Just For Fun

[Brenda K Hutson]

You know what would be a really fun Thread on here sometime: The funniest and/or scariest remarks we have heard from Hospital staff. We could call it "Just For Fun." Here is mine, just for fun (and it is not Blood Bank oriented; I will think more on that):

A Physician calling at one Hospital (called the wrong dept.) asking: Is it ok if I draw the Peak and Trough at the same time (drug levels). The Tech. responded: I am going to hang up now and I want you to think about that for a minute.

Brenda Hutson, CLS(ASCP)SBB :D:D

[RR1]

I once received a call from a medic asking what the normal range for a malarial parasite screen was.

[Brenda K Hutson]

I once received a call from a medic asking what the normal range for a malarial parasite screen was.

Oh ....my ...gosh.....!!

Brenda

[Likewine99]

Several years ago the lab and hospital moved to a new computer system. A nurse called me looking for a CBC result.

We were guiding them through the new screens so they could get the feel of how the lab screens looked and so they could look up results for themselves w/o having to call us all the time.

I guided her to the CBC result line and she said, "the status of the test is D-O-N-E, what does that mean?:eek:"

[RR1]

How about the one when you inform the midwives that the baby of an RhD- mum is also Rh D-, and they reply " oh good- so the baby won't need to have any anti-D".

Sometimes you want to cry!

[mrbull]

i had a nurse request a credit for a t4 test...i asked her why would she want it credited?...she stated that the doctor specifically requested a FREE T4!...LOL

[TimOz]

The scariest thing I heard was:

"Where is Mrs Smith's other unit of blood - we ordered 2?"

Taken out of context this may not seem scary but I had delivered her 2 units to the theatre fridge not 20 minutes before. Can you guess where it was?

My first unit of A to an O patient - not Mrs Smith.

[David Saikin]

Tim - I've heard one like that also - except it was, Where is my blood on *****? It went to the floor and went to the wrong patient (an O getting an A) - she did not survive. The scariest part was that they would not draw a specimen for a reaction workup. They said she could not have had a rx because she did not complain (SHE WAS COMATOSE). The Medical Director had to come in at 3 AM and demand a specimen. Surgical ICU/nurse with 17 yrs experience - gave the correctly labeled unit to the incorrect patient.

Edited August 17, 2009 by David Saikin
poor spelling

[TimOz]

Here is a quote from a very experienced Immunohaematologist:

"I don't worry about weak antibodies. What is the worst that can happen? The patient will go a bit yellow and the antibody is easier to find next time!"

Frightening. My reply to this type of attitude is WIIWYD? (What If It Was Your Daughter?)

[Kellpos]

I always loved when a surgeon, while waiting for his crossmatches to finish, and not wanting uncrossmatched blood, would state that "it's your fault if my patient dies"!

[Lekota40]

Love all these replies! My 2 funniest and scariest (do to wondering where the knowedge levels of RNS and MDs are sometimes) was the nurse that came down in the middle of the night to pick up blood on a B pos patient. We crossmatched B Neg as the units were shortdated and we wanted to not waste them as there is many less B neg that B pos patients. She questioned up and down the "wrong blood type" I explained to her the whole its perfectly fine to transfuse Rh neg blood to an Rh pos patient just dont do it the other way. Showed her a blurb in the technical manual stating such as well. She took the blood and returned in about 15 minutes saying there was no way she could give this blood to the patient. Ended up having to call the pathologist on call at like 2 am to explain it was perfectly fine to her and since it was a doctor explaining it she finally took it.

The other scenario is the patient they took to the OR and drew a crossmatch specimen while the patient was on the table that ended up with an antibody. The tech working it up kept trying to explain the delay and the doctor said "well just give me O negative".

[bmarotto]

I always hated getting orders for "salt poor albumin" and having to drag out of them if they wanted 25% or 5% albumin. Even worse is when they order "salt pork albumin". :sarcastic

[Nancy L.]

We also had a doctor (ER physician) who had an A pos patient with a positive antibody screen. He was insistent that he needed blood right away and we offered to have him sign for emergency release. He declined and requested that we just send him O negative blood. I guess they think they "negative" means negative for everything!

In a non-blood banking example, we received a call from the registration clerk at the after hours ER desk stating that a patient was dropping off a stool specimen for culture and C. diff at the request of her doc. We asked that they please register the patient and forward the specimen to us along with the orders. They insisted that the patient didn't need to be registered since we were only receiving the specimen and not the patient. "It's not a patient, it's just a specimen. There's no reason to register the patient." I could almost understand this from some people but you'd think that a registration clerk (who also works in billing) would know better!

[Brenda K Hutson]

i had a nurse request a credit for a t4 test...i asked her why would she want it credited?...she stated that the doctor specifically requested a FREE T4!...LOL

NO WAY!!!!!!

Brenda

[Brenda K Hutson]

Well, along the lines of "scary" scenarios: RN sent for unit on patient (pick-up slip was a duplicate; 1 copy went back with unit and 1 stayed in BB). We received a call a little later for the Nurse, complaining that we sent her blood on the wrong patient (now the fact that she had hung the blood, obviously without checking it with another RN and/or the patient armband, was besides the point). We told her we sent the blood for the patient requested (and we had 1 slip to prove it). So she said, "well that is not the patient I asked the clerk to send for;" still not taking responsibility for her actions. On the good side, the unit was group O so no reaction. On the bad side, the patient's children found out about it; Oh, and did I mention that 1 daughter who was a doctor and a 2nd who was a lawyer?

Moral of the story: If you are going to ***** up, check the family history first!

Brenda Hutson, CLS(ASCP)SBB

[Brenda K Hutson]

Here is a quote from a very experienced Immunohaematologist:

"I don't worry about weak antibodies. What is the worst that can happen? The patient will go a bit yellow and the antibody is easier to find next time!"

Frightening. My reply to this type of attitude is WIIWYD? (What If It Was Your Daughter?)

Ah, the old "increase the titer method of Antibody ID!"

Brenda

[Brenda K Hutson]

Oh, sorry to keep responding to my own post, but your responses remind me of things (and after 26 years in the field, I have heard a lot).

I once had a patient with a positive antibody screen and I needed more specimen for the antibody work-up. I called the floor and told the Nurse we needed 2 more EDTA tubes on the patient. A little while later a biohazard ziploc bag appeared; guess what was in it? 2 EDTA tubes (NO BLOOD in them). Upon calling her, she said she sent what I requested.. for real!!!

Brenda Hutson, CLS(ASCP)SBB

[John C. Staley]

My favorite diagnosis was "acute accident".

My favorite nurse question was "how do you spell CBC".

My favorite physician request was "if the patient has antibodies just wash the blood". We had just got and IMB 2996 cell washer about 2 weeks earlier.

Brenda, this is kinda fun!

[LaraT23]

Okay here are mine:

1. Well if I drew the CBC in the wrong tube and it was red, could you just pour it into the purple one now? Nurse

2. ...Now take this syringe and go draw the patient through the heart muscle, oh it's okay he is already dead he won't feel a thing! ER physician....

[Brenda K Hutson]

My favorite diagnosis was "acute accident".

My favorite nurse question was "how do you spell CBC".

My favorite physician request was "if the patient has antibodies just wash the blood". We had just got and IMB 2996 cell washer about 2 weeks earlier.

Brenda, this is kinda fun!

Yes; what is that saying, "if you don't laugh about it you will go crazy."

You reminded me though of something regarding diagnosis. One Hospital I worked at always entered the diagnosis of patients coming into the ER, as their initial complaint. So we got such Diagnosis as "nausea;" dizzy;" "headache;" etc. So what if the patient was "also" a Bone Marrow Transplant who needed CMV-, IRR, LR blood products!! Details, Details!

Brenda

[L106]

John & Brenda,

Don't get me started about diagnoses!! Two of my favorites were "ball bladder disease" and "sickosellonemia". (I kid you not!)

Donna

[knittie5]

my favorite diagnosis pedestrian vs motor vehicle. please run stat!!:tongue:

[Likewine99]

We had a pt that was an O pos and was scheduled to go to OR. We had 2 directed donors for this pt, both donated by her adult children that were A pos.

I called the surgeon to let him know that we did have the dd's but that they would not be compatible for the pt. The pt was apprehensive about receiving blood from someone she didn't know so the surgeon suggested that "maybe we should send her husband down to donate for her".

As diplomatically as possible, I asked the surgeon if the pt's husband was the father of the children and he said, "of course he is".

I proceeded to explain to the surgeon, diplomatically I might add, that since the kids were group A that the husband was also group A and his blood would not be compatible either. I saved the husband a trip to the blood center!!

[Likewine99]

I ran a CBC on a pediatric sample collected in a Microtainer tube. This patient was in the ED and the plt count was <10,000. I called the ED and asked to speak to whoever had drawn the blood on this pt to see if there was any possibility that this specimen could be clotted.

The doc came on the phone and I explained that I thought it was unusual that the plt count was this low when everything else looked perfectly fine.

I asked if he thought that the spec could maybe be clotted and he said, "I know there aren't any clots in that specimen I removed them myself".

Come to find out, the ED had applicator sticks in the dept and they were checking their specimens for clots prior to submitting them to the lab.

[Brenda K Hutson]

I ran a CBC on a pediatric sample collected in a Microtainer tube. This patient was in the ED and the plt count was <10,000. I called the ED and asked to speak to whoever had drawn the blood on this pt to see if there was any possibility that this specimen could be clotted.

The doc came on the phone and I explained that I thought it was unusual that the plt count was this low when everything else looked perfectly fine.

I asked if he thought that the spec could maybe be clotted and he said, "I know there aren't any clots in that specimen I removed them myself".

Come to find out, the ED had applicator sticks in the dept and they were checking their specimens for clots prior to submitting them to the lab.

Hmmm...kind of missed the point, didn't he?!

Brenda