Hey All, it’s ERP from ER stories doing a quick guest post.

The myriad of ways that the staff entertains themselves late at night when there is a lull in the action is boundless. In fact, White Coat has blogged about this.

There is the “Obituary Game” made famous on Nurse Jackie but widely known to have been stolen from Nurse K.  (reading the Obits and taking bets on who the deceased was and what the cause of death was based on their name)

There was “Cane Ball” which we used to play in the ambulance bay in residency (basically stick ball using a cane and a ball of tape).

Saline battles with pre-filled non-sterile flush syringes. (They squirt pretty damn far!)

Recently, we had a sort of “What would it take” game between some docs and PA’s.  Of course it rapidly degenerated into a sexual theme.  Sort of “how much would it take for you to sleep with so and so?” or “Would you sleep with so and so, if….?”   Basically we found quite a variation in tolerances between us.

It mostly revolved around a fairly revolting surgeon at our hospital who is both unattractive physically, lecherous and creepy, and grossly unethical. What we discovered was that the amount required by the women was a minimum of 500,000 dollars providing he wore a paper bag over  his head!

A variation of this was “Would you Rather?” where you have to make a choice between two very unpleasant options – basically the lesser of two evils.  Some choices we were given:

Would you rather fracture your penis or your femur? (I chose the femur)

Would you rather get pancreatic cancer or glioblastoma? (I chose GBM)

Would you rather get a chest tube or a DPL with no Lidocaine? (I chose the DPL)

And of course the old classic, Would you rather be beautiful and stupid or brilliant and hideous?  Man, that’s a tough one!

Anyone else have any good late night time-killing games?

Hey, it’s ERP from ERstories.net doing a guest post.

The other day during a shift I said to myself “Dang it, it’s Murphy’s Law again” when something went all FUBAR. That made me decide to compile a little list of how that law applies to my job.

1. The GYN cart will only be stocked with the extra large and “virgin” sized speculums when you have a normal-sized patient to examine.

2. The GYN speculum light will not work and you will need to have your chaperon use the odoscope.

3. You will have three or four pages out to various doctors for an hour and no one calls back. The moment one finally does, so do all the others. They get annoyed being on hold and hang up.

4. There is guaranteed to be an issue whenever a patient needs transcutaneous pacing. Of course everything worked fine on the practise, model patients, but the moment you need to use it, the thing does not sense or the wires are not compatible with the pads.

5. The IV is going to blow the moment you have to push Epi – even though it was working fine for an hour before hand.

6. The nurse you need for a patient is always on break.

7. The nurse tells you that the patient in room 15 is getting annoyed waiting for an hour with pelvic pain. When you finally go into the room, the patient is either in the bathroom, waiting room, or fully dressed in a wheelchair.

8 There is never a nursing home’s number on their transfer paperwork, making history taking on a demented, bedridden patient a true joy.

9.The SMA-7 on a critically ill patient is always haemolysed.

10. The rate of RN, tech, and unit secretary “sick” call-ins is directly related to the niceness of the weather outside.

I am sure there are many more. Feel free to submit your own!

ERP here from Erstories.  A little quick post while I am out skiing.

Yes, I admit I get a little juvenile on occasion during a shift.  Other staff members do as well and I think this is a good thing.  It lighten things up.  A little silly laugh because someone said something that conjures Beavis and Butt-head – style snickering helps our blood pressures come down.  Of course there is a fine line between jokes and harassment but if everyone laughs when someone says something that is unintentionally of sexual connotation, who would complain?

Some of the things I have heard or had said to me:

“Hey ERP, do you have a measuring tool”?

“Who was that new doctor? He pissed me off by getting all up in me.”

“Holy Moly, it is busy. I have never seen such a patient load.”

“Yes, Doctor Newbie, I can help you get that DVD into the slot.”

“Hey ERP, the new patient in room 5 has priapism, go help him take care of it.”

People need to lighten up in the work place.  Sometimes things are just funny!

ERP here from Erstories.

Blanked out Letters are sometime appropriate. According to the NY times, people were greeted with the above sign when they went to the Elmhurst Emergency Room in Queens, NY.

OK Ladies, how would you feel in this scenario? Suppose you were standing in an examining room with your husband, fully clothed, waiting for the ER doctor to come in and examine you for a slightly embarrassing problem. Suddenly, your husband, who is getting frustrated with waiting, opens the door and grabs the nearest doctor who is walking by. Leading him into the room, without any chance for an introduction or for you to change into a gown, your husband takes hold of your pants, and apparently not caring that you are not wearing any underwear, yanks them down to your ankles while asking the startled doctor “What do you think this rash is?!?!?!”

I bet he is sleeping on the sofa for at least a few days.