What are the weirdest/most uncomfortable interactions with patients you've had so far?

[anonymousresident99]

Obviously this is a duplicate account because I wanted to share my story but wasn't comfortable including some of the details posting from my normal account.

So I am a peds resident and my first baby unfortunately had a number of birth defect incompatible with life and we decided on neonatal hospice. For a variety of reasons I elected to deliver at a nearby hospital and not where I worked. About half an hour after I delivered and 25 minutes after my son passed away, my nurse and the baby nurse help me to the bathroom. As I am sitting down on the toilet, the baby nurse suddenly asks me if I am a peds resident at hospital X. I confirm that I am and she then starts talking about how she knew she recognized me and I took care of her son exactly one year ago that day when he was admitted to the hospital for Guillan-Barre and she was so happy with his care and she had been so worried and he was doing great now and did I remember her and her son who was name Bobby Smith. I don't remember what I answered, I don't remember her son at all and mostly felt like I was in a daze and the rest of the world should have stopped since mine had. I do remember exchanging a completely baffled look with my nurse who was also in the tiny bathroom.

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[DD214_DOC]

Female patient at the end of therapy session: "Maybe we can meet outside of here sometime?"
Me, knowing what she meant but giving her a way out: "You mean like having our next session outside of this office, possibly on the hospital grounds or something?"
Her with a flirty laugh: "No, I meant not as a session. Like at a restaurant. Or my place"

Different but more direct female patient after a few sessions of therapy: "When are we going to ****?"

At the beginning of my outpatient year for psych (the year we take on a long-term psychotherapy caseload), our intro course consisted of the attending telling us over and over and over, "Don't have sex with your patients!". I found it a bit strange and somewhat comical at the time of why it seemed necessary to constantly mention it, but about halfway through the year I understood why.

 

[Med student 18]

psychotic outbreak in ER room. Was convinced that my colleague and I were demons. Then she proceeded to get naked.

 

[Keona]

Other encounters that have been bizarre for me. Discussing cleaning sex toys. Patient wanting specifics on the correct soap to use. Med student in the room with me slowly turning red. Me trying to redirect the interview and recommending following manufacturers guidelines but that I would go with dish soap if whatever type she had at home as opposed to just water or whatever she was currently doing. (She had some vaginal complaints).

 

[austintr]

When I was working as a paramedic, we had a 40ish yo female patient that reportedly stabbed herself in the abdomen. She had a small puncture barely trickling blood, but we couldn't find the implement she used. And she wasn't in the mood to tell us, even upon our (and the cops') persistence. En route to the hospital, she told me she was a witch and placed several curses/hexes upon me. She then started speaking in tongues and singing some sort of creepy song I'd never heard. Nothing terribly interesting about the encounter, except in a true Shyamalan twist, the previously undiscovered implement was found to be a little decorative pen knife and it was resting peacefully in her vagina.

 

[wholeheartedly]

this is mostly just awkward.

I work in a small rural clinic lab and occasionally have to help out the phlebotomists when we're short. I previously worked at a huge tertiary care type place that had an army of phlebs so I went the better part of a decade without having to poke anyone. I'm not terrible or anything and get most of my patients on the first attempt, but am by no means a rockstar at it either and feel kinda ****ty when I miss.

So I was shadowing one of our FM docs last Fri, trying not to do anything to make myself look like an idiot, and we see this kid with a wart that the doc is going to burn off. Kid starts to get a little scared. Kid's mom pipes up, "It's no big deal, it's not like getting poked with a needle. I got poked 4 times when she (pointing to me) was trying to draw my blood and even that didn't hurt much. You'll be fine."

Cue my very mortified look in front of doc I was shadowing.

I stuttered, "Four times? We only ever try twice on someone... oh yeah, that was when I missed twice and SD missed once and got you on her second try right?

"yeah something like that"

 

[SqEdSaint]

I am a fresh PGY1 on my first medicine rotation. Got assigned several new patients in my second week on the service, one of which had epididymo-orchitis. I marched into the patient's room (man was a pleasant old and dignified ex-air force officer), asked how he was feeling, if he was ok down there, asked for permission to examine his balls, then proceeded to "play around" (not sexually) with his pair. The examine was normal and I felt odd how an infected reproductive organ could recover overnight. I asked him if it was feeling much better than yesterday, and that was when he looked at me confused and said impatiently "I've never had problems down there." Then I realized that I had confused him with another old white male patient...who also turned out to be a pleasant and dignified ex-air force officer.

 

[QualityProcess]

My family med rotation as an M3 was in a really rough neighborhood. One of my pts had blood on her shirt, and when I asked about it, she told me she had killed someone in self defense the night prior, while being sexually assaulted. She was male to female transsexual, and she very calmly explained to me that she had stabbed him 6 times in the heart, once for every time she had been sexually assaulted previously. I was pretty shocked and I couldn't think of anything to say at all. She said "oh honey, its ok, you don't have to say anything. Just listening to me and remembering is good enough." I think about it every few days at least.

 

[Kittenmommy]

Me: Good morning ma'am I'm calling from Hospital X about your daughter Y-"
Patient's mother: "You mustn't leave her alone with any of the other children or let her go to the bathroom alone she's a chronic masturbator and very good at it she can orgasm very quick-"
Me:"....she said she's had sex before, do yo-"
Patient's mother: "You have to get her to tell the truth sometimes, you have to be firm. Did you explain to her what sex is? She forces her little sisters (ages 2 and 3) to masturbate with her and she gives them oral sex become she says she wants them to enjoy it with her, she puts her finger inside them and you know they're so little so it hurts I used to hear them crying at night..."

More red flags than a parade in downtown Beijing. OMG, that poor little girl!

 

[rafa 22]

After hours and hours in the shift I was absolutely exhausted. was there when a patient was about to receive an intramuscular injection. the patient looks at the needle and asks "all of that??" and i don't know why i said this...but i responded "yeah all of that in the butt". I have never seen a more hateful look than the one her boyfriend gave me (who was there the entire time).

 

[AshNiffler]

More red flags than a parade in downtown Beijing. OMG, that poor little girl! .

The most traumatic phone call I've had till date

 

[Kittenmommy]

The most traumatic phone call I've had till date.

The most traumatic phone call I've had till date

I can't even *imagine*.

*hugs*

 

[Goro]

I can't even *imagine*.

*hugs*.

Sorry to interrupt, but I love the avatar and screen name!

 

[Mad Jack]

Yeah.

So when I was a resident at a federal facility, there was a real hard @$$ colorectal surgeon. Pretty classical guy with regards to being a dick in the OR, super competitive. The kind of guy you want things to go wrong for, but at the same time he's a good surgeon, so you'd feel bad if they did.
And this federal facility - run by idiots, like most of them are.
So one day he comes to work, dark and early, and his office is locked as usual, only his key doesn't work. So he gets the master key from his manager, and that doesn't work. And he's gotta round and be in the OR, so he's getting hot.
So he goes to security to let them know they're all @$$holes, and that they need to let him in to his office immediately. But they tell him they can't.
So he asks why, and they tell him that they can't tell him why. He's gotta wait for the head of security to get in. So, of course, now he's right pissed, but there's nothing he can do. So he waits.
The head of security shows up and tells him that his computer, all his files, and his laptop have been confiscated pending an investigation.
An investigation of what?!
They can't say. But he can't be around patients until the investigation is over.

Now this guy, he's an @$$hole, but a pervert he is not. Beyond the fact that he wanted to have a career as a professional butthole surgeon.

So he goes to IT, who is busy taking apart his computers and transferring information to CID (military police/JAG). But they also won't tell him what it is they're looking for, because it's an ongoing investigation, and he might want to talk to JAG.

So he does, but JAG won't talk to him, other than to let him know that they'll contact him when they're ready to make a decision.


So now he's sweating. What could it be? Is he going to jail? Dies he need a lawyer? Is someone setting him up?

He works his way into the command suite where finally he gets someone to listen to him. All these surgeries he'll have to cancel, the clinics, the resident education, and he swears there's nothing bad on those devices.

So he goes back to JAG with the brass to find out if maybe they can clear this all up.

And JAG tells them the IT guys were scrubbing last night, and they came across some very questionable materials - illicit materials, in fact, on his machine. Real bad stuff. Definitely against hospital policy, and sad to see that a surgeon might be doing these kinds of things...

What kinds of things?

Saving pictures of @$$holes on his laptop. Tons of them.

Because he was giving presentations about diseases of the @$$. Because he was a colorectal surgeon. These were all linked to PPT slides, but he had made a folder of pictures of diseased anuses, and the IT guys had found it. And reported him as some kind of lowlife pervert.

What the hell. This is why we can't have nice things.

 

[HighPriest]

What the hell. This is why we can't have nice things.

It was a military facility. They take pride in not having nice things.

 

[Kittenmommy]

Sorry to interrupt, but I love the avatar and screen name!
.

Awww, thanks! That's my little Ginny, my sweet babycat. Unfortunately, we lost her suddenly in 2015.

 

[DD214_DOC]

A female patient I had come back as a walk in to review lab results who started the session by saying how annoying and obnoxious all the kids in the waiting area were, and that she hates kids and never wants to be a parent....

I brought her back to discuss a positive hcg.


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[CajunMedic]

The worst (so far) was when I was a Paramedic. We were holding with a patient on our stretcher, waiting on a bed. PD had come in behind us with a teenager in handcuffs. Officer asks for Dr X (the senior resident).
Dr. X: "Why is my nephew in handcuffs?"
PD: "Well ma'am, he was caught driving a stolen car."
Dr. X to nephew: "Is this true?"
Nephew: "Well...."
Dr. X: SLAP!
She backhands him right there in front of us, 6 beds, ER staff, and everybody and commences chewing his ass. PD is looking confused as to what to do now since he's in custody. The patient is looking at us, probably hoping she wasn't going to be their doctor. We dropped the patient and got the hell out of there as quick as we could