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.
But the self-defeating ruse is a short-lived one. Despite the most outlandish, roundabout attempts to avoid honesty and outwit the doctor, EVERYONE is unsuccessful. It's as if half the job of doctors' work is seeing through these bold faced lies.
Plenty of Redditors are indeed those very doctors, and they give a behind-the-scenes look from their perspective, watching a patient with obvious-and proven-health issues squirm as they downplay those exact issues.
TheGrimReefah asked, "Doctors of reddit, what's the most obvious lie a patient or relative has ever told?"
Hate When That Happens
Patient brought to the ER - was allegedly naked in his bedroom making a salad, when he accidentally sat on an upright cucumber. parrotman41
The condoms keep the veggies fresh. cohrt
Giphy"Nice Try, Twerp"
I am not a doctor, but i once heard a little boy tell a nurse that he was bitten by a brontosaurus.
He was obviously lying, because brontosauruses were herbivores.
The Current and Obvious Facts Say Otherwise
There is no chance of pregnancy because I've never had sex before (patient is pregnant).
I don't use drugs ever (drug screen is positive for marijuana and/or other substances).
"Well, Inside the Hospital Snacks Don't Count."
"I've been sticking to my diet and exercising but my blood sugars are staying high all the time."
Says the diabetic patient who I just saw buy a damn snickers from the vending machine in the waiting room.
GiphyThe Jig's Up
"Do you use cotton buds to clean your ears?"
"No, never, absolutely not, never have, you shouldn't put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear!"
"..... Because there is definitely the end of a cotton bud stuck in your ear.."
"Oh yeah, maybe just this one time.."
Waiving the "Recreational Drug Abuse" Flag
(Trying to weasel a prescription for ADHD medication)
"I have fat-ih-gue."
Fatigue, she was trying to lie about her fatigue.
"Just Making Sure"
Doc: Do you smoke? Patient: No
D: Do you drink alcohol? P: No
D: Are you lying? P: No
Those Long-Con Tests Will ALWAYS Get Ya
Only a medical student, but we had a patient with tremendous degeneration of the liver, and his blood analysis told us he had been drinking heavily at least the last 6 months, despite being instructed it could definitely destroy what he had left of liver.
Most people still don't know we can check daily alcohol consume in such a long term.
"They're Fries, What Was I Supposed to Do?"
"Oh I gave up salt last year for my blood pressure" while literally reaching for her second White Castle slider during our conversation. The cheese fries were gone by then.
At Least Doc Was Cool About It
My parents run a construction store so they have a few other people that are hired to help them.
One day this lady decide she is too lazy to work so she "fainted". People start panicking and bring her to the doctor.
When the doctor tried to open her eyes to see the pupil, she basically rolled her eyes so the doctor couldn't see the pupil. The doctor then kinda poked her telling her to wake up.
GiphyAs Obvious as it is Problematic
“Every time a patient feigns a seizure (either intentionally or unintentionally) it's a comically bad interpretation of what they think it should look like."
The Proof is in the Penis
“'I haven't had sex.' Sorry sir, the syphilitic lesion on the tip of your penis says otherwise." - dagayute
“Someone said my name?" - [deleted]
Pre-CGI Special Effects
“My sister said a kid around 12 came in one day with his dad. The kid had like red marker or something on his wrist and was trying to convince her that it was blood/broken and he got beat up (but beat up the other kids worse)." - AppealToReason16
Here's Hoping the Hospital has Better Technology
"Tests positive for morphine...'I've been eating a ton of poppy seed bagels!'" - cskelly
"A relative of mine played sports at a Division I university. They were not allowed to eat any poppy seed baked goods because they screwed with the drug tests." - aspiegrrrl
A Flesh Wound
"'I'm fine Doc. Just a little scratch.'"
"Me saying this while having blood all over my arm after an accident."
GiphyYou Should See the Other Lie
'I fell and hurt my hand.'
"Yeah, right. It's not called a Boxer's Fracture for nothing."
For them, though, a lot of those moments are totally commonplace. What could be the most humiliating medical moment of your life is just "Tuesday morning" for them - and in a way, that makes them even bigger heroes in our eyes.
One Reddit user asked:
Surprisingly, not a lot of actual medical professionals spoke up at first. We suppose they're so used to not talking about a patient's personal issues with anyone but them (thank you HIPPA!) that it took a while to get things going. Having said that, plenty of patients were willing to talk about their own mortifying experiences.
So the responses you're about to read are a mixed bag, some from medical professionals, some from patients, some from family members - all awkward.
I Remember When...
GiphyI'm a male nurse. I was working a rehab unit one time and had to give a younger gentleman a suppository due to no bowel movement for 4 days. I saw him a couple years later in a public place and he shouts out to me "Hey dude remember when your finger was in my butt!"
I wasn't sure what to say, it was a little awkward. So I just did this snapping finger gun back to him. That ended up being just as awkward. If not more.
The First Dad Joke
When my wife was giving birth our Gyno told her to give a big push. She did and proceeded to pee all over the doctors face (she was wearing a protective mask for just such an occasion so no harm no foul). Being terrified as I was that my wife was in the process of delivering our firstborn, I helpfully offered up "Don't worry, some people pay good money for that." I still hate myself for it.
- hasentj
Going The Distance
Surgical tech, I was in the OR prepping the patient for a bladder sling. Patient wasn't all the way under and while I was helping the surgeon, we heard coughing and what sounded like water falling. We turned and every time the patient coughed, urine shot out about two feet. We measured it, she had good distance. It wasn't awkward as much as interesting.
Talking About The Weather
In nursing school they taught us about how to insert a urinary catheter in men. There's this lidocaine lube that helps make an otherwise uncomfortable procedure considerably less uncomfortable. The catch is the you have to insert a syringe (not a needle) into the tip of the penis and inject lidocaine lube into the urethra and then hold the penis with your thumb over the urethra for five minutes. So like just hang out, holding a penis talking about the weather for five minutes.
- Laederol
Caw! Caw!
GiphyAcquaintance was a 17-year-old male getting a physical from a female doctor. She was checking for a hernia, so grabbed his testicles and asked him to cough. In his nervousness, he misheard. He turned his head and did his best crow imitation: "Caw! Caw!"
The Knot
Urology nurse here-
We had a teenager come in with his mother (we were not a pediatric urology office but saw teens on special occasions with a doctors OK)...
.. kid was masturbating with a cell phone charger and got it stuck in his bladder. We went in with cystoscopy to take a look and potentially remove it in office with no sedation. We enter his bladder and there is a huge KNOT in the cord. Kids acting like this is an everyday NBD kinda thing. Moms just sitting there horrified. Obviously he had to go to the OR due to the giant knot tied in the cord.
That was the weirdest.
Hand Delivery And Google
Yes!!! This is going to get buried, but I worked in a urologist's office for a long time. It's pretty wild and I have lots of stories (my poor boyfriend), but here are two of my favorites:
- Patients have to bring in semen samples post vasectomy to make sure there was no issue with the procedure so we can declare them sterile. We give them two sterile cups, paper bags, and instructions. One patient called a took the "just bring it in, hand deliver it!" directions too literally and tried to shove a handful of semen through the office window. I still have so many questions.
- Teenager comes in, thinks he might be sterile. We tell him to go home and bring us back a sample. He doesn't understand. I explain to him, professionally, that he should ejaculate into the cup we provided. He asks how. I think he's messing with me and just answer "masturbation." He asks what that is, and if his mom can help him. I don't know to this day if he was messing with me, but I'm pretty sure I just told him to Google it.
Squats
While getting a prostate exam for a physical, I asked if he could tell I'd been doing squats.
Without missing a beat he said yes.
Wheely Stool
At a gyno appointment when I was 19, I was all situated on the table with my legs up, fully exposed. The doctor was adjusting her wheely stool, it slipped, she lost her balance and went headfirst into my spread eagle crotch. Reflexively, I pulled my knees together, essentially putting her in a headlock with my thighs. It all happened in about 3 seconds but felt like an eternity of unending embarrassment and shock.
A Third Ball
I was getting snipped and they had me on some valium. Had a great conversation with the doc. We talked about vacations, homebrew, cars, etc. When he was done he said, "I've had such a nice chat with you I almost wish you had a third ball." Kinda made me tear up a bit.
- Dugdstew
"Man, This One's A Stinker!"
Last time I was at the gyno, my doctor was getting ready to start the exam while her assistant was opening one of the disposable tools. The assistant was having some issues and as soon as I got in the stirrups, the assistant said loudly, 'Man, this one's a stinker!'. I looked at her with my jaw dropped and it clicked a few seconds later that she was talking about the difficulty of opening the tool, and not my vagina. It was the most fun I've ever had at the lady doctor.
Almost Sad
Patient here; For my first gyno visit I was pretty anxious and clumsy about the whole deal. After the nurse sat me down on the chair and made me spread my legs eagle style, my doctor walked in with 4 students in row, around same age as me.
So, eventually there was 6 people in the room, looking at my vagina in interest. At one point my doctor even said "Damn I wanted to show you some lumps or tumors today but looks like she is okay... I'm almost sad.'
- purinnie
Zero Jollies
GiphyI'm primary care. Older man teasing me after his prostate exam that I "took his anal virginity".
These both really offend me. I am NOT doing anything that is supposed to be pleasurable or having sex or taking anyone's virginity during exams. I am a doctor doing my job. I get ZERO jollies from it. If you think I did, you should report me. These jokes make me feel abused as the doctor quite frankly. I wish I had told the patients at the time that these comments are not appreciated.
Reddit user J0E_The_Psych0121 asked:
Doctors/surgeons/nurses of reddit, what's the worst thing you experienced while at work?
We're going to caution you, if you've got a weak stomach for talking about bodily fluids (or solids... or semi-solids) or you're easily upset by talk of death or dying, proceed with caution. This article will have plenty of it all.
The responses were sometimes funny in retrospect, but for the most part they ranged from disgusting to heartbreaking to disgustingly heartbreaking. Take a look.
Go Through It Alone
"Taking care of a fall patient that broke her pelvis. She just found out her husband had cancer and she wouldn't be there for him. She was crying, telling me that he was there for every appointment and treatment when she had cancer, and now he'd have to go through it alone. She felt like she was failing him or letting him down."
"She About To Die Anyway"
"Watching another nurse pulling a fall mat away from a patients floor next to her bed. When asked why, she said flatly (in front of the patient!) "She about to die anyway."
"The patients mouth was stuck open because she was so emaciated, but she could still cry. Her frozen face somehow allowed her to still cry after she heard that, and she did for a long time. I sat there with her. The patient was in custody of the state (a mental hospital) and they chose to withhold food and water as a type of forced DNR (do not resuscitate.)"
"Part of a DNR type of plan can include refusing artificial ways of being fed like a feeding tube etc... and if someone else is in charge of making you a DNR or not because you've been deemed not of sound mind, then yes that can happen. A lot of mental patients have no family and their "guardians" are the state. The state doesn't know the patient and will chose whatever option they want, typically the most "cost effective" one which can lead to situations like this."
"She was around 90 something. We were forced to watch her slowly starve to death and were not cleared to give her enough medication to ease her awareness of it."
"The nurse who made that heartless comment in front of the patient was reported, but I don't know what happened because I quit right after that."
The Longest Incident Report
"Former Paramedic, long story short, got a call for what turned out to be a very dead, decomposing man who had passed alone in his apartment. His body was filled with gas (fairly common.) As I'm standing by the body calling the hospital to give them a heads up about what's about to come their way and get approval to move, the new EMT decides to poke gas filled body. It explodes. He loses a hand and a trillion vaporized bits of dead old man cover me, got in my open mouth, under my clothes, etc. Taste was...awful."
"A lot of gas can accumulate in dead bodies, and if it gets trapped, it can be almost like a bomb. New guy was kneeling next to the body, I think this was his first serious call because he had that kind of glazed-over, "I'm in shock" look in his eyes, and he put his hand on the guy's stomach. NEVER press on bloated dead body's stomach. His hand sank down into this bloated, gas filled sack until said sack just..broke."
"My crew chief said it would be like sinking your fist into a box of firecrackers. Honestly, not sure how he came up with that analogy and didn't really work in my mind. But yeah... dead body exploded, got gunk everywhere and took off the EMT's hand."
"After hundreds of showers I could still smell corpse on me. My SO at the time said every time she nuzzled me, or got close to my hair she could smell it too. It was like that for about a week. It still makes me gag to think about - but that new kid's life was pretty much permanently changed."
"Longest Incident Report I have ever filed."
- Sam9231
Fear Of Dentists
"This happened when my wife was a student nurse. A guy came in who had broken a tooth; but as he had a morbid fear of dentists and of anything to do with his mouth, he didn't seek any treatment for months and the tooth got horribly infected."
"By the time he came to hospital, he was seriously ill and it was too late. The infection got into his blood and he died a few days later of septicemia. Apparently, the smell from his mouth was the worst smell that any of the staff had ever experienced."
Why I Gave Up On Pediatrics
"This case in my internship made me give up on specializing in pediatrics."
"Young boy got brought in for rheumatic heart disease, already in heart failure. Apparently this all started from a minor skin infection and went all the way up into his heart valves. We met him already in the pediatric ICU. He was still conscious and able to talk, and so for his first day we built a sort of rapport."
"The next morning, before my friends and I clocked out, he wasn't looking so great so the resident in charge called in the general surgery team to perform a cutdown to expose his veins for access. I had to hold down the poor kid during the procedure, since local anesthesia could only do so much. He was screaming so I told him, "Just hold on, we'll get through this!"
"He nodded and said "Okay" then tried his best to be brave."
"That was the last conversation we had. When I came in for my next shift, he was already intubated. The only parent with him was his father, since his mother was employed overseas. Now for many of these cases, a letter to the employer is needed to explain why so and so must go home in this case of family emergency. I volunteered to draft the letter and send it out so we could get this lady on a flight soon, and have her come home for her son."
"As soon as I put the last period on that letter I was typing in the nurse's station, the kid coded just a few feet away. We couldn't bring him back. The next worst part, of course, was telling his father what had just happened and asking if he wanted us to stop the resuscitation. That conversation will stay with me."
"No one should have to bury a child due to something so preventable."
- KatyG9
Death Over Debt
"The saddest one was a woman who had an aggressive but treatable cancer. She was riddled with guilt from all the debt her family was incurring and broke down when she told me she wished she would just die soon so that the debt would stop accumulating. That one hurt to hear."
When Mom Only Wants One Baby
"Respiratory therapist here. When I was a student we had to do a rotation through a NICU/PICU. The NICU was very busy with 7 or 8 sets of twins all on mechanical ventilation. As the therapist I was with was giving me a generalized report on the babies and trying to teach me about the disease states the babies were experiencing, she said "and mom only wants one of them" and moved on like it was nothing."
"I asked if it was common if a family only wanted one baby and she said "Oh, yes. all the times. sometimes it's because one baby is a lot worse than the other and mom doesn't want to get too attached in case it doesn't make it, or, like those two over there, mom can only afford one of them."
"I couldn't believe something like that took place and was as common place as it was. Made me never want to work in pediatrics. The human experience is far, far worse than the traumas and illnesses."
- rip_lyl
"People think they want everything possible done to save them until they see what that means on a dying family member. We had it happen in our family. It took two months for her spouse to finally let their dying partner go and the shock and grief made our younger daughter not talk for a year. I went gray in those two months and my husband barely spoke during that time. Death with dignity should be available for anyone who needs it."
"Our younger daughter is back to singing again after years of therapy. We all wish more people knew the importance of medical wishes being filed before things go really wrong so that nobody else suffers the way my family member did because of someone that just doesn't want to let go. She needlessly suffered and it devastated everyone else."
Worthless Nephew
"I worked a temp job for a local hospital's home health/hospice department. One of my jobs was to call new patients and confirm their address before the nurse and/or therapist would make their first visit. I had to call this one patient who tried to take his own life by jumping in front of a commuter train."
"When I called, his uncle answered and went on a twenty minute rant about how worthless his nephew was and how he was a complete burden on the family now and that it would have been better if he died. I understand suicide can be seen as a selfish act but my heart went out to this guy."
"The patient obviously had some stuff going on to push to the point of attempting to end his life and then for him to survive and have to listen to his family member say such harsh things... it was brutal to say the least. I often wonder what happened to him."
Diarrhea Blood Fountain
Giphy"I was a 3rd year med student on my 3 month internal medicine rotation. For people who don't know, this is generally the time in your life where you feel the most stupid every minute of every day."
"I had arrived for work just barely on time (at 430 am) for my 573 hour shift. Of course I was dressed to the nines because medicine is stupid sometimes and you have to dress to impress. Tie, nice shoes, slacks, button up, that sort of thing. Might as well have had on tails and a top hat. Imagine a monocole for effect."
"I started rounding of course. I went in to see a patient I will call "Mr. Hipaa." I had seen him for several days at this point and he was usually pretty chipper. He had been in the ICU for a GI bleed, but had done great and now stepped down to the floor. This morning he wasn't talking very much. That's not unusual though, it was 442 AM and I was barely conscious myself. But something felt off and there was just an odor in the room."
"My spider sense was tingling so I checked the bathroom. They always say you only have to smell melena once to never forget. This was my once. The floor, the toilet, the walls, were covered in that inky black anal spray. I was assaulted by the pungent aroma of iron shavings and death. It was icky. So I went, "Oh. Mr. Hipaa I'll be right back!"
"I toddled off to find one of my residents. Those lazy bums didn't usually wander in until after 5. Managed to find my chief who seemed uninterested in what I had to say. I wasn't chicken little, I had never cried wolf before. I remember this seemed fairly important and him showing no interest whatsoever. Bad resident, no donut."
"So I went to the real power on the floor, the nurses station."
"They promptly did the wrong thing too."
"They check his BP and systolic is in the low 80s. Prior had always hovered in the 130/40s. My internal dialogue is screaming "that boy aint right!" but my third year medical student body is standing there, now surrounded by multiple nurses, just trying not to get in the way and trying not to look even more stupid or say the wrong thing."
"Well, they want to move him to the chair. I still all these years later have no idea why. I managed to squeak out a "Should we be standing him up right now given the crazy low BP and massive blood loss?" but an MS3 speaking is like a fart in the wind so I went unheard."
"So we stand him up. I'm holding on to his left arm, another nurse on his right. He had little strength to support himself. A half a gallon of blood-tinged feces (or feces tinged blood?) promptly falls out of him and on to the floor. I mean it literally fell. Imagine moving your china cabinet and it tilts a little bit and the dishes just FALL. It didn't squirt, or spray. It just fell as a mass, hitting the floor and splashing out."
"At that point Mr. Hipaa decides, "Enough with being conscious!" and promptly passes out. It could have been something to do with he now had a Hgb around 3 and went from laying to standing with a BP on the lower end of life compatibility. Now I'm a regular sized big guy, 6' 200 pounds. My nurse was 5'3 120. Mr. Hipaa was 6'3 250. There was no stopping this fall once it began. Timmmmbbbeeeeeerrrrrr He fell face forward and planted... right into his bed! Crisis averted! My moment of joy was instantly changed to terror as I looked down at his bare behind, jack-knifed into the air like a Whataburger A-Frame. Then it happened."
"Diarrhea blood fountain."
"The perfect symmetry of it as it exploded from him is something I'll never forget. It was like the Bellagio, or Buckingham fountain in Chicago. Just this perfect fluid dynamic cone that reached a foot and a half into the air then gently allowed gravity to pull it down making that gorgeous trumpet like flare."
"Except it was made of diarrhea and blood."
"I, in my tie and fancy clothes suddenly became Neo from the matrix. My concrete pillars were the various nurses. They took hit after hit, while I dodged like Christian Bale in Equilibrium. I danced, I juked, I spun like no one has ever spun before. I was the Fred Astaire of sh*t swerving."
"When it was all said and done, three nurses lost their lives that day (meaning were covered in feces and blood) while I, who had been staring down that fleshy barrel, had gotten away without one speck of red or brown or black on me."
"The outcome? Mr. Hipaa went back to the ICU, little bit of PRBC, another embolization and he was home happy and healthy two weeks later, I got in trouble for not letting my resident know what was going on (WHAT?!), And as far as I'm aware those nurses are still showering to this day."
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/
We thank all the medical professionals out there for their commitment to their patients.
Do you have any experiences to share? Let us know in the comments below.