Category: medical

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Doctors Share The Funniest ‘My Patient Googled Their Symptoms’ Stories

We’ve all heard the advice to “not Web MD” our symptoms, as in, to not do a deep-dive of our own symptoms on the internet before seeing a doctor.

We could easily become misinformed or even scare ourselves with a disease we don’t have.

Fortunately for doctors, some of the situations they find themselves in are pretty funny.

Redditor squishy0930 asked: 

“Doctors of Reddit, what was the dumbest ‘I read on the internet…’ moment you had with a patient?”

Some doctors took issue with homeopathy.

“I once had a lady come in who clearly didn’t believe in modern medicine, but had to see us for an official diagnosis for her disability application.”

“I remember she probably had fibromyalgia, admittedly a very difficult condition to manage. She presented me with a report written by a complete quack (and I use this term very rarely but it applies here).”

“This ‘practitioner’ had taken a strand of hair and run a ‘DNA’ test on it for some significant amount of money. The whole report went through all her symptoms and decided that because the patient had lived in a moldy house 10 years ago, all her symptoms were caused by residual mold in her body.”

“Specifically named her kidneys, heart, nervous system, and brain as having mold in. Then recommended a homeopathic remedy to fix it. The patient had swallowed this story hook, line, and sinker, and nothing I could say would dissuade her.”

“It’s the only time I have tried to track down a therapist of any kind to try to report them. Funnily enough, they chose not to respond to my e-mails or telephone messages.” – clickygirl

“Not a doctor. As a transplant recipient, I have to take immunosuppressant medication for the rest of my life. There are studies that some people do come off them completely, but it’s such a huge risk to take that it may trigger organ rejection.”

“A family member of mine still can’t grasp how a life-saving surgery provided by western medicine which initially saved my life, is still keeping me back from living my life. He suggested that I get off my immune suppressants because I am a cash cow for big pharma.” – mango_invasion

“You’d be amazed at how many people tell me (type 1 diabetic) that I could get out from big pharma and my dependency on insulin if I just eat right…”

“I’m skinny and otherwise healthy. Type 1 is autoimmune disorder that must always take insulin due to the pancreas no longer creating any on its own…”

“These conversations are often met with a blank stare by me.” – BearXW

A few had experiences with Gout symptoms.

“Conversation I had with a doctor a few days ago:”

“Me: ‘So I was told that if I can identify what food I am eating that is giving me gout I can avoid it and won’t have as many flare-ups, is that right?’”

“Doctor: Literally laughs out loud ‘Aaaaaaaaaaa no. Evidence for dietary-based management of gout is very sketchy at best. Take the pills. Where did you even hear that?’”

“Me: ‘Your nurse said it to me…?’” – reverendmalerick

“I suffer from gout. I was diagnosed with it last summer and had to go through various combinations of pills to work out strength and dose I needed to manage it.”

“Anyway, my Mum tried telling me it was because I drank too much beer. I ate too much red meat. All stuff she’d googled.”

“Doctor told me that they don’t fully know the cause and that he knows professional athletes that have struggled with it. I’m not saying I’m a professional athlete. But it made me better knowing it can be literally anybody.”

“On the downside. The bouts I have had have been some of the worst most consistent pain I have ever endured. I literally wanted to chop my foot off to stop it. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Gout is horrific.” – highlander2189

There were stories about using medical products… wrong.

“Had a pt prescribed NuvaRing for birth control to be inserted vaginally. Ring lays around the cervix. She came in complaining it was too tight and needed a bigger one. Shows wrist, pulling on a tight ring to show how was cutting off blood supply to hand. “ – wereallmadh3r3

“Not a doc (nurse) but my doctor friend who works in the ER had a patient with a few garlic cloves stuck deep in her vagina because she had read on the internet it helps with certain infections and yeast.”

“(I realize garlic does have antibacterial properties but needs to be used appropriately and with caution.)” – Professional-Quote59

“As a general surgery resident on the colorectal surgery service, we do a lot of hemorrhoids, anal fissures, etc.”

“One of my colleagues prescribed a cream for a middle-aged woman and she later called back and asked if the cream would still work while she was on vacation in Hawaii.”

“Uh, yes it will, why? She replied, ‘Because I was told to apply it locally.’” – TypeADissection

Some instances were actually horrific. 

“I’m an RN. A patient with diabetic foot ulcers read on the internet that salt would dry them up.”

“He put his foot in two plastic shopping bags w/rock salt & turned his foot into prosciutto basically.”

“Had to ‘carve/amputate’ most of his foot. He has forever been nicknamed ‘hammy’ by me.” – scottylynn77

“Had a patient come in with horrid cellulitis because they thought they read that putting dirt in a cut would help stimulate their immune system. It did for all the wrong reasons.” – captainspalding232

There were also some interesting stories about alcohol.

“I’m not a doctor, but I did take my very elderly Nana to the hospital after I showed up to her house and found her slurring her words and behaving very strange overall.”

“Now, my Nana is a major hypochondriac, and when she was admitted the first thing she told the doctor is that she believed she was experiencing the beginning signs of Parkinson’s.”

“It turned out that she had mixed up a bottle of non-alcoholic wine with a bottle of regular wine, had drunk the entire bottle, and was completely hammered.” – Pygmalion335

“My grandmother was not an alcoholic, per se, but she was accustomed to having a glass of wine in the evening. As the years passed on, one glass turned to two, two glasses turned to three, probably to help her sleep.”

“Given that she was living alone, we didn’t actually know how many glasses she usually drank, except that it had been increasing over time.”

“She ended up at a nursing facility at one point, and it was pretty clear she was deteriorating and would pass away in the coming months. The nursing facility wouldn’t allow alcohol.”

“With the anger and stubbornness that sometimes shows itself with advanced age, my grandmother was livid and just refused to accept this.”

“My mom talked to the nursing home staff. My mom basically said that she’s really sorry but grandma is adamant, she’s at the end of her life so a 12-step program isn’t really in the plan, and given that no one really knows what her previous alcohol intake was, they also weren’t sure what would happen in terms of detoxing.”

“The nurses said it was against their policy and they didn’t really have a choice, unless it was prescribed from a doctor.”

“So, my mom talked to her doctor, and the doctor ended up writing a prescription for 1-2 glasses of sherry every evening, which she had for the rest of her days.” – longjumpcamel

Though it’s important for us to be informed about how we can better take care of ourselves and stay healthy, there are certain instances when it’s better to talk to a doctor instead of the internet.

Clearly from these stories, there are instances where research will cause more harm than good.

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13 Ridiculous Reasons People Lost Their Jobs

Losing your job sucks. It can mess with your head and your self confidence.

Getting fired brings so any new worries, at a time when you don’t have the headspace to deal with them.

But it’s even worse, when you’ve already got a lot going on.

1. How long is too long though?

Are we talking days? Hours?

A good boss might have suggested a nice fiber supplement.

Image credit: Whisper

2. I’m sensing a theme

Why are employers so obsessed with potty breaks?

What do they think you’re doing in there?

Image caption: Whisper

3. They were afraid she’d spend all day crying in the bathroom?

This one is so heartless I don’t even know what to say.

Image caption: Whisper

4. Don’t they know there’s a movie about this?

They were afraid she’d stay after hours to make amazing new flavors of pie.

Image credit: Whisper

5. What a headache

Whether or not it’s wrongful termination, you gotta hope karma gets them in the end.

Image credit: Whisper

6. I guess that’s one way to avoid a lawsuit?

Or to get out of paying short term disability?

Image credit: Whisper

7. It’s called the Emergency Room for a reason, guys

It’s nice to actually see one where the good guy wins.

Image credit: Whisper

8. I guess their boss wasn’t a family man

Anti-family, even. Just wow.

Image credit: Whisper

9. There’s a special place in hell for this employer

I mean, what exactly is a “good excuse” if not this?

Image credit: Whisper

10. Pretty sure working there would give me a panic attack

That guy can join the other one in The Bad Place.

Image credit: Whisper

11. Do they think it’s a gourmet celery restaurant?

No, really, do they?

Image credit: Whisper

12. If they didn’t immediately get their job back then this one wins them all

I mean, you can get a doctor’s note for that right?

Image credit: Whisper

13. I feel like there’s got to be a better way to say it

Somehow I’m in awe of both the worker and the boss.

Image credit: Whisper

I don’t think I’ve ever heard such awful reasons–beyond the workers’ control–for being let go from a job.

What about you? Share your story in the comments.

The post 13 Ridiculous Reasons People Lost Their Jobs appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

13 Ridiculous Reasons People Lost Their Jobs

Losing your job sucks. It can mess with your head and your self confidence.

Getting fired brings so any new worries, at a time when you don’t have the headspace to deal with them.

But it’s even worse, when you’ve already got a lot going on.

1. How long is too long though?

Are we talking days? Hours?

A good boss might have suggested a nice fiber supplement.

Image credit: Whisper

2. I’m sensing a theme

Why are employers so obsessed with potty breaks?

What do they think you’re doing in there?

Image caption: Whisper

3. They were afraid she’d spend all day crying in the bathroom?

This one is so heartless I don’t even know what to say.

Image caption: Whisper

4. Don’t they know there’s a movie about this?

They were afraid she’d stay after hours to make amazing new flavors of pie.

Image credit: Whisper

5. What a headache

Whether or not it’s wrongful termination, you gotta hope karma gets them in the end.

Image credit: Whisper

6. I guess that’s one way to avoid a lawsuit?

Or to get out of paying short term disability?

Image credit: Whisper

7. It’s called the Emergency Room for a reason, guys

It’s nice to actually see one where the good guy wins.

Image credit: Whisper

8. I guess their boss wasn’t a family man

Anti-family, even. Just wow.

Image credit: Whisper

9. There’s a special place in hell for this employer

I mean, what exactly is a “good excuse” if not this?

Image credit: Whisper

10. Pretty sure working there would give me a panic attack

That guy can join the other one in The Bad Place.

Image credit: Whisper

11. Do they think it’s a gourmet celery restaurant?

No, really, do they?

Image credit: Whisper

12. If they didn’t immediately get their job back then this one wins them all

I mean, you can get a doctor’s note for that right?

Image credit: Whisper

13. I feel like there’s got to be a better way to say it

Somehow I’m in awe of both the worker and the boss.

Image credit: Whisper

I don’t think I’ve ever heard such awful reasons–beyond the workers’ control–for being let go from a job.

What about you? Share your story in the comments.

The post 13 Ridiculous Reasons People Lost Their Jobs appeared first on UberFacts.

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A Botched Surgery Causes Pubic Hair to Grow on a Woman’s Face

It’s hard to deal with traumatic events – things like a dog biting a hole in your face, for instance. That’s exactly what happened to Crystal Coombs when she was 9 years old, according to People.

It bit an actual hole, in her face.

“It was open for a while. Like how the outside of Freddie Kruger’s face looks, with the burn? That’s what the inside looked like.”

That was clearly a horrible experience for a 9-year-old child, but her saga doesn’t end there.

The video below explains a bit more about why Coombs is seeking help from Botched, a reality TV series that connects people to doctors who help them after a past botched surgery.

Coombs reveals that she had a hole in her face for a good while before she eventually sought help. Though her doctor fixed her wound, unfortunately, there were some complications to the surgery that her doctor didn’t warn her about. She says,

“He suggested the skin graft, [and to] take it from the groin. They did the surgery, and then the hair started growing.”

Coombs has been growing pubic hair on her face since that surgery. And, in fact, the show’s Dr. Terry Dubrow told her that it’s rare for a doctor to grab a patch of skin from the groin in order to do this type of surgery, for this exact reason.

“They could’ve done the back, the abdomen. You obviously wouldn’t do the armpits.”

Typically, doctors do try and match skin as well as possible before a graft, but that appears not to have been a concern this time,

The show’s doctors did say that – hair aside – Coombs’ original surgeon did a good job with the surgery, and that they’d have to be careful with her next corrective surgery. It looks like Coombs will be fine soon enough.

What do you think of Crystal Coombs’ predicament? We’re all ears for your opinion in the comments!

The post A Botched Surgery Causes Pubic Hair to Grow on a Woman’s Face appeared first on UberFacts.

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10 Doctors Share Their Most Shocking Anti-Vax Horror Stories

At the risk of potentially getting some angry comments from a few folks, I’m gonna go ahead and say it: vaccines are a marvel of modern medicine that have saved countless lives, and any potential negative side effects (such as they are – the most commonly-feared ones have been widely disproved) are vastly outweighed by the benefits.

Many doctors have experienced real-life horror stories in their dealings with anti-vaxxers. Recently, we found out a few of these stories when a Reddit user posted the question, “Doctors of Reddit, what are some of your anti-vax parent stories?”

Brace yourselves. Some of these will shock you.

1. An odd rationalization

“Had a kid come in for generic upper respiratory virus. Asked mom if he was vaccinated, as is routine. She said no. When I asked why not, her response was “Well my boyfriend was vaccinated and he still got meningitis, so they don’t even work”

I told her that’s the same as saying your friend got bruised by a seat belt in a car accident, so you don’t wear them when you drive.”

2.This is shockingly heart-breaking

“I’ve told this story before, but the worst was when I was in medical school. The woman actually brought her daughter in to get catchup vaccines. Why? Because her other daughter was in the ICU with fulminant meningitis from a vaccine-preventable illness, hanging on for dear life. The nurse there sat her down and told her point-blank that she rarely sees this disease because people are vaccinated for it. The mom couldn’t understand how her girl had contracted it. We asked if she knew anyone who wasn’t vaccinated. Apparently no one in her church vaccinated, and several had been sick recently. She couldn’t believe the source could be them. The kicker? She also brought her son to clinic, but refused to vaccinate him, saying “he’s my only son”. No matter how we explained it to her, she believed giving her son the vaccine would result in brain damage.”

3. Doctors understand the dangers if only we’d listen

“Doctor here. Guy decided to not get a flu shot this year. Ended up in the ICU with flu infection in his brain He has currently been in the hospital for a month most of which in the ICU. Has likely permanent speech difficulty and left sided weakness.”

4. Unbelievable!

“Child A had an absolutely horrible time with chicken pox; to the point that I thought he might not make it. So what does she do? Intentionally expose Child B to it.”

5. Real talk from Dad

“Friend of mine is a military OBGYN. Was at a OB appointment with the pregnant dependent and servicemember. He had just returned from AFG a few months prior.

OB mentions about follow-ups after delivery in 1st year of life, including vaccines.

Wife says: ‘I read on the internet that vaccines cause autism, I don’t think we’re going to do that.’

Husband says: ‘I saw a lot of little graves in Afghanistan, sure as sh!t we are getting our kid vaccinated.’”

6. And vaccines have bad side-effects?

“I had a kid come in that was super sick. 3 years old and in septic shock. He had the flu and another compounded viral infection (I want to say pertussis). Heart rate was close to 200, respiratory rate in the 50s, blood pressure in the 70s. Kid was so fucking dry that we could barely get IVs into him and I almost had to drill an IO. We dumped a ton of fluids into him, started him on vasopressors and transferred him to the local children’s hospital.

I had asked the mom if he was vaccinated and she said “No, vaccines have really bad side effects! They’ll make you sick.” I explained to her that NOT getting the vaccines had made her kid 10 times sicker than he ever would have been from any mild vaccine reaction. She told me I was a moron and that I obviously have no clue what I’m talking and that’s the reason her kid was getting transferred…. She also told me that recommending she vaccinate her kids was racist.”

Photo Credit: Quick Meme

7. Anti-vax beliefs pushed to the extreme

“We had a 14 year old female come in for abdominal pain one time. She weighed 80 pounds. Looked sickly. Her mother refused to let her eat anything but a handful of things, nothing with very much protein at all. She literally had a binder full of articles about how horrible vaccines are, all the bad things they put in food these days, etc. She had completely brain washed this kid so the kid believed it too. Her labs showed malnutrition, her teeth were horrible. Just a sad case all around.”

8. This doctor knows what’s up

“When I was a med student, I had a parent who wanted to do a ‘delayed vaccination schedule’. Basically it means that you get all the same vaccinations but you pointlessly and foolishly do it over a longer time period. The mom had read a book promoting this practice that was unfortunately written by an MD. My pediatric attending had zero chill: ‘Is that the book written by Dr __? Yes? Well, then you should know that I was in the same medical school class as Dr __ but I got much better scores than he did.’”

Photo Credit: Make a Meme

9. A secret vaccination?

“I’m not a medical doctor but a mental health therapist, went to do a new client intake and while asking the mother about the kid’s medical history, vaccination records etc she said he was not vaccinated because vaccines cause autism and she didn’t want to risk her son getting it, then when I went to meet the kid within 5 seconds of laying eyes on him I could tell… he was autistic. Worst part was that when I told her she became very upset and started yelling at her husband saying he must have gotten the kid secretly vaccinated and then immediately ran out the house and took the kid to the emergency room for “testing” and just left me and the dad in the living room just kind of staring at eachother. Never answered my calls or texts again after that and I had to get DCF involved.”

10. Excuse me?

“This one time this lady came in for a check up. The child had not been vaccinated yet and I told her she needed to vaccinate him. She said that she didn’t want any needles touching him because she didn’t want him to get autism from the needles. She wanted him to get an ass spray of the vaccine. To this day it left me very confused and I told her we didn’t do that so she left. Maybe an anti-vax but idk anymore.”

Photo Credit: Make a Meme

Please do your research to understand the down-sides of not vaccinating your children. A preventable death is the ultimate tragedy.

The post 10 Doctors Share Their Most Shocking Anti-Vax Horror Stories appeared first on UberFacts.

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Doctors Reveal 12+ of the Dumbest Patients They’ve Ever Experienced

The next time you get yourself in a difficult medical situation…just let a doctor handle it. There’s a reason why they went through years of medical school.

So, listen up to these doctors on Reddit who shared stories of the dumbest patients they ever encountered.

Caution: extreme stupidity ahead.

1. Bite The Sun

“I’m a general practitioner, and the most outrageous thing I’ve heard was from a boy who was something like 20-22 years old. He was from an impoverished, illiterate family. The boy had a bad case of tonsillitis and refused to take any medication because all he needed to do was ‘bite the sun.’ Basically, at noon, he had to look up to the sun, open his mouth as wide as possible and ‘bite’ the sun several times so it would ‘burn’ his tonsils and cure him over the course of a couple of weeks. When that wouldn’t work, plan B was to do the same at night but only under a full moon.”

2. Yikes

“I had a 34-year-old who popped a pimple on his privates with a needle after cleaning it by putting it in his mouth. Yeah, he ended up losing everything.

A 72-year-old recently had a heart stent placement and started having similar chest pain at night around 10 p.m.

He decided to stay in all night and try to sleep through it. He popped ten aspirin overnight and came to an urgent care instead of a hospital. He was not doing so hot when he left our care.

Another guy, a mid-20s male shot his junk off.

Now he lives with a hole in it.

This other time a young female jumped off the balcony just so that she can get some pain meds. I loaded her up and intubated her.

A guy had a room freshener spray stuck in his butt.

They had to take him to the operating room. I don’t know what he was thinking. It’s a vacuum when you shove stuff up there!

Another good one was when this dude pulled out his catheter just because he was angry at medical staff.

Yeah, that didn’t help with the situation. He realized later what mistake he made and how painful it’s going to be for him for a while.”

3. His butt hurt

“In the wee hours of the morning, a doctor friend of mine got called to see a trauma consult. It was a guy who reportedly wandered into the ER stating he’d just come from a bus stop across the street from the hospital.

He had just woken up there and realized that he was missing his wallet… as well as all of his clothing from the waist down.

What, you ask, would prompt an indecently-clothed man to march barefoot across a busy downtown road, in a big city, by the dawn’s early light to seek assistance in the ER?

Shame be condemned… his butt hurt.

My friend did an appropriate workup and discovered a large chunk of broken-off concrete lodged in this gentleman’s rectum. It required an operation to retrieve it. However, before they whisked him off to the OR, the patient confessed the rest of the story:

He’d hooked up with two strange men off of Craigslist, and they’d gone out in one guy’s awesome sports car, used copious amounts of illicit substances, and done… well, at that point, he wasn’t too sure just what they’d done.

All he remembered was waking up at the bus station with no pants and a rock up his butt.

While my friend was still in the ER with the guy getting consent for the operation… the patient’s very worried wife walked in.”

4. Google Master

“I am an ER doctor and recently had a young male patient who came in for about the fifth time complaining of abdominal pain and vomiting. Looking over his records from past visits, I could see that his symptoms had previously been attributed to either acid reflux and gastritis or cyclic vomiting syndrome due to daily heavy substance use. Anyway, he’d been told to take Nexium twice a day and cut back on the drinking, as well as follow up with a GI doctor, but he had done none of those things.

Instead, he tells me, ‘Doc, I Googled my symptoms and I’m sure I have stomach cancer. My mom has cancer too, so she gave me some of her chemo-therapy pills and I started taking those.’

So, yeah, guy ignored the medical diagnoses and recommendations he was given and instead decided he had stomach cancer and treated himself by taking his mother’s chemotherapy pills. He wasn’t sure what kind of cancer his mom had.

I tried to explain that different cancers require different medications, that chemotherapies are the most toxic medications we made and might kill him. He was very unlikely at his age to have stomach cancer and much more likely to have over-production of stomach acid for which he should take the medicines he was prescribed the last several times he came to the ER.”

5. A drinking emergency

“Had an old coot (best possible description of the man) who was sweet but had spent his adult years drinking away whatever brain cells he had when he started. He presented with the chief complaint, ‘I can’t drink anymore. Every time I drink one, I just throw it back up a few minutes later.’

Well, it turns out he hadn’t been able to eat actual food in months, was subsisting on pretty much just liquid, and hadn’t gone number 2 in over two weeks.

That didn’t bother him a bit – until he couldn’t drink. Then it was an emergency!

He had a big ol’ tumor blocking the distal part of his left colon (so near the end of the road, intestinally speaking), and everything gradually got backed up all the way to his stomach. That’s why he couldn’t keep a drink down – there was just no more room at the inn.

I fixed him with a colostomy, and he got better and left. He refused chemo, and I figured he’d just go home and die of cancer. However, almost exactly one year later, he came back to me with just about the same complaint – obstructed to the point of not being able to drink.

Except for this time, it was that his ostomy had essentially retracted into his abdomen and the skin had nearly grown shut over it.

He was pooping out of a teeny-tiny hole in his skin. WHAT?

Even my oldest partners had never seen anything like it, but once again Cooter wasn’t remotely fazed. He just wanted us to fix it so he could go home and keep drinking.

I did. Haven’t seen Cooter since. I kind of hope he’s still out there, treating his cancer with suds and just blissfully ignoring the Grim Reaper.”

6. Might want to double check those instructions…

“There was a patient who was upset to find out that she was pregnant again because she’d used her diaphragm EXACTLY as she’d been told. She carefully inspected it for holes, applied the spermicide, placed it, wore it at night, then took it out, cleaned it and put it away each morning… and then her husband arrived home from his night-shift.”

7. Some explaining to do

“We responded in the ambulance to a place that is… well, it’s different. We go hot for a 13-year-old girl with abdominal pain.

We get there, and she’s lying on the couch, surrounded by family. She’s uncomfortable but able to laugh and joke that her stomach hurts.

It feels ‘crampy’ for the last two days and she has had blood trickling out from her privates.

This happened last month too, then about a month before that. She has had to go home from school each time.

She is surrounded by women. Her mother (late-20s), her grandmother (40s), great-grandmother (early 60s) and great-great-grandmother (mid-70s). Every one of them is flabbergasted as to what this could be.

So, here I am, a 30-year-old dude of a very different ethnic and cultural background, asking all sorts of uncomfortable questions.

‘Have any of you explained to her about periods?’ No. Clearly not. No one here has been NOT pregnant for a long enough time to understand that they come more or less regularly, roughly once a month.

We took her in any way.

Better safe than sorry. At least us and the nurses could explain some things to her. Clearly, no one else could.”

8. Full contact

“I worked in the ER during my internship and met a girl who had increasingly painful and red eyes since a couple of days back. The last 24 hours had been horrible. I asked about all the normal stuff, and she claimed to have no idea why she had an eye problem – she had never had anything wrong with her eyes.

I proceeded to drop some dye in her eyes to check them under a microscope, and when I did, I realized she was wearing contacts.

She didn’t like her natural eye color, so she had bought a set of blue colored lenses eight months earlier.

Never removed them, not even during night time. She didn’t even think to mention this to me, claimed to have no ‘foreign materials’ in her eyes.

I gave her quite the harsh lecture and a referral to an ophthalmologist.”

9. Home Improvement

“I worked in a private WASP hospital in a very affluent community. This meant I missed out on injuries from gang violence but got to see some of the dumbest attempts at home improvements ever. I will list my favorite.

So, two guys are attempting to lay hardwood flooring.

They have no clue what they are doing, but what the heck. They rip up the old flooring, lay down some plywood and start to lay down their nice antique hardwood boards. At this point, they have an issue.

How does one find the studs in the floor when they are covered by the larger plywood panels?

Well, being geniuses, they decide to send one guy to the floor below and have him call out under the beam and have the guy fire his nail compressor over the sound.

There are so many issues at this stage that it is amazing. I have no clue why they thought this plan was a good idea. So tempting to start smacking them around at this point… but had to be professional and just let them keep going.

Sure enough, the guy on the top floor missed a beam, fires the way over-powered tool into plywood, it goes through the weaker first layer of flooring, shoots the guy on the bottom floor in the head.

They know the nail missed the beam (there is a hole to prove it) but can not locate the nail.

Oddly enough, the patient was fine. The nail grazed his skull and entered the skin, then settled behind his ear.

It was a very sore bump. He assumed the nail had hit him on the way by and initially, didn’t want to come in, but the friend insisted on it since they could not find the missing nail.

Great x rays, couldn’t keep them.”

10. Smelly

“I was an intern in the ER. I have seen a lot of stupid people; it was a small town and all. The worst I think was when I walked in, and the floor smelled like… I don’t even know. It was by far the worst thing I had ever smelled.

I asked a passing nurse what the smell was, and he just shrugged his shoulders and told me, someone, probably poop everywhere.

Well, the doctor is preparing to go into this room, but I did not expect what would happen next.

He opened the door, and I almost barfed. It was extremely hard to keep my professional composure.

The guy had his leg wrapped up. The doctor asked him to unwrap it, and it was gangrene. From his foot up to the middle of his thigh.

The smell I had been smelling was rotting flesh. The cause? ‘The four-wheeler I was riding caught fire six months ago.’”

11. Nothing a little Jack can’t fix

“As an Army medic, I have had some dumb patients. One of the first guys I treated got nasty road rash from a motorcycle crash and decided to treat it himself by pouring Jack Daniels on it. By the time he came to the medics, it was pretty bad, and I had to do debridement with a scrub brush: scrubbing the bad parts off with plastic bristles.

He was in a lot of pain, and I was trying not to laugh at him.

We once had a guy who had the tip of his finger amputated. His first question was, ‘will this grow back?’

One guy had a sore back, and while I was doing the physical exam, he said, ‘Doc, my spine is curved (it wasn’t).

That’s why my nose is crooked.’

Medics all have lots of fun stories.”

12. Baby only likes the good stuff

“I grew up in Upstate New York, where my dad had his practice (he’s an OB/GYN). Genesee Brewery was nearby, so it was a fairly popular adult beverage brand with the locals.

A patient came into the office for a prenatal checkup.

As part of his follow up, he asked if they were drinking anything they shouldn’t so that he could tell them to avoid it.

The woman reassured him that her drinking habit was fine. ‘Oh, don’t worry Doctah!

I drink da good stuff. I drink Genny Cream!’

My dad then had to explain that even if she’s drinking the ‘good stuff,’ she still can’t have it when pregnant. She honestly thought that if she had ‘good’ stuff, it’d be fine for the baby.

Yikes. Plus, I think Genesse Cream is pretty awful to begin with, which makes the story funnier.”

13. He drove himself

“I’m a surgical resident, and one that comes to mind while I was on the cardiothoracic service was a gentleman that came in through the trauma bay with a stab wound to the chest. He reported (after we fixed the rather large hole in his right ventricle) that he was just visiting a friend and while on the stoop of the building, a random stranger stabbed him with a sword from a 1st-floor window.

He proceeded to laugh, get back in his car with his buddies and drive home, despite the rather profuse bleeding from his chest. He drove home and then eventually decided he should go to the hospital. He drove BY HIMSELF to the hospital.

The last thing he remembered was being on the way to the hospital. Lucky jerk was found in the parking lot. He had passed out in his car. He eventually made it to the OR and walked away just fine.”

14. Too many to count

“There are several close calls. There was the patient who fixed an appointment for a pedicure the day after open heart surgery. He said that he’d just sneak out of the ICU and that nobody would notice.

Then there was the patient who had an amputation of half of his foot and decided that it would be a good idea to walk to the toilet after returning to his room, covering the floor in bloody footsteps because the suture ripped open again.

Then the patient who said that he didn’t have any previous operations, but was covered in scars. When asked about each of them, he suddenly remembered having about 15 surgeries for various accidents.

The patient who forgot that he had his kidney, spleen, and part of the colon removed (because of a tumor).

There was one patient who decided that he’d never take more than three pills a day (because obviously taking more than three pills a day is going to kill you). He was on four or five different meds at that time, and just chose at random which meds he was going to take which day.”

15. Better safe than sorry

“I still remember a guy coming to the hospital with his girlfriend and asking for the morning after pill. I asked them when did the intercourse happen and he says, ‘Well, I wouldn’t call it exactly intercourse, but my girlfriend would feel much more relaxed if she took the pill.’

I asked, ‘Could you define the nature of your contact?’

He says, ‘Well… uh… my girlfriend is pure, so we don’t ‘do it,’ but last night we were in our underwear, and we were cuddling, and I came a bit in my underwear, and then we kept cuddling, and my wet underwear was touching her thigh.

So maybe something found its way into her?”

16. How else?

“I had a marine once who came to me complaining of a rash to his right forearm for two weeks. This was his first visit for the issue and hadn’t had anything like this before. He was worried since he reported worsening symptoms since initial onset.

When asking about prior skin issues, he told me he had ringworm just before THIS rash.

I look at his arm, it looked like a mild second-degree chemical burn in a rather circular shape, with blisters on the edges. What got me was the exact definition in the burn edge. Asking the young LCPL how he got that he replied, ‘Well that’s the burn I got from the bleach I poured on my arm.’

When I ask him WHY he poured bleach on his arm he says, ‘Well, how else was I going to kill the ringworm?’”

17. Don’t miss it

“I have the grandma, the mom, and the teen in the room. The teen is pregnant, but this apparently is a good thing. There are no fathers/grandfathers/boyfriends/jobs in the picture, but everyone decided it was about time a new generation was added to the family lineage.

Apparently, the teen did not appreciate the fatigue, full bladder, back pain, etc., that go along with being pregnant and is also experiencing some cramping pains. She demands that we do a C-section because she’s tired of being pregnant (even though she’s still not far enough along) because then we can just hook up the premie in an incubator to finish growing and the government can just pay for the (incredibly expensive) ICU stay.

My jaw just dropped.

Then there was the lady wearing short shorts and no underwear who raised her leg and showed me the puss-filled wound on her labia … while in the middle of the waiting room.

I don’t miss rural OB/Gyn experiences.”

18. Cement cast

“Turns out using cement as a DIY cast for your broken (but not reset) leg is a bad idea. Turns out the chemicals in the cement irritate and dissolve your skin. A patient became septic and almost died by the time he presented for medical care.

Emergency Medicine – preventing natural selection one stupid person at a time.”

19. The thirst and the energy

“As a med student, myself and another student took a history from a guy who drank several (10+) cups of tea a day with six sugars in each one ‘for my thirst’ and had six meals a day of four bacon sandwiches, with butter, ‘for the energy.’

That’s all he had every day.

That’s it. He couldn’t understand why his heart disease wasn’t getting better, why he’d put on weight, why he was now showing high blood sugar and was borderline diabetic.”

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10 Facts You Might Not Know About Migraines

There’s not much worse than having a terrible headache – except, perhaps, having a terrible headache that won’t go away. It’s not just a headache, either. Migraines are often associated with nausea, dizziness, fatigue, sensitivity to light and sound, and sometimes temporary blindness.

Sounds pretty awful, right?

If this is news to you, here are 10 more facts you might not have known, either.

#10. They may be hereditary.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Most people find that their migraines run in the family – between 80%-90% of sufferers say that at least one family member also has them. If one parent has migraine headaches, children have a 50% chance of dealing with them, too.

#9. They’re the 3rd most common disease in the world.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

One good reason to learn about migraines is that chances are good that someone in your life suffers – they affect 14.7% of the population, or 1 in every 7 people. That’s 39 million people, just in the US.

#8. Veterans are more likely to suffer.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

After a 12-month deployment in Iraq, one study found that 36% of returning veterans exhibited symptoms. The cause stems often from head or neck trauma sustained during service, and most go away within a few months.

#7.  Women are also more likely to suffer.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Even though women make up 50% of the population, they make up 75% of migraine sufferers worldwide. Due to laboratory research, most medical experts attribute this to the cyclical nature of female hormones.

#6. Research is underfunded.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Last year, the National Institutes of Health invested just $22 million in migraine research – while asthma, breast cancer, and diabetes receive between $286 million and $1.1 billion.

#5. Some people experience “auras” as warning signs.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Even more than nausea, dizziness, and headache arrive, some people (around 25%) experience numbness or tingling in the hands or face, or blotches of light or darkness disrupting their vision. These typically occur anywhere from 10-30 minutes before a migraine develops.

#4. It costs a lot of money annually.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Because migraines are so widespread, they do havea widespread negative societal impact. Workers take time off from jobs – some estimates say up to 113 millionwork days are missed annually, which can add up to $13 billion in costs.

#3. One rare symptom is the loss of limb function.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

It’s called hemiplegic migraine and people who experience it can have weakness, numbness, tingling, or loss or motor function in part or even half of their body. The sensations typically dissipate within 24 hours.

#2. Migraines are linked to depression.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

In the US, up to 40% of migraine sufferers also deal with depression. The risks of anxiety, bipolar disorder, and panic disorder are also elevated for people who get migraines. Researchers are still working out why the link exists, but they suspect the brain chemical serotonin, which is involved in both mental illness and migraines, may play a role.

#1. Kids can get them, too.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

10% of school-aged kids will report migraines and are reported as the third most common reason for children’s emergency room visits. They have similar symptoms, though nausea and stomach pain can often be more pronounced. The good news is that, according to one study, 23% of children will report “outgrowing” their migraines by age 25.

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12 Times the Routine “Sexual History” Question Went Weird

The sexual history question is supposed to be routine. It’s there to cover bases and help doctors and nurses check off boxes and eliminate variables, or lead them to the source of a potential problem.

But, as these 12 stories from doctors, nurses, and patients can attest, when the subject of sex is invoked, the routine can swiftly veer into the absurd:

#1. Be Cool

When I was in year seven, probably 11 or 12 years old, I had broken my foot in a way that needed a minor surgery, so my cute twentysomething nurse was asking me the pre questions with my dad.

When she got to the personal part, she asked if I wanted my dad to leave the room, I said no, because, whatever.

When she asked if I was sexually active, I turned to my dad and said in a loud whisper, “I want her to think I’m cool.”

#2. Socially Active

The best response I’ve heard to this question was from a quiet guy in my freshman college English class.

Somehow our discussion on vaccines led to this topic, and he told a story about his doctor asking if he was sexually active.

His perfect response was, “Bro, I’m not even socially active.”

#3. Sweet Ride

One of my classmates was asking a 75 year old woman with dementia about her occupation for a PT exam.

Her response: “I give blowjobs in my garage to afford my sweet ride.”

#4. “Not that that would change a thing, though.”

I’m a hospital corpsman (navy medic) and I had this older retired salty dog as a patient a while ago.

His wife had passed away, but I didn’t know that.

When I asked if was sexually active he said, “Well, no for two reasons: I’m married, and she’s dead. Not that that would change a thing, though.”

I felt terrible, and then he just started laughing and told me not to feel bad.

Seriously caught me off guard though.

Crusty old bastard!

#5. Huge Difference

My doctor was just telling me a story…

Back when they first started performing vasectomies, doctors had to call their patients back for standard follow up questioning a number of weeks after the procedure.

He told me he got the same answers from all of the couples he interviewed:

Any Sensation change? -No, Any performance Change? – No… etc.

This went on and on… until one day, he asked a couple if there was anything different after the procedure. Any changes at all….

The wife said YES… There is a huge difference since he had the surgery.

My doc was very surprised, and when he inquired further, the wife said, “It tastes different”…

He said it was all he could do to keep from laughing as he made the note of, “Seminal fluid tastes different after procedure”

#6. Lottery

I told my doctor back in high school that I wasn’t sexually active and she said:

“And you go to ______ High School?! I should play the lottery!”

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Medical Pros Reveal the Most NSFW Situations They Encountered at Work

A lot of us like to stay away from NSFW content at work.

Hence the acronym…

But, what if the NSFW actually happens at work?

Well, I suppose you take to AskReddit, and you start sharing those stories.

At least that’s what these 18 doctors, nurses, and vets did:

#1. That should do it

“A person thought pouring Lysol on their diabetic foot-ulcer would keep it from getting infected.”

#2. Ugh!

“An obese women came back to the hospital after an abdominal operation, because her staples had ripped off, and she didn’t notice (!?!).

She now had a huge v-shape gash at least 2 inches deep from her pubis to the diaphragm. We had to clean that gash a couple of times a day.

The first student that went into the room fainted at the site of it, so our teacher asked me to do it (I had the reputation of being tough).

Imagine a small yellow and green river coming out of her each time she moved. The smell was so horrible that we had to opened the window and close the door.

Sadly, that poor woman died of the infection a couple of days later.”

#3. Good job parents!

“A patient’s extended family physically stopped us from resuscitating a completely limp and unresponsive newborn because helping it breathe, ‘isn’t natural. Labor is natural and requires no intervention.’

Baby eventually and slowly perked up about 15 minutes later.

Needless to say, I don’t expect this baby to go to Harvard.”

#4. Kind of like ‘The Walking Dead’

“I had a homeless patient come into the dermatology clinic. He had a filthy bed sheet wrapped around his head, with only part of the left side of his face and left eye exposed.

You could see the rancid stink coming off of his head.

We got him in the exam room and unwrapped his noggin. Turns out he had a basal cell carcinoma (skin cancer) for which he had refused treatment, for like 15 years.

The cancer had eaten away all of the skin on most of his head. There were very large areas of muscle and bone exposed.

The tumor had eaten into his skull and you could see into his skull as well as his sinuses. His right ear was long gone.

I could watch his muscles move and contract while he spoke. It was literally like watching something from The Walking Dead, except there was no sign of infection or maggots or anything else horrible.

It has literally a living, dissected skull talking to us like it was totally normal.

It was simultaneously horrifying and amazing to see.”

 

#5. Bath salts?

“Walked into back room with two patients with CP (cerebral palsy). Another client was in the back with FEMA and mentally disabled.

FEMA client was eating one of the CP clients’ face off.

Blood everywhere, and the screaming is enough to stick in my mind forever.

1/4 of her face was missing after that.”

#6. Fun with veggies

“Bok choi in an adult male’s ass.

Insisted it just, ‘slipped in.’

Removed it, and it had a condom on it.”

#7. Beware of washcloths

“A story about a quadriplegic guy who just had an operation. My teacher, another student, and I were taking care of it.

The teacher took a washcloth and decided to clean his face, and that’s when it happened.

The guy started to eat the washcloth. Yes, eat it.

The more he would eat it, the more he would start to choke on it.

The other student panicked. My teacher was pulling on the washcloth with her 2 hands and her knee on the bed to get some grip.

Nothing…

The guy was still eating it and choking. So I had, probably the best idea in my life, and I block his nostrils with my hand.

He couldn’t breathe, so he let go of the washcloth.

The 3 of us were shaking, sweating and swearing to never put a washcloth near the mouth of someone who just came back from surgery.

The funny thing is that I talked to the guy a couple of days later, and he didn’t remember a thing.”

#8. OBGYN

“Probably the most disgusting time of your medical school career will be your obstetrics and gynecology rotation.

You can expect on a daily basis to be splattered with blood/amniotic fluid mixtures, and on a slightly less frequent basis to be covered in vomit, urine, and poop.

For me the worst was assisting with C-sections. Mostly as the med student it would be your job to hold the retractor, which means standing there and pulling on a big metal thing and staying perfectly still.

Once they cut into the uterus, the amniotic fluid and blood all spills out all over your hands and arms and drips onto your gown and down to your feet.

It’s warm and there’s a lot of it and you can feel it through your gloves, but you can’t move.

That’s not really a special occurrence. It’s literally every day for the whole month (or more if you decide you like it of course).”

#9. Classy

“Walked in on a woman blowing her husband.

She had just delivered a baby 2 hours prior, who was in the NICU.
If my hubby had asked me to do that even a week after having our baby, I would have punched him in his dick-hole.”

#10. Depressing

“The worst day on the job was being the nurse for a pregnant woman who was due the same week as me…

I was in the room when the doctor told her that there wasn’t a heartbeat anymore. I sat with her while she cried.

Her boyfriend didn’t answer her calls.

She was hospitalized for an infection and I visited her after my shift. I felt so awful that she had to go through that alone.

I later found out that my baby had trisomy 13 and had an abortion.

I felt guilty for watching a woman cry over what she couldn’t control and then opting out of a wanted, albeit flawed, pregnancy.”

#11. A man and his dildo

“My dad is an ER doctor. Early in his career, he had a big, burly truck driver come into the emergency room and flat out say, ‘Doc I’ve got a dildo in my ass you’ve gotta get it out.’

So, my dad takes him into a room with a nurse accompanying him, has the guy bend over and grab the exam table, and my dad tells the nurse to duck when he says so.

He grabs hold of the end of the dildo with those gator clamp things, and straight yanks it out as hard as he can.

The nurse behind him never ducked, and a splurge of blood and shit hits her, full-frontal.

My dad said the nurse ran out screaming, leaving behind a perfect silhouette against the wall while the dildo flopped around the floor, still vibrating.”

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