We asked members of the BuzzFeed Community to tell us the worst thing that happened to them as a student nurse. Here are some of their stories.
1. The fake eye:
"On my first day on my first placement as a student nurse, I was looking after a dementia patient, and no one told me he had a fake eye. I was horrified when he pulled his eye out of its socket and rolled it down the corridor. I went running after it to give it back to him… he washed it in his orange juice and put it back in his socket while I stood there in surprise."
Submitted by laurenc4f2c3d039
2. The log flume:
"I trained as a midwife. I was once performing a vaginal examination on a client at the exact moment her membranes ruptured (waters broke). It was like a log flume, my clothes were soaked through – right down to my underwear! I had to change into some highly attractive paper pants we give to women postnatally."
Submitted by aimeeh4d991477b
3. The call bell:
"I answered a call bell pressed by a patient I had assisted onto a commode thinking he was finished, instead he said he needed some help and asked me to massage his poo out for him."
Submitted by ronandex
4. The floodgates:
"My patient rang his bell saying he needed the toilet. As soon as he stood up the floodgates, front and back, opened. Luckily I had a pad on me, but what I didn’t know as a student was that pads weren’t designed to capture free flowing liquid straight away. At this point I was on my knees panicking and praying it wouldn’t get on my face because it kept going and going and going. Let’s just say my late shift couldn’t have ended any worse."
Submitted by katrinaa47dd0dc38
5. The wash bowl incident:
"An elderly gentleman asked me for a wash bowl and a razor. I thought this was pretty weird as he didn’t have any facial hair but gave him it anyway. A few minutes later I popped my head in to ask if everything was okay and to my horror he had one knee up to his shoulder and was shaving his balls. He just carried on and started a conversation like it was nothing."
Submitted by Thunderkitten
6. The nerf gun accident:
"I was looking after a child who had been putting push pins into a nerf gun and using it to pop balloons. I guess one of the pins got stuck so he turned it round to look down the barrel and… Yeah. Pin in the eye."
Submitted by tammyf10
7. The Titanic:
"This older guy pretty much posed like Kate Winslet in Titanic when he heard I was giving him a bed bath. Door open, privacy curtain open, hospital gown open, everything."
Submitted by Marla J. Laub, Facebook
8. The fainter:
"My maternity professor HATED me so I didn't see a single birth that entire rotation...but I did "get" to assist on seven, that's right, seven circumcisions! When you spend five weeks just watching tiny penises getting clipped and holding screaming infants, it really takes the wind out of your sails. The highlight of that rotation was when one of my male classmates came in to watch and fainted, just went out cold. I had to think fast and secure the baby and somehow catch my classmate before he smashed his skull on one of the bassinets. Good times."
Submitted by Lauren Donadio, Facebook
9. The stuck radio:
"During a placement in aged care home an elderly resident managing to get her radio locked on full volume Metallica. Brilliant."
Submitted by Sarah Kerby, Facebook
10. The indecent request:
"I once had a patient who was a 10/10 for pain. When I asked if there was anything else I could get for him, he said 'You could slap me on my ass and get me going!' 10/10 pain my ass."
Submitted by kfunk
11. The space hopper:
"I was on ward round on a urology ward. They doctor told me prior to going into a patients room that the patient had a hydrocele (sack of fluid that firms around the testicular area). I had no idea what this was but nodded along politely and went into the room. The patient whips his pants down without a being prompted and revealed that I can only describe as a space hopper between his legs. I was in stunned silence and don’t know where to look. Reminded me of Randy Marsh in that South Park episode!"
Submitted by jamesh4143d3ae2
12. The surprise pregnancy:
"My strangest delivery (I was a student midwife) was dealing with a concealed pregnancy where no one in the family knew the girl was pregnant. The girl had gone to A&E with her mum after telling her that she had twisted her ankle, but she was actually in labour. The whole time in the delivery room, the girl was in denial and her mother was crying. It was by far the strangest and most awkward experience of my life."
Submitted by nataliedun
13. The massive dump in the middle of the ward:
"There was a physio on the ward and doing exercises with a patient; specifically squats and this lady just took a massive dump in the middle of the ward. All the other patients got up and left the ward space."