Dear patients...

[trailerparkmedic]

Cocaine is totally a cause of chest pain, heart attacks, and heart disease. One of my patients induced a heart attack when he ate several crack rocks so he wouldn't get arrested. In the words of one of my favorite doctors: "He failed his crack stress test."

Can't say anyone has tried to pay me in cocaine. I should ask the EMTs/paramedics if that has ever happened to them.

[mhkohne]

People like these are among the numerous reasons I thought it best to steer clear of nursing when looking for a new career ... (I do realize that not all patients are like these, by the way ...)

I am always amazed that health-care workers can cope as well as they can with the parade of humanity they see daily.

I work for a company that makes EEG equipment, so I get to hear a bit from the field. Given what the staff puts up with on a daily basis, I'm pretty surprised they don't get out the torches and pitchforks when we do an install sometimes. I mean they like better care for the patients, but one more piece of equipment to learn about and deal with is NOT what anyone in a hospital really wants.

[Pixilated]

People like these are among the numerous reasons I thought it best to steer clear of nursing when looking for a new career ... (I do realize that not all patients are like these, by the way ...)

I am always amazed that health-care workers can cope as well as they can with the parade of humanity they see daily.

[Draper Mel]

1) Isn't cocaine sometimes a cause of chest pain?

2) So how does this guy eat at home? Does someone feed his perfectly capable adult self? Demanding that a nurse feed you just forfeits any shred of dignity you might have had. And now you've pissed off your nurse. Have fun when you need that catheter.

8) I bet that guy cries when he stubs his toe. Those guys are always big sissies.

[EvilEmpryss]

The insult and the poop emergency are the best!

[Metody]

Dear patients,

Cocaine is not an acceptable treatment for chest pain.

--Metody


Dear patients,

'You feed me. I don't feed myself' is not the same as 'I can't feed myself'. 'I don't use forks' is not the same as 'I can't hold a fork.' One of these will get you an aide to feed you, the other will get you a packet of hand wipes so you can clean up after you feed yourself with your fingers. Like a child. Because you don't want to feed yourself, and think you're punishing me by doing this.

--Metody


Dear patients,

If you stop taking your antipsychotic medication for a week, don't catch up by taking seven day's worth at once. You will go crazy, but in a new and unexpected direction. And then you'll have a heart attack, and then you'll end up on my floor.

--Metody




Dear patients,

If you are going to bite me, try to still have teeth. I will feel bad for laughing at you, but only later, and just a little.

--Metody





Dear patients,

If you are going to insult me, make sure you know what the insults mean. Calling me a 'cock-sucking dyke' is just going to make the aide ask you if you're sure you know what a dyke is. Later, we will all gather around at the nurse's station and have a jolly laugh at you.

--Metody


Dear doctors,

Don't tell me I'm the best nurse because I always do what I'm told. That makes me way more likely to start saying no.

--Metody


Dear patient,

It's true, I did say I needed a urine sample. I wish you'd used the little covered cup I gave you instead of your coffee mug.

--Metody


Dear family member,

I'd be way more likely to let you stick around while I did the dressing change if you hadn't just called your brother a pussy for wanting painkillers before I start poking at his one day old amputation stump, you utter failure of a human being.

--Metody


Dear other family member of another patient,

If you ever run out of a room screaming, 'Help, help, he needs help, please, oh, God, help!' there better be blood on the walls and guts on the floor, not diarrhea in the bed. This is a hospital. Poop is not an emergency here.

--Metody