What's the craziest thing a nurse has asked you while working hospital?

[Sparda29]

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Since I can no longer contribute to the retail thread since I am no longer in retail, here's a thread for all ye hospital peoples.

I'll start off with this one:

A nurse called us and asked us if she could use Windex to sanitize a port on an IV bag since she ran out of alcohol swabs. 😕

 

[Its Z]

I couldn't divulge that information.

 

[Praziquantel86]

From a CCU nurse over the phone:

Her: Where's my Vitamin K!? The patient's INR is over 4!
Me: I dropped it off myself about 3 hours ago, put it right in the patient's drawer.
Her: You're lying! The only thing that's in this drawer is this phytonadione that's been here all day!
Me: ...

The sad thing is, she'd been working there for about 15 years, and I don't think we've ever called Vitamin K anything else.

Honestly though, RNs are overall pretty good. There are a few bad examples that give the rest a bad rap, but its the same with any profession. It's the CNAs and LPNs who pretend they're RNs that I worry about.

 

[Sparda29]

From a CCU nurse over the phone:

Her: Where's my Vitamin K!? The patient's INR is over 4!
Me: I dropped it off myself about 3 hours ago, put it right in the patient's drawer.
Her: You're lying! The only thing that's in this drawer is this phytonadione that's been here all day!
Me: ...

The sad thing is, she'd been working there for about 15 years, and I don't think we've ever called Vitamin K anything else.

Honestly though, RNs are overall pretty good. There are a few bad examples that give the rest a bad rap, but its the same with any profession. It's the CNAs and LPNs who pretend they're RNs that I worry about.

At the hospital I'm at, the main problem is that the nurses and PCAs don't like looking for anything. We send up a STAT antibiotic order, put it in the refrigerator inside medication room, then 3 hours later we get a call that the order is missing.

Our pharmacy messenger starts yelling at them that they need to look around the medication room better.

 

[pharmwannebe2]

thread name stealer!!!!

 

[TemSirolimus]

This thread is pathetic.

It is easy for you guys to take cheap shots at nurses who have had a semester, or two if they are lucky of pharmacology. I know its always humor at everybody else's expense, but c'mon...jus sayin"

 

[Quiksilver]

This thread is pathetic.

It is easy for you guys to take cheap shots at nurses who have had a semester, or two if they are lucky of pharmacology. I know its always humor at everybody else's expense, but c'mon...jus sayin"

wow. way to be a total buzz kill.

 

[owlegrad]

This thread is pathetic.

It is easy for you guys to take cheap shots at nurses who have had a semester, or two if they are lucky of pharmacology. I know its always humor at everybody else's expense, but c'mon...jus sayin"

Lighten up. You think nurses don't complain about pharmacy people?

I find it hilarious when I deliver insulin only to get a call 2 hours later for the same insulin. Really? It got up and walked away? Better double-check, eh? Black hole claimed another victim?

Nurses have a tough job (I wouldn't want it), but it's not unreasonable to have a little harmless fun at their expense on these boards.

 

[Sparda29]

Hey, I hear them all the time bitching to each other about how the pharmacy takes forever to send up orders. I think we can get some payback.

Also, I was doing a tracer today on hand washing hygiene throughout the hospital. Surprisingly, the best performers were the janitors. The worst performers were the nurses and the nursing aides.

 

[daabc]

Hey, I hear them all the time bitching to each other about how the pharmacy takes forever to send up orders. I think we can get some payback.

Also, I was doing a tracer today on hand washing hygiene throughout the hospital. Surprisingly, the best performers were the janitors. The worst performers were the nurses and the nursing aides.

Well if you were a janitor that has to clean the mess in a hospital, would't you want to wash your hand until it bleeds?

 

[UBCmicrobi]

Well if you were a janitor that has to clean the mess in a hospital, would't you want to wash your hand until it bleeds?

true true!

 

[StevePerry]

I couldn't divulge that information.

LMAO! So true, I hear ya there brother...

 

[pharmdout]

Lighten up. You think nurses don't complain about pharmacy people?

I find it hilarious when I deliver insulin only to get a call 2 hours later for the same insulin. Really? It got up and walked away? Better double-check, eh? Black hole claimed another victim?

Nurses have a tough job (I wouldn't want it), but it's not unreasonable to have a little harmless fun at their expense on these boards.

As a nurse going in pharmacy school, you wouldn't believe how so much you have to do and remember at any given point and looking for a drug could be the biggest time drain while you have one patient going crazy and pulling stuff all over the place, the other having respiratory problems, one developing an irregular heart rhythmn and some family member complaining about their water pitcher not getting filled...on top of that looking for that antibiotic that is 30 minutes due that you scanned 1 hour ago can make you wanna pull your hair out...so take it easy on us haha! but seriously we all should work together and I believe we should concentrate on the real enemy, those pesky MD's...j/k

 

[owlegrad]

As a nurse going in pharmacy school, you wouldn't believe how so much you have to do and remember at any given point and looking for a drug could be the biggest time drain while you have one patient going crazy and pulling stuff all over the place, the other having respiratory problems, one developing an irregular heart rhythmn and some family member complaining about their water pitcher not getting filled...on top of that looking for that antibiotic that is 30 minutes due that you scanned 1 hour ago can make you wanna pull your hair out...so take it easy on us haha! but seriously we all should work together and I believe we should concentrate on the real enemy, those pesky MD's...j/k

😆

Yeah nurses have it tough. No joke. I wouldn't want that job at all. Still a little harmless fun never hurt anyone. 😉

 

[therxist]

From a CCU nurse over the phone:

Her: Where's my Vitamin K!? The patient's INR is over 4!
Me: I dropped it off myself about 3 hours ago, put it right in the patient's drawer.
Her: You're lying! The only thing that's in this drawer is this phytonadione that's been here all day!
Me: ...

The sad thing is, she'd been working there for about 15 years, and I don't think we've ever called Vitamin K anything else.

Honestly though, RNs are overall pretty good. There are a few bad examples that give the rest a bad rap, but its the same with any profession. It's the CNAs and LPNs who pretend they're RNs that I worry about.

Haha so funny. Your story reminded me of my 1st inpatient rotation. RN called and demanded to talk to the pharmacist (not tech) because pharmacy messed up her Xanax order and sent this goddamn alprazolam.

While I've never heard anything crazy from RN myself, I hate receiving faxed order from this nursing home that my pharmacy is serving. The RN's there often make mistake transcribing original MD order to their own order form (thanks God, they do include the original order in the fax). Hydrocodone/APAP 5/325 got transcribed to Vicodin 5/500. The sig for a pain med dosing scale (1 tab mild, 2 tabs moderate, etc) was simply written 1 tab PRN pain. Microbid get changed to Microdantin. Seriously, how hard is it to copy things from one page to another??

 

[kvl1027]

From a CCU nurse over the phone:

Her: Where's my Vitamin K!? The patient's INR is over 4!
Me: I dropped it off myself about 3 hours ago, put it right in the patient's drawer.
Her: You're lying! The only thing that's in this drawer is this phytonadione that's been here all day!
Me: ...

The sad thing is, she'd been working there for about 15 years, and I don't think we've ever called Vitamin K anything else.

Honestly though, RNs are overall pretty good. There are a few bad examples that give the rest a bad rap, but its the same with any profession. It's the CNAs and LPNs who pretend they're RNs that I worry about.

The real question here is why are you doing a Vit-K reversal for an INR just over 4? Silly Students

 

[All4MyDaughter]

The real question here is why are you doing a Vit-K reversal for an INR just over 4? Silly Students

Active bleed or high risk for bleed. And you've been out of school how long? 3 or 4 months? You weren't a student that long ago...

 

[Praziquantel86]

The real question here is why are you doing a Vit-K reversal for an INR just over 4? Silly Students

Surgery.

 

[FruitFly]

Hey, I hear them all the time bitching to each other about how the pharmacy takes forever to send up orders. I think we can get some payback.

Also, I was doing a tracer today on hand washing hygiene throughout the hospital. Surprisingly, the best performers were the janitors. The worst performers were the nurses and the nursing aides.

I wouldn't be surprised if they were the cleanest in the hospital.

 

[kvl1027]

Active bleed or high risk for bleed. And you've been out of school how long? 3 or 4 months? You weren't a student that long ago...

My point was not they it would never be warranted with an INR of 4, but that it should be one of the first thoughts before sending a dose of Vit-K up to the floor. How many patients do you see who are at a high risk of bleeding being given warfarin? Warfarin is contraindicated in patient with extremely high bleeding risk. Docs, especially the residents, are always wanting to bring down, mediocrely high INR with Vit-K, when holding a dose for day will likely do the trick. Is an INR of 4 really that high, especially considering that in some cases the goal range is 2.5-3.5.

While most surgeons would not perform a procedure on a patient with an INR of 4, typically they would postpone the surgery if possible and hold the dose of warfarin until the INR was in a safe range. There are some major problems with just giving vit-K to bring down someones INR. The biggest probably being the amount of time it may take to get the patient therapeutic again. During my trauma rotation I rounded daily on the surgical critical care service and I never saw a surgeon do a Vit-K reversal for a surgery with an INR less that 5-6, they would always just postpone the surgery and hold the coumadin.

 

[HaloKing]

How many patients do you see who are at a high risk of bleeding being given warfarin?

a pt on warfarin with co-morbidities... NO!! you mean like A Fib? (where risk is increased with age).. Black box bleeding warning: > 65, renal impairment, serious heart disease, HTN, etc..

i rarely see warfarin prescribed for a pt with a low risk of bleeding.. haha. just saying...

 

[spacecowgirl]

Microbid get changed to Microdantin.

Nitrofurantoin and nursing home? Shudder.

The real question here is why are you doing a Vit-K reversal for an INR just over 4? Silly Students

For the same reason you warfarin load post-op, duh.

 

[J ROD]

Got a request for some pink bullets......

Can anyone guess what the hell the nurse was asking for?

that was actually written on the request form and sent down to the pharmacy...I had to call to verify what the hell she wanted....

 

[njac]

Got a request for some pink bullets......

Can anyone guess what the hell the nurse was asking for?

that was actually written on the request form and sent down to the pharmacy...I had to call to verify what the hell she wanted....

The saline thingers - they called them "chiles" at one hospital I worked at. I think they're mostly used by respiratory.

 

[delano2000]

Brought up a TPN to one of the floors.

Nurse: (already had an attitude, don't know why) "Put it in the refrigerator."
Me: "Sure." (Goes to med room and place TPN in the refrigerator)

35 mins later I was back on that floor...

Nurse: "Where the hell did you put my TPN?"
Me: "Where did you ask me to put it?"
Nurse: "In the refrigerator!"
Me: "Then that's where I put it."🙄

I like most of the nurses at my hospital though.🙂

 

[J ROD]

The saline thingers - they called them "chiles" at one hospital I worked at. I think they're mostly used by respiratory.

you are correct! 🙂

 

[daabc]

The saline thingers - they called them "chiles" at one hospital I worked at. I think they're mostly used by respiratory.

So would you put some real chiles in a bottle and hand it to the nurse to see her reaction? She did ask for chiles...😉

 

[psychoandy]

Chiles? I thought those were called the pink swedish fish or something?

My sole job is answering the phones and making sure that, logistically, everything runs somewhat smoothly, so I get a lot of crazy calls. From missing meds, actual drug info questions, IV compatibility, discrepancies, etc, I handle it all...but I've never had anyone ask me if they could windex an IV port.

I do, however, get a lot of calls for missing med requests literally hours AFTER it was supposed to be given; not only that, but in the chart it's also marked off as administered. Drives me up the wall, millions of dollars and manpower spent on having an electronic MAR, only to have a bunch of RNs mark things incorrectly as "given" because they're afraid their manager is gonna see that they're late OMG, which is clearly worse than documenting lies on someone's chart...but I digress.

As far as the craziest thing an RN has ever asked me for (and this has happened many times), it has to be the M&M enema. I suppose some pharmacies might prepare this, but at my lovely workplace it falls under the realm of nutrition.

 

[Carboxide]

Chiles? I thought those were called the pink swedish fish or something?

My sole job is answering the phones and making sure that, logistically, everything runs somewhat smoothly, so I get a lot of crazy calls. From missing meds, actual drug info questions, IV compatibility, discrepancies, etc, I handle it all...but I've never had anyone ask me if they could windex an IV port.

I do, however, get a lot of calls for missing med requests literally hours AFTER it was supposed to be given; not only that, but in the chart it's also marked off as administered. Drives me up the wall, millions of dollars and manpower spent on having an electronic MAR, only to have a bunch of RNs mark things incorrectly as "given" because they're afraid their manager is gonna see that they're late OMG, which is clearly worse than documenting lies on someone's chart...but I digress.

😱 Wouldn't that be a serious issue, if they were caught "re"-administering a drug hours after it had been "given", or doctoring the chart? WTF? That's appalling.