Ms. Sassy

Hope the interwebz is doing well today.

Last week at clinicals, we were a little slow. I had an easy patient that was up with assist with no AMS or anything. I assumed that that meant it was going to be an easy day. Nope. She had COPD with an O2 sat of 75%, which isn't that bad, but if she would comply with the nasal cannula, it would have been a lot higher....also, everything I asked her to do, she was pissy about. Just general nastiness in my general direction. Not a big deal, but she softened me during our head to toe assessment together. I had just completed the physical part of it, and I was asking how her general health status was, how she felt, if anything new had come up since yesterday, etc:

Me: Do you have any pain anywhere Mrs. X?

Mrs. X: Counting the pain in my ass that you are causing me, one.

Me: Well, on a 1 to 10 scale, with 10 being the worst pain you have ever felt, how would you rate that pain in your rear?

Mrs. X: Fifteen. Now get out of my room.

Deadpan. No smile. It was hilarious. I had to step out of the room after that.

Surgery!

Well, it's been a while folks. Sorry about that. I've got a few things to share though. This semester, we have been doing various rotations. We started out with pediatrics (not my cup of tea thank you very much), we did med surg, surgery, and I go to the wound center soon. Surgery was....interesting. The surgery that I went to was a knee replacement. That was....interesting.

The minute I stepped onto the surgical floor I was swept away, made to change clothes (MUCH more comfortable than our school uniforms), put into a gown and a surgical mask, and put into a room. I got there just in time to....PUT IN MY FIRST MALE CATHETER. It was great. When you do a catheter, it has to be sterile, or you can give someone a urinary tract infection. I wasn't nervous, but breathing my own air in that face mask was fogging up my glasses. I opened the catheter kit, donned my sterile gloves, and went ahead. Now, this is where it gets interesting. You see, you use one hand too....hold the....you know. Okay. Penis. There, I said it. Ha! My understanding that was as long as it was firmly...held...that all was fine. No. Apparently not. The circulating nurse that was helping get the man positioned on the table informed me very loudly that, "Girl, you got a man handle that thing! It'll get away from you and you have to start all over it, really grab it in your fist like a snake!" Suddenly, I felt as though I was at a rodeo and we were discussing pigs, not male genitals. Same thing I guess when you really think about it. Anyhoo, after I had properly grasped the pig snake penis thing, everything went fine after that and the nurses and surgeons clapped like I was at show and tell.

The actual knee replacement was interesting to watch also. It was very brutal and bloody, which I liked. They chiseled, hammered, sawed, hammered some more, drilled scraped and nailed all sorts of pieces in. It was a lot like wood shop, except bloodier. And more sterile. It gave me a better idea of what kind of pain I am treating when I take care of post-op patients. I don't think I want to be a surgical nurse, but it was fun.

HIPPA induced statement: The above x-ray was courtesy of google and in no way had any relation to the patient that I am talking about in the above entry.