Curious to hear from baffled doctors and nurses about dealing with certain types of patients, Redditor babyhippo01 asked:
"Medical professionals of Reddit, have you ever had a patient so lacking in common sense you wondered how they made it this far. If so, what is your story?"
It's not rocket science.
Reading Instructions
"There is a reason the instructions for prescription suppositories say 'unwrap and insert' and not just 'insert.'"
– Artisanal_AF
An Afterthought
"I’m a pharmacist. One evening shift I was working a relief shift (not my usual pharmacy). A man comes in looking distressed."
"Man: I had sexual relations with a woman I do not intend to pursue a long term relationship with. (Yes. He said it just like that)"
"Me: okay. I’m assuming there was an accident or it was unprotected. How long ago did it happen?"
"Man: last night, at 7pm on the couch. (Woah TMI, I just need to know approximate time to know if plan B will work o.o)"
"Me: we have this medication called Plan B, and since the incident happened within 72 hours-"
"Man: oh yes, I got that for her already yesterday right after we finished. We want to know if there is anything we can do to know if she is pregnant now."
"Me: unfortunately not. She’ll have to wait 3 weeks or so to see if she gets her period, and if she doesn’t then she can do a pregnancy test then. Theoretically you could do a blood test for faster results, but that would also not be until a couple of weeks, at least."
"Man: we’re just really anxious because she really doesn’t want to be pregnant. Is there anything that she can take to prevent the pregnancy? Any multivitamin? Minerals? Food?"
"Me: she’s already taken it, which was the plan B. There are some other options but those are prescriptions. And no, there are no over-the-counter products she can take."
"Man: What about me? Is there anything I can take now to prevent the pregnancy? Any multivitamins or minerals?"
"Me:……………………………..No sir. There isn’t anything you can take now."
– V_imaginary
"Improper Specimen"
"73 here, former clinical microbiologist, LONG ago."
"Still, I found myself all over the clinical lab at times, not just infectious disease."
"So, one day, this 20-something guy (wife and mom in tow) walks in with a paper request for semen analysis, pre-computer era."
"Ok, not the most comfortable encounter, but I'm a professional and did this drill many times."
"He had not been briefed by the doc and had no idea how establishing infertility in males was done."
"Well, OK, a challenge, then."
"I took him aside and... using standard medical terminology told him how a diagnosis is made and what he needed to do to provide a specimen."
"He couldn't/wouldn't believe that I was asking him to masturbate into that container. Astonished!"
"Then he played dumb, as if the word was unfamiliar to him."
"We looped through the medical terms and procedure again, and I eventually resorted to every word I knew to describe the 'act.'"
"It was like a George Carlin bit!"
"A half hour later, he emerged from the toilet with two inches of urine in the cup. God Almighty."
"The report went back 'patient provided improper specimen.'"
– BrunoGerace
The following examples are relating to drinking problems.
The Giver Of Life
"Paramedic. Elderly woman complains that her mouth is dry and she felt a bit dizzy climbing the stairs earlier. Go through the whole rigamarole of getting a medical history, vitals, more detail on symptoms. Ask her what she's had to drink today."
"A cup of tea, ten hours ago."
"Any water? No."
"Guess what fixed it within five minutes."
– SpatchcockMcGuffin
Java Junkie
"Physical Therapist - Had a patient with neck pain and spasms, also complained of anxiety and heart palpitations. Asked about caffeine intake and patient revealed drinking and average on 15-20 cups of coffee daily."
– jdotbrone
Oh, you're not ready for these stories.
Man At The Mower
"Had a buddy who was an EMT, he was called out to a location for a gunshot wound."
"Apparently what happened is a father was mowing his lawn when he accidentally touched part of the mower near the engine and burned his hand. He got mad at the lawnmower, pulled out his pistol, and shot it. The bullet ricocheted and hit his son in the leg."
– Kretuhtuh
Immaculate Misconception
"Not me but my mother would pick up shifts as a nurse sometimes in Labour and Delivery and she had met a handful of women who didn’t know the baby was going to be coming out of their vaginas. Like no clue. My mom usually said something like 'how you got it in is how it’s coming out honey'. This was the late 90 early 2000s."
– QuailPuzzled1286
One Small Detail
"Rural ER doc here: 35 year old female walks in with right sided jaw/neck swelling. 'I think it happened because I ate some meat yesterday that my body is reacting to' … 10 minutes later : 'oh yeah, and I accidentally swallowed a bee and it stung me in my mouth right before this happened. Sorry I forgot to mention that.'"
– ThomasToHandle
Parents might be blamed for their kids' intelligence levels.
Some teachers could be responsible for overlooking teaching the basics.
Or maybe it's the rural locale where they were born and raised having something to do with it.
Whatever the circumstances, it's confounding that anyone capable of communicating and thinking for themselves can be so oblivious.
Curious to hear from medical experts online, Redditor DrPloyt asked:
"Doctors and nurses of Reddit, what’s the most blatant lie a patient has told you about why they’re in the hospital?"
Those who felt ashamed thought they could get away with lying.
The STD Source
"Had a patient convince his wife he got an STD from a dirty toilet seat in the ER when he arrived to the hospital. He was in house for about a week or two after, his wife dutifully staying with him each day until about 6. She home cooked meals for him every night and would bring them to the hospital each day while trying to file complaints to us for his STD he got from us."
"A doctor had to kindly explain to her the impossibility of him getting that particular STD from a toilet seat and it also become active / symptomatic in that time frame. She never believed us."
"After she went home each evening at 6 to cook for him for the following day, his affair partner would show up from 7-10 each evening."
– Duffarum
Running From The Law
"I’m a paramedic. I had that. They called 911 to get away from the police and a fight that had been happening.Jumped in the ambulance and started screaming at us to just drive away. We locked ourselves up front and said that’s not how this works and he ran away."
– Fianna9
Substance Abusers
"I’m a paramedic, and it’s the ones who deny doing drugs and insist we don’t know our job. I had one patient swearing up and down he doesn’t do any drugs, he was just sleeping. On the kitchen floor. While cooking."
“Do you know why your mom is crying? She just did cpr on you because you stopped breathing”
"Then admitted to doing some weed. And crack. And heroin. And meth."
"ETA- this was after he woke up to naloxone. I always ask twice if drugs are suspected before moving on to other medical issues."
– Fianna9
Attention Seeker
"I've told this story many times before, but when I worked in the emergency department there was a frequent flier who would come in complaining of migraines, seizures and stroke symptoms. She was completely full of sh*t, just wanted drugs and attention. One time the symptom she presented with was that she could only speak Spanish, but the thing was that in reality she couldn't speak Spanish*,* so you had to ask her yes or no questions or she just wouldn't respond. If the answer was yes she would say 'si' and if the answer was no she would shake her head, because she didn't know the Spanish word for 'no' is no.'"
– PigWithAWoodenLeg
The Axe Thrower
"Psych patient told me she didn’t know why they were keeping her in the facility. She claimed nothing was wrong with her, wasn’t on drugs, and didn’t do anything to be admitted… after 30 minutes of talking she admitted to throwing an axe at her neighbor, unprovoked after use of meth."
– lanakame
Quick observations revealed these patients were untruthful.
The Ex
"I lied to hospital staff once before, my ex gf stabbed me in the hand and it cut me wide open. So I get to triage and I tell them I fell and accidentally cut myself, because I didn't want to get my ex in trouble (yes I know I'm an idiot blah blah blah I've heard it a million times) when I get into a room I look around and notice an unusually high amount of domestic violence posters on the wall, I thought 'huh that's weird' the first thing the nurse says is 'we know it can be hard to talk about being abused' like damn they were on to me from the start, I still don't know how they knew, but I ended up spilling the beans, they said they wouldn't tell the police if I didn't want them to."
– dayzers
Does Not Compute
"I was in the ER for a suspected testicular torsion, and we saw a guy with a pretty clear bullet wound on his arm. The lady handling intake asked him what happened, and he said he fell off his skateboard."
– doctordoctorpuss
What's Up, Doc?
"I had a frustrating itch inside my rectum and the carrot was the only object that I could fit in there"
– LithuanianLion
What The Ex-Con Did
"Easy. A guy came in complaining of being constipated and couldn't poop for 5 days. He reported rectal blood and difficulty passing gas. A CT was done and showed a 9 inch linear object bordering or slightly puncturing through his bowel with questionable free air. With the CT results in hand we confronted the guy. 9 MONTHS AGO, yep, 9 months ago this guy got out of prison where he stuck a prison shank in his butt to hide it during a cell search. It was already in there about a year before he got out. He didn't tell anyone for fear of adding on his prison sentence. He was never able to retrieve it and thought it would just pass naturally. He was just hoping we'd give him some prescription strength laxatives and he'd have better luck. He needed surgery."
– alwaysforgettingmypw
Things got out of hand for these patients with erectile dysfunction.
Hard Situation
"Back when Viagra first dropped, every grandpa in Miami with chest pain would lie about why they had a raging erection. Or the boner would be gone, and they'd be so much more confident in their answer. No matter how much we stressed how unsafe lying would be, no matter whether we ferried the ladies out of the room."
"It was quite a way for little baby nurse me to learn how low blood pressure could get. Being in Miami at the time was like being on the front of a boomer battlefield for erectile rights."
– MissAnthropicRN
Forever Stiffie
"Oh boy."
"I'm an admin in a hospital and just the other week we had a younger guy (30s) come in because he had injected viagra into his unit...his erection had lasted for a worrying amount of hours so he came to ED."
"After having 220mls drained from his member, he regained full function."
"My colleagues and I joked that he wouldn't be touching it for at least a day or two."
– HailCrystals
The moral of the story is, it's pointless to lie to your doctor.
The truth will eventually come out, and it should, because your life could depend on it.
And the truth of the matter is, doctors and nurses don't care about your situation, no matter how embarrassed you are. They just want to make sure you are properly tended to.
Any judgement from them will most likely be because you're a bad liar, not because you shoved a foreign object up your bum.
Redditor Still-Tangerine2782 wanted to hear from all the healthcare workers out there.
"Doctors of reddit, what’s it like when you go in for a doctors appointment? Do you and your doctor discuss what’s wrong with you like it’s a group project? Do you not go at all because you’re your own doctor?"
Sounds like it's time for the medics to take their own medicine.
The Community
Doctor GIFGiphy"My mom's a GP and she usually just self diagnoses most of the time but will sometimes get a second opinion. She doesn't really go to another doctor, just calls them to ask about stuff. Her contacts are filled with all kinds of doctors. It's like a secret underground community. For stuff like getting ultrasounds etc, then yes they do discuss stuff like it's a group project."
JustChard
The Internal Monologue...
"I was at a lecture a couple of years ago, performed by two doctors who’d undergone treatment for breast cancer and written a book about it together. I remember her talking about her diagnosis. She was a breast cancer surgeon herself, you couldn’t make it up."
"She walked into the room, saw her own scans with the doctor and her heart dropped, she barely heard a word he said because she couldn’t stop the flood of information she was getting. Looking at the scan she knew if she’d need surgery, chemo, radiotherapy, how long it would be, what her estimated survival was."
"I don’t think they discussed it like a group project, but I suppose she couldn’t stop herself from listening to her own internal monologue since it was her own field. I remember her saying she’d found it, in hindsight, an incredible learning opportunity regarding how to interact with patients, and that she thought about it a lot."
Pain_Free_Politics
Specialties...
"It depends on what I'm going in for. As a background, I'm an oncologist so I've trained in internal medicine before. For most internal medicine type stuff, I don't bother going in unless I need something that I can't easily get for myself (e.g. labs or images). For specialty stuff I wasn't trained in, I go in and try to give them the best history I can, but let them do their own thing."
alkahdia
30 seconds flat...
"I don't get involved in the management. I let the Doctor seeing me lead that, unless they missed something huge and i would just double check. The main difference is i can present the whole history and relevant info in about 30 seconds flat and the doctor with that info can just give me the management plan in about the same time. Fastest consultations ever. Very methodical."
triple_threattt
I Stay Away
"Doctor here. In general, we are not good about going to the doctor."
"For me it’s physicals about half as often as recommended and that time I had strep a year and a half ago that didn’t resolve with 'whatever antibiotics I had in my medicine cabinet.' When we do go in, it is like a group project. We usually hash things out together but ultimately I am going to defer to someone with more expertise than me in that area who can make an objective decision."
nellyann
In general, none of us are good about the doctor. So I feel ya.
New Bits
Chicago Med Episode 6 GIF by NBCGiphy"I was sat in in a consultation between two doctors with one needing an ultrasound. They knew each other through work already so it was very friendly and casual between the both of them. The patient doctor trying to figure out what was going on on the ultrasound screen and the doctor doctor was teaching him the bits he didn't know."
kr4kenz
Language
"Doctor here (neurologist)." I'm not good at going to the doctor. I don't go often but when I do I usually just STFU, especially if it's a field of medicine I have no idea about (like say... derm). That being said, the doctor usually knows I'm a physician as well, and so the language terms to be more technical. I also find that we practice less defensively with each other since we can be more open ('We could do ABC tests but honestly what you probably have is X so take this and if it doesn't get better then we can do ABC')."
Telamir
Participation
"I hope you get some doctors in here to give personal answers. Paul Kalanithi did address this a bit in his book When Breath Becomes Air. At first in his cancer treatment he was very involved in the decision making and the way he described the conversation with his oncologist was more like a collaboration."
"Later, she reminded him that he didn't have to participate in the decision making and that he could just let her be the doctor and focus on himself. He ended up taking her up on this offer. So even between the same patient and doctor, the relationship varied."
aaoch1
generic conditions...
"Dr here - it is a bit dependent on the field of medicine involved. For example I don't know much about neurological issues so if I went to see a neurologist I certainly wouldn't be chipping in. For more generic conditions I have previously offered my thoughts to my doctor about what it could be. Ultimately I still go to the doctor as they can prescribe drugs/order tests for me that would be difficult/questionable for me to do myself."
drbigmac69
Strangers
Sunglasses Hiding GIF by Soul TrainGiphy"I always go to someone who don’t know me, and I wouldn’t say that I’m a doctor as well. On the other hand, my SO is a doctor too, and whenever we feel something we do discuss it like a group project in which he always refuse any treatment until his symptoms got to the very worst."
eatfart420
It can be quite the enlightening experience when the tables are flipping.
Any other medical professionals what to chime in? Let us know in the comments.
