospital I work at has 3 or 4 different wings, however, and I've yet to determine exactly how to connect, except that while standing in the "South" wing I have to walk through the "East" wing to get to the "West" wing. That makes a LOT of sense.

At the hospital I did my fellowship at, the 8th floor was the top floor, and only occupied 1 wing of the hospital. Only a few of the many elevators went to the 8th floor. The 8th floor had psychiatry offices, some used for outpt visits, and new patients often had trouble finding it.

 

[Tigerz_Fan]

I can understand getting lost in the hospital, but the pager question did give me a good laugh.

The worst question I was ever asked by one of my interns was how to write an order for aspirin in the chart. And this was after 3 months on different floor teams.

Otherwise, usually the questions are pretty standard and I am sure I had some dumb ones myself!

 

[Khaos]

I had a nurse come up to me one night and ask to clarify an order. The intern had ordered a potassium of 2.7 (stable patient) to be replaced with 40meq KCL IV push x 2.

This is the same intern that 2 days into the month told me that lisinopril is a diuretic and needs to be held (along with the real diuretic) if a CHF patient is losing too much weight. I should've known then...

Another one just for common sense so you aren't paged all night long. This intern had gone up to a nurse that she had been working with all month long and addressed her as nurse and told her to do something for a patient. The nurse looked at her and said, after a month you don't even know my name. "I don't need to know your name, I just need you to do this" was the interns answer. The nurse looked at her and said "and I don't NEED to do this" and walked away.

All from the same intern. I do have other stories but that can be for another time.