The stupidest thing a nurse has ever paged you for...

[Dr JPH]

My boy, you haven't figured out the gang-pages? Where they page everybody at once? I remember as a wee med student, card-rounding in the morning with the team, and every resident's pagers went off within 30 seconds. Yeah, that nurse got yelled at. Don't pull that with surgery residents.

Ever gotten the "Never mind" pages? Don't let them get away with that. You paged me, I stopped what i was doing to call you back. Now, you're going to tell me why you paged. Don't care if "someone already called back." It's my patient and you paged me. Once they have to repeat everything twice, you magically stop getting gang-banged. I mean paged.

I will do that next time.

I did something last week that I was proud of as well.

I was returning a page about a medication clarification. I asked a simple question that should have been one of those "top of your head" things, but even if it wasnt having the chart or Med Card handy would have been sufficient to get the information I inquired about.

Anyway, I got the "I dont know I dont have the chart with me...can you hold on?"

I said "I would appreciate if, in the future, when you page me you have the patients info in front of you...otherwise I may not be able to answer your question. I will address this later this morning on rounds."

Now, it probably didnt sound that nice...I was postcall PLUS Im pretty much an dingus anyway. But I think my point got across.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Dr JPH]

It's totally ass-backwards.

Agreed, but I think you mean bass-ackwards.

 

[snoopy brown]

My boy, you haven't figured out the gang-pages? Where they page everybody at once? I remember as a wee med student, card-rounding in the morning with the team, and every resident's pagers went off within 30 seconds.

When that happens, we usually call back and the first question is why we all were paged. If the answer isn't that someone is dying or dead, then we deliberately start wasting the nurses time by lecturing her on paging etiquette and then right when she's about to get to ask her question we pass the phone to the next person and they start all over again. It's precious.

 

[Dr JPH]

When that happens, we usually call back and the first question is why we all were paged. If the answer isn't that someone is dying or dead, then we deliberately start wasting the nurses time by lecturing her on paging etiquette and then right when she's about to get to ask her question we pass the phone to the next person and they start all over again. It's precious.

After I write a STAT order Im going to tell every nurse I see on that floor. If I get a "thats not my patient" Im going to say "yeah, well, it doesnt matter WHO does it as long as it gets done."

Afterall, thats their attitude with these gang-pages, right?

 

[snoopy brown]

Right on. How about when the nurse directly pages your attending or chief on purpose because they know it's going to get them angry at the interns? The best is that it backfires so often that almost nobody falls for it. Usually, the entire team will have been rounding for fifteen or twenty minutes and the chief will get a page that "the interns have been ignoring my pages!!" And everyone was sitting right there together. It's like they think they beat the system or something or have some ace up their sleeve.

 

[caroladybelle]

What I believe, assuming everyone is being truthful here, is that Clio and CarolLadyBelle are great nurses who don't recognize the pain that their bad coworkers inflict on us. Y'all won't ever get this as a nurse, because you will always have the luxury of just being friendly with lazy coworkers, since their work doesn't directly affect you. I don't get that luxury. I have to resort to hanging out with the charge nurse, negotiating which RN gets assigned to my patients,

Again, if you're really premed, you will look back someday on all your snide little comments towards us and realize how blind you were to what goes on in your hospitals.

Actually we do feel your pain, we have to work with those nurses regularly, and frrquently hate working with them also. And no, I personally stay away from the lazy ones...As agency I have to value my rep.

It also does affect us. We have deal daily with the fall out from their poor behavior. But also as agency, my feelings hold little sway over the PTB.

(Though it does mean, on my final days, I can say something about it and not worry about dealing with the fallout for too long. When a manager asks me why I didn't re-sign contract - I almost always do 2-3 contracts if I like a place- I do tell them, if it was heinous- one place in Philly had some of the rudest staffers, I have ever met)

I have no intention of premedding, NPing, CRNAing, or DNPing. I am a nurse, period. And they are not "our" hospitals, certainly. They increasingly are the purview of insurance companies, medicare/caid bureaucrats, and MBAs....that could care less about good medical/nursing care and more about paperwork and profits.

 

[fab4fan]

I dont think we need anymore cheerleading from our RNs guests

For the record, we're members, not "guests."

I've stayed silent for a while, but I am going to comment on this. As far as I know, this site is open for all members to comment. That includes members who happen to be nurses. I've asked for clarification on this, and to the best of my understanding, neither you nor anyone other than an admin. has the authority to tell another member to stop posting. And you may feel free to post at allnurses if you wish--no one's stopping you.

Remember a while back when I said there were docs I go out of my way for and others I don't? If you wonder why you're one of those docs who never seem to get help from the nursing staff, it may not necessarily be all about them.

ETA: Feel free to resume your "Woe is me..." posts.

 

[Dr JPH]

Actually we do feel your pain, we have to work with those nurses regularly, and frrquently hate working with them also. And no, I personally stay away from the lazy ones...As agency I have to value my rep.

It also does affect us. We have deal daily with the fall out from their poor behavior. But also as agency, my feelings hold little sway over the PTB.

(Though it does mean, on my final days, I can say something about it and not worry about dealing with the fallout for too long. When a manager asks me why I didn't re-sign contract - I almost always do 2-3 contracts if I like a place- I do tell them, if it was heinous- one place in Philly had some of the rudest staffers, I have ever met)

I have no intention of premedding, NPing, CRNAing, or DNPing. I am a nurse, period. And they are not "our" hospitals, certainly. They increasingly are the purview of insurance companies, medicare/caid bureaucrats, and MBAs....that could care less about good medical/nursing care and more about paperwork and profits.

Which place? You can PM me if you wish. I bet I have worked there!

 

[Clio]

I realize we're all getting lovey dovey in here, but I just wanted to add that this is the point. If a nurse has a "bad doctor" in charge of a patient and he's really messing things up, you may cringe but he's probably not going to be practicing for very long. If a doctor has just a few bad nurses, it's the end of the world. Because the nurses aren't going to get fired and I don't care what you say about you guys getting written up for wearing makeup. And meanwhile, what's going on?

Let me give you an analogy. A lot of nurses talk about how they have one or two "horrible" patients who keep bugging them every minute for everything. Even if most of your patients are average patients, just that one or two can make your life miserable. Now extrapolate that to the doctors where the nurses are the same way plus we also own the patient. Sure, I bet if I actually devoted all my time to it, I'd find that only a minority of nurses were bad and most average (I firmly repeat that I've only worked with two nurses that I actually felt were stellar), but guess what? It feels like it's the majority.

Point taken.

In my experience, really bad nurses do end up getting fired (or asked to resign). Above-average to "stellar" nurses end up burnt out carrying the load for those who are simply doing enough to get by.

As far as stupid pages go, I don't have to be paged with stupid questions--- these people are in my face the entire shift. And no, it isn't the majority of those I work with; it only takes a few to make my nights hell. When I tell them a page to the doc isn't necessary, and go to great pains to explain why it isn't necessary, they will often ignore me and do it anyway. So what am I supposed to do? Wrest the phone from their hands? When I bring it up to the unit manager, I'm made to be the bad guy for not "supporting" my staff.

If you have any suggestions on how to handle this, I'm all ears. It's distracting and aggravating for all involved.

 

[Dr JPH]

For the record, we're members, not "guests."

I've stayed silent for a while, but I am going to comment on this. As far as I know, this site is open for all members to comment. That includes members who happen to be nurses. I've asked for clarification on this, and to the best of my understanding, neither you nor anyone other than an admin. has the authority to tell another member to stop posting. And you may feel free to post at allnurses if you wish--no one's stopping you.

Remember a while back when I said there were docs I go out of my way for and others I don't? If you wonder why you're one of those docs who never seem to get help from the nursing staff, it may not necessarily be all about them.

I dont want to post on a nursing website. Im not a nurse.

 

[Dr JPH]

Point taken.

In my experience, really bad nurses do end up getting fired (or asked to resign). Above-average to "stellar" nurses end up burnt out carrying the load for those who are simply doing enough to get by.

As far as stupid pages go, I don't have to be paged with stupid questions--- these people are in my face the entire shift. And no, it isn't the majority of those I work with; it only takes a few to make my nights hell. When I tell them a page to the doc isn't necessary, and go to great pains to explain why it isn't necessary, they will often ignore me and do it anyway. So what am I supposed to do? Wrest the phone from their hands? When I bring it up to the unit manager, I'm made to be the bad guy for not "supporting" my staff.

If you have any suggestions on how to handle this, I'm all ears. It's distracting and aggravating for all involved.

Ive done a 180 on you. Youre OK in my book.

Wait...are you cute?

Ignore above 'change-of-heart' until you have answered.

 

[Noble Gas]

Right on. How about when the nurse directly pages your attending or chief on purpose because they know it's going to get them angry at the interns? The best is that it backfires so often that almost nobody falls for it. Usually, the entire team will have been rounding for fifteen or twenty minutes and the chief will get a page that "the interns have been ignoring my pages!!" And everyone was sitting right there together. It's like they think they beat the system or something or have some ace up their sleeve.

That's the BEST!!!! Just shows the attendings how they lie like a rug. I tell ya: there is always a computer record of pages. The nurses don't usually know this- i say it loud and say it proud. they can check it with the hospital operator if they doubt it. that usually makes them poop in their pants a little bit, when they find out they've been caught lying. "Really, you paged me six times? How odd, I've been in clinic with the attending for the past four hours. Let's check with the operator...maybe my pager isn't working."

 

[Dr JPH]

That's the BEST!!!! Just shows the attendings how they lie like a rug. I tell ya: there is always a computer record of pages. The nurses don't usually know this- i say it loud and say it proud. they can check it with the hospital operator if they doubt it. that usually makes them poop in their pants a little bit, when they find out they've been caught lying. "Really, you paged me six times? How odd, I've been in clinic with the attending for the past four hours. Let's check with the operator...maybe my pager isn't working."

Yeah the "Ive been paging all day but no one is answering" cracks me up.

 

[snoopy brown]

If you wonder why you're one of those docs who never seem to get help from the nursing staff, it may not necessarily be all about them.

First, I think you're misinterpreting what he said. I can understand that it stinks to have your profession criticized, especially because you seem to be competent. Nevertheless, you must feel that we are saying that you by extension also are horrible but this is not the case. I truly hate nurses that act like what I say, but I also truly respect nurses who perform their jobs (and admire the two nurses that I've met who were stellar). But again, the ones who act like how I say? I show more respect to the janitor (who does his job pretty well, actually) than to them.

I think he meant "guests" because this thread is in the "physicians" section of the forum. I don't think it was meant to imply you were "second-class" or anything, but whatever.

Lastly, I don't care if a nurse does "extra" to help me out. All she has to do is her job. That's all.

 

[deleted87716]

As far as I know, this site is open for all members to comment. That includes members who happen to be nurses.

Absolutely correct.

 

[Dr JPH]

First, I think you're misinterpreting what he said. I can understand that it stinks to have your profession criticized, especially because you seem to be competent. Nevertheless, you must feel that we are saying that you by extension also are horrible but this is not the case. I truly hate nurses that act like what I say, but I also truly respect nurses who perform their jobs (and admire the two nurses that I've met who were stellar). But again, the ones who act like how I say? I show more respect to the janitor (who does his job pretty well, actually) than to them.

I think he meant "guests" because this thread is in the "physicians" section of the forum. I don't think it was meant to imply you were "second-class" or anything, but whatever.

Lastly, I don't care if a nurse does "extra" to help me out. All she has to do is her job. That's all.

If the crappy ones did "extra" they would still hardly be doing their job

 

[Dr JPH]

Absolutely correct.

No one asked her to leave. She can post all she likes, but she is placing the entire thread off topic. Its hard enough to work all day with nurses making things difficult but now I have to try to wade through their posts here to get to the good stories.

I vote we put this thread back on topic!

 

[snoopy brown]

Yeah the "Ive been paging all day but no one is answering" cracks me up.

You know what's fun to do? When they say that, you apologize and then say, "gee, this sure must have been important if you were worried about it all day! What's going on?" 9/10 times you get this long pause like, "oohhhh, crap, I gotta come up with something good."

 

[Clio]

Ive done a 180 on you. Youre OK in my book.

Wait...are you cute?

Ignore above 'change-of-heart' until you have answered.

Yeah, I'm cute. Probably old enough to be your mom, but cute LOL.



Well, I'm going to take your verbal order to heart and get off of here. The boatload of laundry is finally done and I'm headed to bed.

Argue at you later!

*waves*

 

[Dr JPH]

You know what's fun to do? When they say that, you apologize and then say, "gee, this sure must have been important if you were worried about it all day! What's going on?" 9/10 times you get this long pause like, "oohhhh, crap, I gotta come up with something good."

I like it.

 

[Noble Gas]

Yeah the "Ive been paging all day but no one is answering" cracks me up.

yeah it's funny until the lawyer reads that BS. unbelievable what they write in the chart. clueless.

 

[snoopy brown]

Wait...are you cute?

Dude, a lot of the younger nurses smoke like fiends. You gotta check that, too.

Never mind if she's as old as our moms.

 

[Noble Gas]

Wait...are you cute?

Dude, a lot of the younger nurses smoke like fiends. You gotta check that, too.

at least the smokers are thin.

 

[fab4fan]

That's why I stayed out of it after a while. It was only after a comment by you and one other poster about getting the nurses to stop posting that I replied. I then said to go right back to your tales of woe.

God forbid we (nurses) were trying to add some perspective to why some of these misunderstandings take place. I'm sorry that derailed the intent of the thread.

Some day, you will be thankful for the nurse who goes out of her way for you when you're having a bad night. You can't do it all, believe it or not.

Anyway, resume the bashing. I'll respect your request to post no further.

No one asked her to leave. She can post all she likes, but she is placing the entire thread off topic. Its hard enough to work all day with nurses making things difficult but now I have to try to wade through their posts here to get to the good stories.

I vote we put this thread back on topic!

 

[Noble Gas]

but i can't...stop...posting...but this is the last one...and then i'll leave...

no really...this is it...

but i just had to say...

 

[Tired]

I'm on-call right now.

I have been paged three times in the last three hours on the same ICU patient with a ventric.

RN: "The ventric hasn't put anything out in the last hour!"

<I trot down to the ICU>

RN: "Oh, nevermind, it's dripping now."

Three times.

Either I did something to her, or I have the worst luck in the world. Either way I'm not going to see it again unless it puts out zero for four hours straight, which will conveniently coincide with the time the primary team comes in. If the ICPs stay below 20, I'm not doing anything.

 

[Clio]

I vote we put this thread back on topic!

Here's one for you. Not really a page, but I think it has that "whoa" factor (did for me):

Whenever you see a stupid rule or policy put into effect, it's because someone has done something stupid, and the hospital has to cover itself. For example, our dress code says all staff must wear underwear. You know that's because some idiot showed up one day without any.

Anyway, I come in and my manager hands me a paper to sign that I received a copy of the new administration policy forbidding us to give out any staff member's (personal) phone numbers. I thought, well of course we don't do so, common sense ya know... but silly me had to ask why was this all of a sudden such a big deal.

Seems one of the nurses on the previous night had a patient's family who were bugging her about some insignificant *whatever*. She didn't page the resident covering in house. She didn't page the PA or doc on call. Instead, at 2 am, she gave this family the neurosurgeon's home phone number. Not even his beeper or answering service number, but his home phone number. And he wasn't on call, either. This family called him directly at least three times during the night, even after he directed them not to as he wasn't on call. This doc was a bear on the best of days... I didn't even want to imagine what happened when he arrived on the floor that morning.

As you may have noticed, very few things leave me speechless, but this certainly did.

She did lose her job, btw.

 

[Clio]

<me, getting a 1hr mid-day-while-on-call-preemptive-sleep nap>

pager: *beep* only a number displayed.
me: *dialing*
nurse: DOCTOR G$! THIS IS NURSE X AND THE PATIENT IN ROOM 8A DOES NOT LIKE OUR FOOD!
me: um.
nurse: DOCTOR! she also says she rarely even eats red meat!
me: ok?
nurse: BUT DOCTOR! you wrote to discharge after lunch and patient doesn't want to eat the lunch we're offering!
me: um, i was loosely referring to "the lunch hour."
nurse: DOCTOR WHAT TIME IS IT OK TO DISCHARGE THE PATIENT THEN?!
me: when did i write the discharge orders?
nurse: 9am
me: and it's now 2:30pm?
nurse: yes but she's NOT LIKING OUR FOOD OR WANTING TO EAT LUNCH!
me: please discharge the patient. kthxbye.

(yes, there was much yelling on the part of the nurse; she is rather expressive. i was laughing too much at this page to be angry. i have a pretty high tolerance for stupid pages, as i'm sure i make more than my share of stupid f-ups that cause nursing to laugh, so it evens out. at least in my book.)

Reminds me of when one of our nurses ran up to me with her latest crisis, all out of breath, declaring that her (old, bedridden) patient was constipated... and whatever would she do????

I told her he had standing orders for dulcolax suppository, so go give it.

Some time later she comes back, hair all messed up, even more out of breath and starts bitching at me about those stupid orders 'cuz she thought she'd never get him to stand up.

I **** you not.

 

[deleted87716]

I told her he had standing orders for dulcolax suppository, so go give it.

Some time later she comes back, hair all messed up, even more out of breath and starts bitching at me about those stupid orders 'cuz she thought she'd never get him to stand up.

Oh. My. Gawd.

Be sure to tell her that analgesics can be given orally.

 

[Clio]

Oh. My. Gawd.

Be sure to tell her that analgesics can be given orally.

I don't mind making fun of her. She was probably one of the few truly Evil people I've known. Nasty to everyone.

One day she just didn't show up for work; her phone was disconnected and her house was vacant. That's the last we ever heard of her. I always figured the Devil had reclaimed her soul.

 

[Trifling Jester]

I had a little argument today with a nurse about Lantus. She wanted to get clarification from the attending about my 8am Lantus dose because, she says "Lantus is a QHS drug!"

I kindly tried to explain to her that Lantus is not a QHS drug but it can be given at any time of day...it just so happens that this particular hospital seems to prefer giving everyone their Lantus dose at 10pm.

At least you aren't getting paged about lantus on every patient in the hospital. Because they're NPO. And re-explaining the rational behind a basal insulin. Over... and over.... and over... for each and every patient who is NPO and on lantus on your service.

-The Trifling Jester

 

[snoopy brown]

I refuse to give explanations any more. It's not my job to educate the nursing staff. So when they ask me if I really want to give some med, implying that the answer is no, I just say, "yes, thanks for asking." If it's my job to educate the nurses, then they can organize a class and I'll teach it to them en masse and demand payment for it just like medical school.

 

[gutonc]

At least you aren't getting paged about lantus on every patient in the hospital. Because they're NPO. And re-explaining the rational behind a basal insulin. Over... and over.... and over... for each and every patient who is NPO and on lantus on your service.

-The Trifling Jester

I've actually been paged (as the resident, not the intern mind you) 3 times in the past 2 days on the SAME patient by the SAME nurse, asking if we really wanted to give Mrs. X her 60 of NPH since her last FSG was 120. We've been through the whole basal insulin thing already so I just say yes and hang up now.

 

[TRAMD]

At 4 in the AM:

Nurse: "I was wondering if you could order some Ativan for agitation for the patient in room 704."

Me: "What is he doing?"

Nurse: "Oh, he is sleeping right now."

Me: "Ok, bye."

 

[Tired]

At 4 in the AM:

Nurse: "I was wondering if you could order some Ativan for agitation for the patient in room 704."

Me: "What is he doing?"

Nurse: "Oh, he is sleeping right now."

Me: "Ok, bye."

Man, I get a lot of those too.

RN: "Could I get a prn order for Ativan?"
Me: "He's agitated? Weird, he's been really calm the whole time he's been here."
RN: "Oh no, he's being really good."
Me: "So why does he need Ativan?"
RN: "Well he doesn't need it now. But you know, just in case."
Me: ". . . . um, no."

I'm going to start writing orders like, "Alteplase prn MI" and "Epinephrine IV prn asystole"

 

[Dr JPH]

"Epinephrine IV prn asystole"

I just got this one this morning on my long-range pager. It was a number from the last place I was rotating. I should have ignored it but thought it might be the DME office or Med Records telling me I need to sign stuff.

RN: "Just calling about Mrs Soandso. She needs pre-op orders."
Me: "Im not on that service, I cant write those orders."
RN: "But she is supposed to go to the OR today."
Me: "Im at a different hospital this month...I dont even know why my pager number is on the chart."
RN: "Its not but your pager number is on the intern pager list."
Me: "But if Im not on that service this month I shouldnt be getting paged about those patients."
RN: "Well, youre a surgical intern arent you?"
Me: "Yes, but not at that hospital and not on that service."
RN: "Who do I call?"
Me: "The intern on that service."
RN: "Who is that?"
Me: "I dont know Im not at that hospital."
RN: "Oh yeah, you said that."

The funny thing is the service list is stuck to the front of every chart with the pagers for all house staff covering that patient.

 

[snoopy brown]

First of all, you shouldn't have returned the call. But since you did, that phone call lasted about 11.5 lines longer than it needed to.

 

[Tired]

May have posted this one already, but JPH's last story reminded me. SOrry if it's a repeat:

RN: I'm calling about Mr. ______. He's having a fever.
Me: I don't know that patient, what service is he on?
RN: Neurosurgery.
Me: I've got the list right here, but I don't know who he is.
RN: He's a neurosurgery patient. He was admitted last night with toxic megacolon.
Me: ...toxic megacolon? That doesn't sound like neurosurgery.
RN: Well, it is. Neurosurgery admitted him. He's got toxic megacolon and a fever.
Me: Could you check to make sure it's neurosurgery?
RN: I did check. It's neurosurgery.
<I walk down>
Me: Hey, it clearly says General Surgery on the chart.
RN: Oh yeah, sorry. We use green stickers for both Neurosurgery and General Surgery.

 

[snoopy brown]

Yeah, the nurses don't even try to think. They'll call you for something where any monkey would realize the patient isn't on your service. Like some guy will be there after an ex-fix or something and they'll be calling OB-Gyn and going, "is this your patient?" You'll ask, "what do you think?" And they'll actually say, "I think so!" as if you'll suddenly agree with them and take their call. *****s.

 

[Tired]

Another good one from today from the same-day surgery unit.

RN: Mrs. _____ is ready for discharge.
Me: Okay. Discharge her.
RN: Well, it says I can't discharge her until the nerve block wears off.
Me: Has it worn off?
RN: No.
Me: Then she's not ready for discharge.
RN: Well when can I discharge her? She's been here three hours.
Me: When the nerve block wears off.
RN: But that could be hours!
Me: I know.
RN: So I can't discharge her yet?
Me: Not if the nerve block hasn't worn off.
RN: Fine *click*

<45min later, different nurse>

RN: I have a question about the orders on Mrs. ______
Me: Sure, what can I do for you?
RN: Well, it says we can't discharge her until the nerve block wears off.
Me: Uh-huh.
RN: Well . . . is that correct?
Me: It is if that's what's written.
RN: That's what's written.
Me: And the question is . . . ?
RN: Well, I've never seen that before.
Me: Uh huh.
RN: So I can't discharge her yet?
Me: Sweet Lord in Heaven.
RN: Excuse me, sir?
Me: Nevermind. No, you can't discharge her.

 

[snoopy brown]

You should have just gone down there and slapped her in the face.

 

[Dr JPH]

Yeah, the nurses don't even try to think.

It hurts their head. Plus, they are too busy reading magazines and trying to remember their q1hour smoke breaks.

 

[snoopy brown]

They don't really have to try too hard to remember because those breaks come right in between their breaks for lunch and more lunch.

 

[evstork]

hi all... from experience, I've learned not to hassle the nurses. Some of them are real pieces of work but the good ones really make on call much easier... If they hate you, they'll get you....

 

[deleted87716]

This thread has degenerated from its original topic into mean-spirited nurse-bashing. Closing.