Not A Local Mistake
England, Hospital, Ignoring & Inattentive, London, Nurses, Stupid, UK | Healthy | July 24, 2019
(I am a nurse practitioner, assisting my coworker inserting a vascular catheter for dialysis use. The patient is very restless.)
Coworker: “Please stay as still as you can; we don’t want to puncture the wrong blood vessel.”
Patient: “Okay, okay, sorry. It’s just that it really hurts.”
(My coworker continues with the catheterisation, but the patient still keeps wriggling.)
Coworker: “On a scale of one to ten, what is the pain level? I have given you lots of local anaesthetic already.”
Patient: “Nine to ten!”
Coworker: “Okay, let’s give you a little bit more local.”
(My coworker turns to me.)
Coworker: “Okay, let’s give him some more [anaesthetic].”
(I then point to the tray containing all the items required for the procedure, specifically the syringe containing the local anaesthetic — the FULL syringe that hasn’t been used.)
Coworker: *eyes bulge* “Oh, s***!”
(She turns back to the patient.)
Coworker: “Okay, we’re giving you some more local now. How is that?”
Patient: “Oh, much better!”
(The rest of the procedure went by without a hitch. To clear it up, my coworker has been working in the dialysis ward for almost twenty years and this was her first minor mistake at the end of a very long cover shift, but she d*** well hasn’t made that mistake again!)
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