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Medical Professionals Share The Dumbest Ways They’ve Seen People Self-Treat A Medical Condition
People have always relied on herbal teas, essential oils, and other home remedies to make their headaches and colds go away quicker. But with the spread of the internet, many think they can attack even their bigger health problems. Why pay a doctor if you can just google your symptoms and watch a YouTube video for a diagnosis?
Well, because dumb practices can harm you more than they can help. To illustrate this point, let's take a look at a Reddit thread where medical professionals describe the worst attempts of self-treatment they've ever seen. We're talking about individuals who use "sonic emitters" for cancer and pour bleach into their genitals. Continue scrolling to check out their stories.
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#1
I had a patient come to the ER complaining of severe pain and swelling "all down there." On physical examination we noted a really remarkable amount of swelling, and both the internal and external tissues were extremely red and irritated. She was so swollen she couldn't even pee until we put a catheter in. The physician did a pelvic exam and found blisters on her cervix.
We asked when the symptoms started. She said, "Well it was itching tonight. I thought I had a yeast infection, so I poured a cup of bleach up in there to kill it. But then after a while it kind of started to hurt." Yeah, I bet it did.
**tl;dr** - Do not pour bleach into your vagina.
Jeff Cox 3 years ago
OMG....having a vagina is a responsibility evidently only a few can handle
LizzieBoredom 3 years ago
I could think of several reasons vaginas should come with an owner's manual.
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Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Believe it or not, I've heard of worse: Kerosene. "It kills lice, too, right?"
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
I was a vet tech and nearly choked to death at a family dinner when my aunt's trash boyfriend announced his two dogs had mange so he "washed" them with used motor oil twice a week. Lmao
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Just a ray of f'ing sunshine 3 years ago
Better than drinking it to cure Covid?! (Thanks Trump - you idiot...)
Phryne 3 years ago
Ummm...you don't drink it...you inject it. THEN it cures covid 🤣😂🤣 So does applying sunlight internally!?!
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Adira Bennett 3 years ago
Makes me sad that no one taught this woman how to deal with yeast infections safely. 'Cause bleach AIN'T IT
General practitioner, medical researcher, and founder of PrimeHealth Clinical Research, Iris Gorfinkel, M.D., told Bored Panda that there's a limit to what we can know about ourselves without any help from others.
"People are generally good at recognizing when they're cold. They put on a coat. When they're too hot, they take it off," Gorfinkel said. "They know when they need to urinate and when they need to defecate. For the most part, we're pretty good at understanding when we're thirsty."
But if we go beyond these things, our judgment starts to deteriorate quite fast. "People are not as good at recognizing when they're genuinely hungry, when they're tired, and when they're stressed," the doctor said.
This brings us to what's actually hard for people to recognize and treat. "Discomfort, pain, putting off pleasure, deciphering complex emotions (especially the negative ones). These are extremely hard for people to do and to do well."
RELATED:
#2
911 dispatch here. Heard the story second hand, but kid had a crazy high fever and wouldn't stop crying. paramedics get on scene... and mom is squeezing a lemon while rubbing it all over the baby's forehead because it's "supposed to keep the fever down". Mom was completely at a loss as to why the baby wouldn't stop crying either. it couldn't possibly be the lemon juice you've essentially been squeezing into it's eyes for the last 20 minutes. no siree.
Stealthzilla 3 years ago
Slap? Why not lemon juice in the eyes for 20 minutes?
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Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
Poor baby. While some natural things can help. Not a good idea to use it on a baby though. Some people. Think about what you are doing first people. Have common sense.
#3
I worked at an OB/GYN clinic for 7 years. One day a girl called and said she had a broken shot glass up her vagina. Upon asking how it got there, she said she was using it as birth control. Thankfully it worked because no one that stupid should have children.
roz 3 years ago
And mandatory until you've passed an IQ test with at least average intelligence.
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DennyS (denzoren) 3 years ago
Sex education and free access (as Francois also posted) should be universal.
Old flint 3 years ago
I have had patients come to the ER with potatoes used as cervical caps. Including a memorable one that was starting to sprout
Some guy 2 years ago
Andy mom used to tell me I'd grow potatoes in my EARS if I didn't keep them clean!
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IceCreamLover 3 years ago
And they want to ban abortions. Proof here is just one of the reasons it should be allowed..
Despite the chances of unnecessary anxiety and finding incorrect, or even potentially harmful information, Americans frequently use the internet to find medical diagnoses.
According to a 2013 survey by the Pew Research Center, 72 percent of adult internet users in the United States said they looked online for health information in the previous year.
53% of online diagnosers talked with a medical professional about what they found online, and 46% did not.
#4
As an Emt- Basic student I responded to a man who called 911 complaining of a insect crawling up his ear. Upon arrival we ask what ear the bug crawled into, he says his right ear, but keeps complaining about burning coming from his left ear. We noticed his wife standing next to him holding a bottle of insect spray, upon further questioning we come to find out she sprayed insecticide into his left ear thinking it would "flush" the insect out of his right ear. I had to explain to her that our ear canals are separated by our brain.
Kathryn Baylis 3 years ago
Evidently some people’s ears aren’t separated by the presence of a brain.
Jami M. Cox 3 years ago
That poor man. Although, anyone with half a brain would not allow insecticide sprayed in their ear.
Verona Bingham 2 years ago
Maybe she told him it was something different??
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Pascale Pierloot 3 years ago
He recovered quickly, except for that small 'tick' on the right side of the face. 🙇
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
I hope he didn't end up having problems from that must likely height of.
#5
Paramedic here. Got called to a house about 11:30 one night for a "girl with finger nail polish in her eyes". Got there and the scene is a s**t show, people screaming and throwing things around. We immediately notice the mother holding down a younger girl and about to pour something in her eyes.
Nail. Polish. Remover.
Jami M. Cox 3 years ago
Shouldn't people who choose to reproduce attempt to learn how not to harm their young? Like, crack a book, ask Google, take a first aid class?
TotallyNOTaFox 3 years ago (edited)
I always said that people should get a license (like driving licenses) for reproduction, but nooo that's "unethical"
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Chickens are fluffy 3 years ago
Remember when I was young like six I went to a birthday party and they put a little eyeshadow on me for fun, but when I got home didn't know how to get it off. Didn't know that makeup remover was a thing. So I thought nail polish remover would work. Ended up getting it in my eyes and began to scream. My mom came up and asked what happened and I told her the story. The second she heard I got nail polish remover in my eye she dragged my into the bathroom and yanked my eyes open and kept splashing water from the sink into them. For ten minutes straight I couldn't breathe well because water was hitting my face so much
Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
What is wrong with people? You don't need to be a rocket scientist to know that you shouldn't just pour random substances into eyes.
Arielle Daughtry 3 years ago
You shouldn’t put anything but water and or saline solution in your eyes.
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Arielle Daughtry 3 years ago
It seems like smart people have very few children nowadays.
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Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
People should really think about what there doing before they do it. Have common sense and don't anything to your kids. Just get professional help.
An Unpopular Opinion. 3 years ago
Nail polish remover is worse than nail polish... that's why it's able to remove it, yeesh. Just the smell of it makes my eyes water
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LizzieBoredom 3 years ago
I don't doubt if there was something called Eye Polish someone would buy it.
"Many of these things [we Google], we're born knowing how to do," Gorfinkel said. "But life strips away permission to be at peace with yourself."
According to her, in order to combat this, we have to start with the education system. "People are exceptionally bad at living with emotions that we're told are negative. Guilt, anger, a sense of being humiliated and embarrassed. We (especially women) are repeatedly told these are bad emotions to have when in fact, they're critical to true well-being." Having a firm inner base, everything else, including our relationships with illnesses and doctors, is much easier to handle.
"If I'm not able to label those emotions [and] understand their origins, then I am unable to act on them. That's a serious problem. [And] where does it lead? Into a helpless space. The backbone of anxiety. Helplessness is the very bedfellow of depression. To get out of that space, the basic labeling of difficult emotions and how to manage them should, in fact, be taught in schools."
"I hope the mathematicians out there forgive me. But all that trigonometry, cosine, and tangent... I mean, yes, they have their place but what's universally important in our lives are relationships," the doctor continued.
"We should [know more] about relationships, people, the stages of love, and what it represents. These things really need to be taught [in schools]."
#6
I'm a triage RN. Had a patient call concerning back pain. I was going about my normal assessment and asked if he had taken anything for the pain, to which he replies "Cobra Venom".
Turns out, he had read about Cobroxin, a topical treatment for pain made from cobra venom, and decided it would be more effective to simply let a cobra bite him. I have no idea how he got hold of a cobra.
Robert B 3 years ago
It’s a neurotoxin so I could see it working. To death.
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Philly Bob Squires 3 years ago
Yeah, he'd have been cured alright. Of this and all other maladies up to and including existence itself.
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
This is was not very smart. Think about what your doing before you do it. Have common sense. Or you will end up in an early grave.
Chantay Robinson 2 years ago
Science has made common sense a rare thing. Natural selection has its work cut out.
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Pansexual Child of Hades 2 years ago
COBRA VENOM FOR A BACK ACHE? what is he, amateur, brainless Bear Grylls?
Allan Rubin 3 years ago
At that point, say sorry, you're on your own. You, sir, are an oxygen thief. I have to go now
#7
Late to the party... Guy comes into the clinic with a boil the size of golf ball on his face. He begins to explain that he had a painful zit, and tried to lance it with a needle and when that failed, he stepped it up to a "micro drill" which he sanitized by wiping on his jeans. The nurse stopped him mid story and asked "So you took a drill to your own FACE, and want to know why it's sore and swollen?"
I was the patient.
Lord Mysticlaw 3 years ago
I mean... I've had an abscess or cyst or something on my face and it hurt so much that I felt like I would happily slice it open with a kitchen knife if that would help. So I sympathise.
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
Yeah my dad tryed to get me to cut my cyst open with this painting razors at least that what they looked like or a torture pack idk. But I almost did it and thought better of it. He was just like oh it okay you don't have to. I was just giving you an a option. He was never that bright.
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Seanette Blaylock 3 years ago
Glad you seem to have recovered, OP, but I really need to ask just how much in the way of alcohol and/or drugs was involved here.
#8
Had a frequent flyer patient who had psoriasis so bad that he literally had huge scales all over his legs. One day he gets admitted and the scales are gone. He tells me he took a brillo pad (steel wool) and scraped them all off. Surprisingly it works with no adverse effects and he's still scale free a year later.
Biliegh Berrie 3 years ago (edited)
Oklahoma doesn't have real medical help for the poor. I had a rash for a year because the er docs wouldn't help. I wanted to end it. You would be surprised what you would do to end suffering
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Waite Forit 3 years ago (edited)
I tend to develop VERY thick hard skin on my elbows and knees that will eventually badly crack if I leave it. Every few months I use light-grade sandpaper to remove most of the thickness before it starts cracking. This is painless, works great, and has no adverse effects - except a lot of dust, which is why I do it outside.
LH25 3 years ago
Same idea as those pedicure things you can buy. Basically a Dermal tool for heels. I use mine on my elbows at times.
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Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
OK, thinking there's something else going on, speaking as an MD. I call BS on this one.
Lillian Swaim 3 years ago
If it works, it works. I've used the rough side of a sponge to exfoliate my scaly patches for years now, just keep it far away from the kitchen
MontanaMariner 2 years ago
I remove the dry and scaly dead skin on my hands from Eczema with a 1600 grit sanding block and light pressure.
Oftentimes, it's not only the internet that we trust too much. "Multivitamins together with minerals are taken by huge numbers of people. It is a tremendously big business that promises a lot of things, including mood boosts, healthy bones and teeth, proper muscle function, and this and that, but let's take a look at the truth. Do they do anything?"
The doctor said that these products don't live up to their promises. "The US National Institute of Health has poured two and a half billion dollars into studying them, only to learn that they do not make people live longer, they do not slow cognitive decline, they do not reduce the chance of heart disease, cancer or diabetes ... Now omega three fatty acids, that's still up for questioning. A gram a day may be helpful for lowering blood pressure."
Gorfinkel also doesn't think that probiotics belong to primetime. "The gut is literally made up of trillions of bacteria, funguses, and viruses that live there," and taking some of them in a form of a pill won't magically fix their entire environment.
"There is no existing test that tells us exactly what a healthy gut microbiome is. Nor is there a test that reliably determines which microbes are missing ... and to make matters worse, the studies done on probiotics have repeatedly shown that what's advertised on the label does not even accurately predict what is in the capsule."
But with that being said, Gorfinkel is still waiting for upcoming research on the subject, which is being done as we speak.
#9
We are a needle exchange/harm reduction station at at the clinic I work at. We have IV drug users come in pretty frequently to get their abscesses cleaned out and dressed properly. So one patient comes in wanting to get her abscess cleaned out like many other patients before her. We take her back to a procedure room and get everything ready to start. She has an ace bandage covering up this spot on her arm so of course we are thinking it's fine because that's better than just letting it be open to the air. She proceeds take off said bandage and exposes not only HUGE abscess but a FOUR INCH LENGTH OF VEIN sticking out of her arm that is rotting away and drying up. We are like, "uh what's going on here?" and she says she took it out of her abscess and left it out because it made injecting heroin easier. So basically she ran her own IV with a vein she cut out of her abscess. We then called the ambulance.
tl;dr- Woman came in with abscess, turned out she cut her whole vein out to make an IV for easier heroin injection.
Becky Samuel 3 years ago
And people have the nerve to say that drug addicts are lazy and have an easy life. Addiction is not easy, people don't *want* to do things like this, but the drive is so strong. If you haven't experienced addiction from the inside then it's impossible to understand.
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
I'm grossed out but also so incredibly sad for her. Addiction is such a demon.
Waite Forit 3 years ago
I'm a retired nurse. There were many times when I had hospital patients who were chronic drug abusers by way of injection. Trying to start an IV on these patients could be a challenge because they often had badly-scarred veins. It was like trying to put a needle through a copper pipe.
Cecily Holland 3 years ago
Next time you think of putting down someone with an addiction remember this story which illustrates just how much of a monster addiction can be
Benita Valdez 3 years ago
My nurse friend working a hospital had a patient come in with "discomfort and irritation" from IV drug use. Removed the bandage and she could see some bone; flesh was necrotizing (basically decaying away). That was a first for her and she actually specializes in wound care outside of the hospital
Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
Necrosis. I know that very well. My legs got crushed when I was a teenager. I got up and walked away from it. Next day I saw the doctor, doc said take tylenol and come back if it hurts too much. It never did hurt too much, but one day I stood up and smelled pee. It was my leg. It had burst open from necrosis.
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Cooter McCoughlin 3 years ago
Stories like this always make me wonder how amazing heroin must feel. Like for this to even be an option is just wild.
Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
I think it's more like how awful withdrawal must feel.
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#10
I worked overnights in a midwestern ER and I have seen 2 men try to treat their erectile dysfunction on their own.
One man used caulk in his urethra and then it dried and cracked like pencil lead and only the 1/4 inch at the tip came out, he had another 3 inches or so all broken into pieces that required surgery to get out.
The other man used a clipped off piece of coat-hanger to try to keep himself erect during sex and that also had to be surgically removed.
Dudes is weird. Ask for Viagra.
Mel The Axolotl 3 years ago
Ahh but what if the two dummies reproduce and create a mega-dummy thats nearly unstoppable???
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Cooter McCoughlin 3 years ago
I'm assuming he never stopped to think about what that wire hanger could do to the insides of whoever he was banging
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Rubber bands to "keep the blood in it". ... You don't even blink at that after a while.
Greg Wilhelm 3 years ago
Sex Isn't that important at all. Definitely not worth "experimenting" to that degree.
Silke 3 years ago
Female here: The highly calcified water in my city gives me kidney stones. Broken up pieces of caulk? Nah uh! Shudder.
Load More Replies... Benita Valdez 3 years ago
I mean I understand it's a kink for certain men to place things in their urethra (it turns them on) but this is the first I've seen about doing it to get it just erect
#11
Animal Attendant for a vet clinic here.
A client came in and had rubber banded their 2 dogs ball sacks as a way of neutering them. VERY VERY VERY BAD. They got the idea from how sheep and goats can be neutered, but there is a HUGE difference between the junk of a sheep and a chihuahua. Both of the dogs had a severe infection and the tissue was completely dead. The treatment for this cost wayyyy more than the neuters would've been.
DO NOT DO THIS EVER EVER.
Miss Frankfurter 3 years ago
I hope the dogs were removed from the owner’s possession for animal cruelty.
Rylosalex 3 years ago
Yeah, still I'm glad that the owner got stuck with a very hefty vet bill
Load More Replies... Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
I could find this guy I would do worse than rubberbanding his balls, IM' INTO CBT I KNOW HOW TO DEAL WITH THEM!
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago (edited)
The story does not explicitly state gender so you have no idea if the person even HAS balls, and I don’t know what “CBT” is but your level of “threatening” a random stranger is a lil scary :/
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Wendy Mitchell 3 years ago
I have seen this as well. Worked as a vet tech through college, and saw some horrific home remedies used on pets.
Lesley Melville 3 years ago
Sadly, we saw it too when I was a young vet tech. The worst was this orange cat that the SPCA named "Tucker". The owner had banded his test*cles to neuter him but had also mistakenly gotten his pen*s in the band. The subsequent infection traveled up his belly, as well. Then, they'd also removed his claws with pliers. That poor guy was the sweetest damn cat I've ever met...and he had EVERY reason to be mistrustful and to hate people. I fostered him at my home while he went through multiple surgeries and medications. Finally, he was able to be adopted out and found his forever family with 2 kids who ADORED him. Wherever you are now, Tucker, I hope you're still doing well and are spoiled rotten, buddy. You deserve it.
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Epona 3 years ago
By breed you mean the humans should not be allowed to reproduce (as in have their own children)? Or breed as in have dogs or cats or other non-human animals that they mate together to produce their (the animal) offspring? Which definition of breed do you mean? I hope both!
Load More Replies... Littlebunnyfufu 3 years ago
This is especially sad since most cities have places that provide low cost neutering/spaying. I feel like vets should be required to share options with folks.
Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
If you can’t come up with a hundo to get your dog neutered, how in the world can you afford to properly care for it day-to-day? Dogs are insanely expensive!
#12
An 8 year old tripped on the cord of a deep fryer, spilling hot grease on his shoulder and arm. His grandma slathered him in butter to "cool him off" and "draw the heat out". When my medic partner and I entered the house and started assessing the boy, I was saddened and hungry at the same time. The poor kid smelled absolutely delicious. No cannibal.
Pferdchen 3 years ago
A friend of mine did the same thing at a party, covering his right pants leg with boiling hot oil. Everybody starts freaking out, even more so because the friend wasn't in any distress. They think he's in shock or something. People calmed down when they learned he has a prosthetic leg.
Electra Complex 3 years ago
Amidst all the horror of this thread, this comment made me laugh 😆
Load More Replies... Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
For anyone who doesn't know, you should NEVER put butter on burns! It can actually seal in the heat and make the burn worse. Cold, running water is the best option.
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
Yes yes. Cold water helps with wonders on burns
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Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
As a kid, I once had to have a shoulder mole biopsied. The biopsy ended up quite deep/extensive, but I was only given a local, so I was awake. The doc cauterized the area. It smelled so much like the Mexican dish carnitas (pork) that I haven’t been able to eat it since. And my family is Mexican! XD
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
I heard this back in my own medical field before i left, that sometimes when they got burned patients, they couldn't help but think of how good they smelled sometimes, this included grease-burned patients too, Talking with one of my Drs {i get sick a lot so some friends are my Drs and we talk} They said it reminds them that humans are a type of animal and just might be coded to eating each other in a way, but our intelligent stops it, only when there's no food /hope will we fiddle with that idea that we will do it {we got on this topic because of my pica, which at some points include my own hands, but I'm way better now}
Bananaramamama 3 years ago (edited)
Pica is an intense disease/disability. I have cared folks with this disorder. Good for you that you're doing better! Also I'm glad you shared this story, pica, like some other conditions are easily dismissed by people who haven't experienced them first hand!
Load More Replies... Bananaramamama 3 years ago
Lmao @ "no cannibal" But butter is an absolute old school treatment. As in, there was a time it was suggested in reference books
Shari Wolf 3 years ago
I remember it was recommended home treatment. I had lots of salty butter put on various burns.
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Aélia Potter 3 years ago
That happened when my parents worked at McDonald’s. A guy got fryer oil all over his hand. He put his hand in water for a few hours. He made it out completely fine. Same thing happened to a girl with poutine sauce, while she was trying to unclog the sauce dispenser. A whole layer of skin came off with the sauce.
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
The last one of my I know how that feels having had been burnt. And had have skin graphs cause it burnt all my skin off 35% of my body. Poor lady. I'm glad the guy was okay even though I can't believe he didn't get his skin burnt off. He one lucky guy.
Load More Replies... Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
Once I got a tree burn and my dad told me to put oil or butter on it. I did. It made it sting really bad. I'll never do anything like that again. I think he just told me that cause he thought it be funny. Cause he laughed at me when I did it and and I waved my arms around trying to get air on them cause it hurt. Should of not listened but I was just listening cause he was my dad and I thought he knew what he was thinking about. It hurt.
Huddo's sister 3 years ago
My next door neighbours growing up were Italian and they sometimes used butter for burns, but more often vinegar, which was even worse! They also used vinegar on bee stings.
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Louisa Spoke 3 years ago
Oh, that’s so old fashioned. I was taught that when I was little and I was 4 and burned my hand in about 1968. Thank goodness they stopped that. It hurt so much more.
#13
Med student. A guy came in to the emergency department with two combs and a toothbrush in his butt. He had stuck the toothbrush up there for pleasure, but lost it. He tried to fish it out with a comb, but lost that, and tried again with a second comb, and lost that as well.
The kicker: he was there because he had gotten in a car crash. He wasn't there to get the stuff out of his butt. He volunteered the information after we asked if there was anything else we needed to know.
Inga Paškevičiūtė 3 years ago
Doctors: Is there anything else we need to know? Guy: Yeah. So I have two combs and a toothbrush stuck in my butt...You know...I fell on it. After the car crash.
Prius Owner 3 years ago
Did you hear the one about the guy who presented to the ER with a vibrator in his r****m? The doctor looks at the x-ray and says "I don't think we can remove this". Patient says "Remove it? I just need you to change the batteries!"
Jami M. Cox 3 years ago
Well at least he was honest and didn't bleed to death from an internal perforated... anything.
Lydia Nijland 3 years ago
Really? Quit a long object lost and two long sharp ones too? And then be comfortable leaving it there? Don't think so.
#14
Paramedic here: Responded to a nursing home for diabetic patient, unresponsive. The nurse didn't keep up with the insulin and gave a tad bit too much, decreasing the pt's blood sugar. Ok, this is fixable. I walk in to see another nurse pouring Splenda down this lady's mouth. She has snoring restorations and the Splenda is just being inhaled into her lungs. It also isn't doing s**t for this poor lady because it isn't f*****g sugar. After give this lady some D50 (IV sugar water) she came to, but felt like she couldn't get enough air. She ended up being treated for a few days for pneumonia. I swear, some people get their medical licenses from the bottom of a Cracker Jack box. Love you. EDIT: I had a few Redditors ask me if the nurse was a Registered Nurse (RN) or Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA). This lady was an LPN. License to Practice Nursing I think. I don't know. That's my correction. And I still love you all.
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
Haha! My grandpa always said something similar....in every med school graduation, someone came in last.
Load More Replies... Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
report her a$$, My aunt has a nurse that comes out every day to change a bandage on her foot, she lost her toe to diabites {nothing she did it just.... happened, she didn't eat sweats just weak body} and she has had then out for the last 2 months, in this time we got to know a few and only one came out and did stupid stuff, tried to make her walk with out a bandage {she has Marsa, the toe is open and free or it but the leg is not, the floor is being cleaned of it} she forgot to bandage it, left without telling us, told me she was getting more, never came back} and more stuff, I called the place that sent her and reported her, even tho she was nice and did her best... we didn't want there to be someone that got that same stuff done to them that my aunt did, what if they had it worse?
GirlFriday 3 years ago
*Licensed Practical Nurse - one step below the RN in RN education system
Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
You shouldn't need a medical degree to know that zero-calorie sweetener won't raise blood sugar.
Some guy 2 years ago (edited)
Or that an unconscious person can't swallow! For God's sake, if you're that ill-equipped (mentally or otherwise), you're better off smearing corn syrup on her gums. Works wonders for hypoglycemic ferrets!
Load More Replies... Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
I hope that nurse got suspended or something she should have to class on that stuff. She needs to do better then that if she is going to be taking care of people.
Bella V 3 years ago
"love you" lmao... also you stole my line. I work in a prison and I work around nurses a LOT and some of them are just plain stupid and I say the same thing. FOOOORRRR example. One time an inmate was playing softball and she fell and broke her ankle. Her bone was straight sticking out, didn't break the skin but you didn't need a medical degree to tell it was broken. The nurse came to the yard and tried to get her to take some advil and walk it off, it was a "sprain" The inmate looked at me and said " Officer Bella please don't let this psycho touch me" (I did not) another time a nurse was doing insulin line and I literally WATCHED this medical "professional" administer insulin to one, he leaves, the next comes in and she administered insulin to the next. No new needle, no new vile (they have their own) I was like WOAH WOAH .... ushered him out with my partner sent the rest home, cussed her out and got her fired by the time my reports were done Ergo: Cracker Jax Box degrees.
Shari Wolf 3 years ago
Nursing home. I’m not surprised. Any help is hard to find and they will hire ANYONE. It makes me so mad!
#15
I saw this patient last year. He had a long history of abdominal pain that was quite non-specific, and his previous workups were negative. He was convinced that he had intestinal parasites that caused the pain (which as an aside, he believed that he got them after an "encounter" with a woman he met on the internet).
So despite having seen several physicians and gastroenterologists, and numerous investigations including gastroscopy and colonoscopy, no diagnostic source for the pain was found. But he was undeterred from believing it was intestinal parasites.
So he develops a plan in which he orders surgical instruments and local anesthetic online. Watches YouTube to figure out how to perform a laparotomy (to get into his abdomen). And so after his preparations, he performs a self-surgery using a video camera to watch himself, and manages to get into his abdominal cavity. He had trouble completing his self-surgery and called an ambulance.
TotallyNOTaFox 3 years ago (edited)
I would check him for psychological illnesses, I don't know the name but there is one that makes people feel insects crawling under their skin
Becky Samuel 3 years ago
Morgellons disease/delusional parasitosis. They come onto r/whatsthisbug once in a while and argue with anyone who tries to tell them that their video is of a normal bit of lint moving in the air currents. It's very sad.
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No Clue 3 years ago (edited)
Why am I still reading these? Was the heroin vein one not enough to teach me a lesson??😱
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
1. Psych consult. 2. Neuro workup. There are weird problems where you can get sensations that are insanely bizarre. You need neurology to help diagnose a lot fo them. ---- signed, an MD. (And I'm assuming they at some point did a contrast CT to check his internal organs for disease.)
Robin Childers 3 years ago
I can't even watch Youtube videos to figure out what's wrong with my washing machine. I totally wouldn't watch it for major surgery.
Vonkiedool 3 years ago
Wait...What....You can't stop there, did he manage to get the parasite or not?
Bella V 3 years ago
So just anyone can order anesthetic and surgical instruments??? Is this like an Amazon Prime Day deal orrr....
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
I can't believe I just read that. It is insane. He needs help or he gonna end up hurting himself really bad
Hazel-Lea Peyton 2 years ago
Imagine how much pain and stress you'd have to be in though to think "f**k it, I can't live like this, they're not listening, I'll do it myself" I hope he got help.
#16
I had a patient treating her lung cancer with a "sonic emitter". Her argument was that sound waves can shatter glass, so lung cancer wouldn't stand a chance.
Monday 3 years ago (edited)
I wonder how she figured the sound waves would only "shatter" the cancer and not also her lungs?
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
If you ever wonder why real medical personnel loathe people like Dr. Oz? The vitamins, the "alternative medicines" etc. they hawk. Not sure if Oz did the sonic emitter, but no MD I know (myself included) thinks he should still be licensed as a medical doctor.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago (edited)
This is sad, in a way - I can imagine the desperation and fear a cancer patient must feel. I wish “sonic emitters” worked fo cure cancer, so people wouldn’t have to endure the brutality of chemo. This lady is still dumb, but it’s a sad situation.
Michael Reed 3 years ago
I read an article recently recently that cat purring can help heal, based on the sound and vibrations. So perhaps not so far out there. But wouldn't use to treat cancer.
Some guy 2 years ago
Yeah, I'm thinking it would be better for, say, depression, anxiety, high blood pressure, etc.
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#17
Here is one that my friend who was a EMT told me. He and his partner got called out for a impailment injury to a child's eye while running with a pencil. The mother removed the pencil before they arrived. The mother was riding in the back. That's when the paramedic said to the mother. "Next time something gets impailed, don't remove it. It's dangerous!" Without skipping a beat the mom goes "oops, I didn't know that." Then she proceeds to quickly and calmly shove the pencil back in. Apparently it was an eventful evening. Edit: corrected the ducking autocorrect on my icrap.
alwaysMispelled 3 years ago
That cannot be true. No way. I refuse to believe this is true. Nope nope nope.
Jay Son 3 years ago
I'm sad to say, but I'm married to an RN , and with the stories she comes home with sometimes, I totally believe this to have happened. People are nuts.
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HelluvaHedgehogAlien 2 years ago
Yes I felt this story even worse than the past ones O_O I’m scrolling back at stuff before cuz I’m bored btw I think this is 2 months ago
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BeepBeepBoopBoop 3 years ago
that's freaky man, but once I heard the same story but in the chest with a knife... and you wonder why stabbing people is a common murder weapon
Fluffy mommy panda 3 years ago
Why would the paramedic let the mother do that if he was setting close to her and the patient.
#18
GP here.
The most outrageous thing I've heard was from a boy who was something like 20-22 years old. Very poor, illiterate family. The boy had a bad case of tonsilitis and refused to take any meds 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 weeks. When that wouldn't work, plan B was to do the same at night but only under a full moon.
**TL;DR:** Bite the sun and cure you tonsilitis.
Monday 3 years ago
and he totally believes it works because his immune system cleared up the tonsillitis over the course of a couple of weeks I bet. This is why basic education needs to be free and the resources to get to said basic education should be available.
Cecily Holland 3 years ago
As GP this doctor is in the UK, Australia or New Zealand and all three have free basic education.
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Got Banned But Now I'm Back 3 years ago
Did this kid grow up to be a medical consultant in drumpf's inner circle? Is THIS where our idiot president heard light would cure covid????
GamerChick5567 3 years ago
I think the only plan b that shoulda been used was by this guys mom....
Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
That’s worse than going to the pastor and getting the laying on of hands 🤦
#19
Had an old farmer come in to the ED one day with a severely infected wound on his head. Turned out he had a growth developing on his head for the past few weeks (which turned out to be a tumour). He had been treating it with RoundUp (a potent weed killer) because "that s**t kills everything"...
#20
Probably will be buried at the bottom but here it is. I responded to a 9-1-1 call for a man bleeding. Supposedly the guy had a angiogram (catheter stuck in the artery near your groin to look at the blood vessels near your heart for blockages) earlier that day and was released with the explicit instructions to not mess with the bulky dressing. The old coot decides to "adjust" it, causing it to open, pouring blood out his artery. What does the guy do? He puts duct tape all around his groin. Not just a few pieces, no, all attached to his junk and up and down the leg. It was a noble attempt but did not do much to control the arterial pulsations.
Kitty 🥀 3 years ago
OP replied “He almost tapped out of life because of it” on the original Reddit post.
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SheamusFanFrom1987 3 years ago (edited)
Moral of this story: If you are using duct tape and it's not fixing the problem, it's not that you are using too little duct tape, you SHOULDN'T be using duct tape even!!!
Persephone 3 years ago
If you were alone, this (if applied with enough force and correctly) could buy you time until help arrived.
Wood Carver 3 years ago
I'm going to assume this is a joke, but just to clarify they will not just tape it back like he did.... they will fix the sutures, then pack and support the wound, then bind it with tape, skin safe medical tape. If being the doctor was this easy they would not be moaning about nurse shortages, they would be hiring HVAC apprentices with their tool belt duct tape
Load More Replies... #21
My patient was instilling honey in his eyes to "treat his cataracts and glaucoma" ... wat. Yes he came in for conjunctivitis cause bacteria were having a party on his corneas.
cogadh 3 years ago
Not saying pouring honey in your eyes is in any way a good idea, but it is naturally anti-bacterial, hence why it is known to never expire. At least real honey is. A lot of the store bought stuff is not actually honey or only partially honey, being mostly made of filler like corn syrup.
WindySwede 3 years ago
But also when waterd down you get mold in honey. Or if you do it right, an ad yeast, then get mead!
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Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
Eyes are a no-no zone! As in, “NO! NO! Don’t pour or stick anything in there!”
SheamusFanFrom1987 3 years ago
I guess the guy only wanted to feast his eyes on sweet things in life...
Pansexual Child of Hades 2 years ago
honey on small scratches, or for a cough? perfectly fine. BUT ON A FÜCKING EYE????
Kim Lorton 2 years ago
FYI.. your eyes have their own little immune system that protects the eyes. Once you do something to mess it up, trouble starts, and the immune system for your eyes will not grow back and become new again. But your eye troubles will become a new focus for problems.
#22
The parents of one kid canceled the surgery to repair his ACL because people had prayed for him at their church the Sunday beforehand and he had apparently been miraculously cured.
They called and scheduled surgery later in the week.
Tamra 3 years ago
I'm not religious, but it's odd that these people apparently can't make the assumption that an all powerful god capable of healing would also be smart enough to give humans the ability to practice legitimate medical science to, you know, actually heal someone.
Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
Normal Christians do know this. The vast majority don't do things like this, it's just that stories like this are more sensationalized in the media. I would never avoid necessary medical care.
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Bananaramamama 3 years ago (edited)
Best religion vs modern medicine argument I have ever heard......: We prayed for healing so God sent us nurses and doctors
Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
Christian here. The vast majority of us are not like this. God gave us brains for a reason, there is nothing wrong with medical care. You pray AND go to the doctor.
Rosa Sensenig 3 years ago
Amen sister, faith and works is how we roll. ;-)
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Erin Grant 3 years ago
My mother in law did something like this. Was diagnosed with Pulmonary Fibrosis. Her lungs were calcifying and the only cure is a transplant, which at first she was told she would not qualify for due to it not progressing fast enough and her advanced age making it difficult. They gave her oxygen to help with reduced lung capacity. She freaked out went to church and got on a prayer group. Immediately stopped using oxygen and stopped going to doctor because God had cured her. Took two visits to ER for low oxygen saturation and a hispice nurse as docs didn't think she had long due to stressor put on the heart for her to finally accept her diagnosis
Old flint 3 years ago
I once had a family in the ER whose mother had a stroke. There is a time window in which we can treat the clot. Instead, they insisted on a long prayer session and she lost the window for treatment. She ended up with total hemiparesis and died a few weeks later from pneumonia because she couldn't clear her secretions.
Some guy 2 years ago
Let me guess -- they a) blamed the medical staff, and/or b) chalked it up to "God's will". "Mysterious ways" and all that.
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Louise Davidson 3 years ago
I can’t figure out how they rationalise praying to the same god for a cure that must have “created” the sickness in the first place? 🤔🤔🤔. Just one of the many, MANY contradictions and irrational aspects of Christianity 🙄🙄😒😒
T Lee Mac 3 years ago
Any religion really. The buybull is fairy tales for people that love to have reasons to hate and judge others and think their way is the only way everyone should live. Religion has been the cause of most of society’s ills and a reason for most of the wars and terrorism done world wide all in Gawd’s name.
Load More Replies... #23
I know a doctor. She told me a story (EDIT: that she heard from another doctor) about how this guy came into the ER, an absolute nervous wreck. He was brushing his teeth for the first time a couple years (he was homeless and couldn't afford toothbrushes or toothpaste) when he found a maggot in his mouth. This happened frequently over a course of 3 days, and he self-diagnosed himself with oral myiasis. Now this guy was bats**t afraid of bugs, so he tried to get 'em out via the quickest way possible - ipecac. He didn't really think that one through, and ended up vomiting shiploads of maggots before he called 911. The doc sympathized with him - I'd freak out too, if I barfed up fifty maggots. S**t's scary.
Pat Head 3 years ago
Just googled oral myiasis images. Don't make the same mistake I just did.
jknbt jknbt 3 years ago (edited)
Oral myiasis is a rare disease caused by larvae of certain dipteran flies. It is mostly reported in developing countries and in the tropics.
Sapphonie Steph 3 years ago
God that poor man I would have a f*****g mental breakdown if that happened to me omg
the shrimp whisperer 2 years ago
my depression fr THIS might JUUUST be that lill push of executive function i needed
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#24
I used to work in a lab in a hospital in a rural town. I got a stool sample from the ER that was basically a blood clot the size of a golf ball. Sometimes the ER gets mixed up and sends me the wrong specimen, like some kind of body fluid and labeled it as urine, for example. I called the patient's nurse and asked what the deal was with the patient and if it was really stool they sent up. The nurse I talked to said the patient thought he'd eaten bad pork and to prevent food poisoning, drank a concoction of bleach, rubbing alcohol, vodka, ibuprofen and some Tums.
Robyn Picknell 3 years ago
What is it with people trying to cure stuff with BLEACH??!!! Do they not read the bit on the bottle that tells them not to drink ?!
Nul Nemo 2 years ago
Hahaha, funny story time: watched some time ago an interview with a bohemian poet of ours telling how he once accompanied another great writer of ours at the hospital to visit that one's brother. Nurses complained to said writer about his bro, an alcoholic, stealing and drinking their medicinal alcohol. Our poet was eagerly waiting to assist at a bright speech given by the famous writer to his bro so as to convince him to stop stealing and drinking the medicinal alcohol. The bright speech sounded like this: Famous writer: "Yo, bro, stop drinking the damn medicinal alcohol here! Don't you know it's only for external use? It says so on the bottle!" To which his brother answered: "Meh, I think it works just fine for internal use too." 🤣
Load More Replies... Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
Remember when the (now former) leader of the free world suggested injecting bleach into covid patients’ veins to cure them?
#25
Patient comes in to the ED with an abscess. Tells us he knew he had an infection and so ate a pound and a half of raw steak to get the antibiotics that were given to the cow.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
didn't help the cow much, I mean it was dead right? please tell me it was dead.
Jane Cortez 3 years ago
That reminds me of a new story I read about a man in a poor Latin American country who boiled a pot of rusty nails to drink so he could get more *iron* in his diet!!! Or, a former acquaintance of mine who proudly informed me that she fed her dog GRAPES, then wondered why her dog almost DIED. Despite me telling her that grapes, raisins are toxic to dogs she firmly stated that it was ‘fine.’ Side note: chocolate, artificial sweetener, batteries, anything from the Allium family, tulip, daffodil bulbs, Lilies, avocado, antifreeze are all toxic to dogs!!
Lyyyy 2 years ago
I think batteries and antifreeze are both dangerous to all life forms. Allium=onions chives and garlic Alcohol and particularly xylitol is also toxic to dogs. There are also things that are not toxic, but can be fatal in other ways to dogs, like corn on the cob and cooked bones. I’m amazed how some peoples dogs have managed to survive so long…
Load More Replies... BrUhEdpaNduH 3 years ago
You would probably have to literally take the blood and filter all the medicine out which would probably give you less than 1 gram
boredpandaki 3 years ago
At this point, I already feel sorry and anxious at the same time about the world ...
Sandra Castle 3 years ago
Well...mainly about the USA and it's health care arrangements 😪
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Ann M Clinkscales 2 years ago
I know you are a nurse! You said ED! It's not a one room place anymore!!
#26
Had a Marine stick a Q-tip up his d**k dipped in hand sanitizer cause he thought he got the clap in Thailand. That's not what Navy medical does guy.
Philly Bob Squires 3 years ago (edited)
If you ever accidentally got some residual soap in there from the shower... for the next few hours, when you take a leak, you'd swear your're about to set the bathroom on fire! Now on the sanitizer... combined with the bleach one above... Imma walk around with legs crossed for a week! Holy shitbirdski!
Sunny Day 3 years ago
I believe at one time (18-19th century?) the treatment for VD was a red hot wire up the urethra.
Some guy 2 years ago (edited)
Ha! Reminds me of an old coworker who got the crabs while he was in the Army (Vietnam War era) and, rather than risk getting in trouble if he reported having crabs, tried to get rid of them with Black Flag bug spray. I'm sorry I don't remember the details, but apparently it didn't go well.
#27
I'm a nursing student and one of my patients had an earache so he decided to hold his daughter's bobby pin to a candle for roughly 5 minutes and then shoved it in the ear that hurt. He is now deaf in that ear and was on fall precautions since he couldn't walk straight. As a bonus, I was able to listen to every episode of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air that was on that day wherever I was on the floor because the TV was on the loudest volume possible.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
I have hearing loss in one ear as a result of a micro-stroke in my 30s. I cannot imagine purposefully doing something to my ear. Ears are sacred no-no-shove-things zones, just like eyes!
Chantay Robinson 2 years ago
Hit the ear drum as a kid trying to get water out of my ear... I feel ya, I am ultra sensitive about touching my ears.
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April Stephens 3 years ago
I saw the picture of the bobby pin, got too squeamish, and couldn't even read the story. My imagination is going into overdrive.
Some guy 2 years ago
In the words of the sage Tim Minchin: "By definition, alternative medicine has either not been proved to work, or been proved not to work. Do you know what they call alternative medicine that's been proved to work? Medicine."
Load More Replies... Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
I’ve heard of scraping out earwax with a bobby pin, but this is some next-level craziness. Who even thinks of shoving hot metal in their ear???
#28
Dentist reporting in:
I had a guy who had tried to pry his own tooth out with a screwdriver. It did not go well.
CalicoKitty 3 years ago
A screwdriver? Guy didn't have a pair of pliers? (For legal and medical reasons do not plier out your teeth either. Thank)
Bouche Clay 3 years ago
I had to pull a tooth with pliers. I'm American, you see. It wasn't a lot of fun.
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Waite Forit 3 years ago (edited)
I had a tooth with a root canal filling that lasted a couple decades. The tooth just happened to break while I was on a fishing trip in a fairly remote area (no doctors or dentists nearby). The broken tooth had a sharp edge that was cutting my tongue. Fortunately, there was a gas station/auto shop in the area. I went there, borrowed a small file, and filed off part of the tooth. This worked well, and I was able to continue on my vacation.
Judy Keith 3 years ago
Kudos to you for your high pain tolerance, saved a bundle NOT going to nearest dentist even if you had to go home.
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Adam Leviness 3 years ago
Yea, tooth pain will make people do crazy things. I wonder how many if these stories simply could have been prevented by a US Healthcare system that doesn't make you choose between risking your own life in home based surgeries/procedures or going into massive debt for the rest of your life. I mean, yes these people are all clearly dumb beyond beliefe. But, would the majority of them have even attempted to do these things if they could just walk into a hospital and get care before it turns into an ACTUAL emergency
Isabel Care 3 years ago
I thought the Quality Street toffee penny was the tool for removing a tooth
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
actually took plyers to one of my teeth, no numbness, it hurt so bad, got it out, told my mom and we went to the dentist the next day....why not to began with? he was the one that left half the tooth in and said it was fine.... it wasn't and he won't do anything for it or pain unless it was gone, and we didn't have the 5k for it to be pulled by him....but its only $800 for us to replace it, so .... bye tooth~
Brian Droste 2 years ago
Seen a show about restoration. There was a employee who had a bed tooth instead of going to the dentist he decided to pull his own tooth out with pliers.
Dorothy Stovall 3 years ago
When I was a kid with a loose baby tooth my dad used pliers (then took me to the toy store). It was all good.
#29
I am an EMT who works in the ER. We once had a patient who spilled hot grease all over his arms after a small fryer accident. This happened to take place at the patient's In-laws who happened to be Chinese. Apparently there is an old wives tale in china that says to treat burns with a layer of toothpaste and rock salt. Not wanting to offend his In-laws he goes along with this do it yourself treatment. I think I spent about three hours that evening picking rock salt out of 2nd degree burns and then cleaning out all of the, now dried, toothpaste.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
it's not just Chinese, but there is an "old wives tale" that you can treat first-degree burns with a layer of toothpaste since toothpaste will keep the heat inside and help, but it will do nothing for 2nd degree, and rock salt is because its usually used with toothpaste or used instead of toothpaste, and he must have thought all of it together was the Real deal
Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
"keeping the heat inside" makes burns WORSE. It's the reason butter is not good for burns.
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SheamusFanFrom1987 3 years ago
I'm Chinese, and my family has an old wives tale for these kind of situations: Get your behind in the car, we are going to the hospital!!!
Erin Sullivan 3 years ago
One time when I was around 8ish, my brothers and my step brother(on my dad's side) were at my Mom's house working on one of their cars. They were in their late teens/early 20s, and didn't know what they were doing. My step brother ended up getting sprayed with hot liquid/steam, and it burned his arm and part of his face pretty bad. They ran inside and my Mom told them to call my stepmother and take him to the ER. But, when they called my stepmom, she told them just to bring him home so she could check his burns. Ignoring my Mom's advice, the boys and I all piled up in the car and drove over to my Dad's house. When we get there, my stepmom decided that the burns weren't serious enough to go to the hospital (but they definitely were) and that she could treat him at home. Did she apply soothing/healing creams, or even aloe you ask? Nope. Mustard. The yellow kind. So not only did he have burns that took months to heal, he was also stained yellow. 🤦♀️
Erin Sullivan 3 years ago
The kicker was that my stepmom was a RN. Obviously not a bright one, though. 🤦♀️😅
Load More Replies... Adam Leviness 3 years ago
Lol he didn't want to offend his in-laws. This dude litterally let them pour salt in his wounds out of social awkwardness. I'd prob be the same way and then rush right to the hospital too.
Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
PEOPLE PEOPLE PEOPLE!!! There is no ancient secret to treating burns. Run some cold water on a first-degree burn, all else seek medical attention 😩
YetAnotherSarah 3 years ago
How the hell are we gonna claim "old wives tale" when modern toothpaste was only created 140 years ago? I know tooth cleansers predate that, but that's not what we're talking about, is it.
Min 3 years ago
What exactly is the acceptable time frame for an old wives' tale if toothpaste being 140 years old is too recent? 200 years? 500 years?
Load More Replies... #30
I have a buddy that is a medic in the United States Navy. One time when he was on leave and in town, us and all of our mutual friends were hanging out, shooting the s**t before a night of typical drunken shenanigans was surely to begin. He then proceeds to tell me multiple stories to which I could not believe. I have forgotten pretty much all of then, except for one...
He proceeded to tell me how a young (late teens early 20's) woman came in complaining of severe stomach pain. He was expecting to diagnose her with menstrual cramps or something else rudimentary and gave her basic pain meds etc. She came back less than a week later, complaining that the pain had only increased. He decided to send her for an X-ray to get it checked out and he could not believe what the results showed.
It **appeared** like roots of some sort were twisting and turning inside her abdomen, and proceeding to wrap around her spine.
Apparently, as a form of do-it-yourself birth control, this young lady had followed her mothers instructions and cut the end off a potato and stuck it all the way up in her vagina. Well, in a damp, moist environment, it began to thrive, as well as partially rot. I cannot even imagine what her gyno must have said, but this story had me in a cold-sweat, near dry-heaving. Easily tops one of the most disturbing stories I've ever heard.
Edit: Emphasis on **appeared**. He did not say it WAS wrapped around her spine, just that's what it LOOKED like it was about to do.
Amanda Rose 3 years ago
He was expecting to diagnose her with menstrual cramps or something else rudimentary and gave her basic pain meds etc. - Well, there's the first part of the problem. Any wonder why women get fed up with the state of healthcare towards us?
Persephone 3 years ago
Well I do agree with you on the state of women's Healthcare, but there is a medical saying "when you hear hoofbeats, look for horses first before zebras"... I would not expect someone to shove a potato up their vag either! That's why medical personnel ask crazy questions sometimes. She should have had a pelvic exam.
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Chocolate llama 3 years ago
Ok, yeah this is stupid. But this guy should also learn to treat women like humans and take their pain complaints serious. At end teen/early twenties most of us will have had our periods for like around 5 years. We *know* what it feels like and we're not going to your offices in pain to have you tell us "oh it's the thing you have experienced every month for the last 5 years, you must've just forgotten what it is". Thanks for coming to my TED talk
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
Right?! No suspected appendicitis, ovarian cyst, ectopic pregnancy, constipation...hell even gas...but don't "expect" a diagnosis
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Deborah B 3 years ago
So no physical exam, no tests, no proper history taken? Just "Severe stomach pain, must be cramps or something, take pain meds." This is incredibly frustrating, the woman could have died from toxic shock syndrome.
Beeps 3 years ago
Came here to say exactly what other pandas have said already: maybe don’t just blindly dismiss women who complain about severe stomach pain. We do know the difference between unexplained pain and menstrual cramps!
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Wehn you're too afraid or ashamed of your own body functions to go to an MD, well, that's what happens. PLEASE, parents, teach kids to accept their bodies, the changes therein, and get a da*n book --- Anatomy for Idiots maybe?
Katy Cordeth 3 years ago (edited)
This is an old urban legend, although in the version I originally heard it was a drunk lady who was feeling a little randy and decided to pleasure herself with a potato as she didn't have anything else to hand. She passed out mid-w*nk and forgot it was up there when she came round. https://www.snopes.com/news/2014/10/05/potato-slip/
TurquoiseTzarina 3 years ago
I'm not believing this story. How did the potato stay up in her vagina? The body would naturally expell it. Certainly she didn't push it up into her uterus.... I'm just saying....
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Miss_Priss 3 years ago
I work in the field. I was assisting my doctor with a procedure on a very nice lady. She was having polyps on her cervix removed. The doctor takes long forceps and grabs the polyp and starts twisting it off. The patient starts squirming a bit and says it hurts. Doc "there might be pressure but no pain, " Apparently the procedure is not supposed to have any anesthetic. Which blows my mind. Like how the heck should it feel?!? I was horrified. Every time I see those forceps I clamp legs shut.
poiplescales 3 years ago
I love when people who are inflicting pain act like you are being a big baby for expressing discomfort. Tell me you enjoy hurting people without telling me you enjoy hurting people.
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Sande Knight 3 years ago
Q: Why not do x-ray at first visit? Hmmm... just menstrual cramps...eh?
#31
I work in a hospital lab. A couple years ago, I worked night shift and would routinely get called up to the Emergency Room to draw blood. I get the call, go up there, and find a two year-old boy, completely unresponsive and a mother screaming frantically and hopping around. I draw the blood, go down to the lab, and start my tests. I found an ethanol level of 350 mg/dl (Blood Alcohol Level of 0.35...possibly fatal even for an adult). I call it up to the doc and they bring in Social Services and whoever else to question the mom. Apparently, she found her son in the garage with a bottle of antifreeze and he was acting kinda weird, so she figured he was drinking it. She went online and saw that the cure for ethylene glycol poisoning is ethanol. So she went to the liquor cabinet and started POURING STRAIGHT WHISKEY DOWN THIS POOR KIDS THROAT!!! Then, of course, he passed out and she decided maybe they should go to the hospital. Kid lived.
TL;DR Mom gave her 2 y/o alcohol poisoning in an attempt to cure him from possible methanol poisoning
EDIT: ethylene glycol, not methanol.
TotallyNOTaFox 3 years ago (edited)
The first advice showing up on Google when searching for poisoning should be "Contact medical services immediately" in big, fat letters
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
This is actually a common veterinary treatment (sort of). We treated antifreeze poisoning with Vodka. Obviously it was monitored and there was follow up care...but yeah...not in a kid.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
That kid party harder than any of us at that age {not being insensitive, I'm sure he made it and it's now a joke to him that "mom got me "drunk" as a child lol" thing now}
Hatred Pony 3 years ago
I'm not sure I would think my mom almost killing me as a toddler would transfer well into a joke as I got older.
Load More Replies... #32
Nurse here. We had a younger patient who had run out of their inhaler and didn't want to tell their mom (after meeting her I could see why, she was just angry at the world) so he took keyboard cleaner Can-o-Air and tipped it upside down and inhaled. Turning it upside down releases the chemicals in an icy cold spray and it immediately caused this kid to go into a severe asthma attack and caused cold burns to the back of his throat.
Biliegh Berrie 3 years ago
Sadly she probably took the cost out on him. Inhalers for our son, with his dad's insurance from military, we're 68.00 each.
Missmegs 3 years ago
That's absolutely criminal. I'm assuming you're US because our system is a really bad joke.
Load More Replies... #33
When I was 12 I had a really irritating case of [tonsil stones](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonsillolith).
No matter what I did I couldn't get them out and was starting to get a little desperate. I decided to use a vacuum cleaner (not a small one, an actual household vacuum cleaner) on its lowest setting to suck them out.
I ended up bleeding a lot and my uvula swelled up so much my throat almost closed. The hospital still wouldn't take out my tonsils.
I was not a smart child.
#34
ER Tech here:
A man came in with his wife because he had been bleeding from his bum. He thought that the best way was to self-anesthetize with alcohol, lubricate the area, and cauterize with a curling iron...
He actually got it a fair way up before he pulled it out, judging by how much of his r****m turned KFC. We had to remove about a foot of GI tract due to burnt, scarred tissue. The worst part was that didn't even stop the bleeding, which originated farther up the GI tract than the iron would ever reach.
There is also the story about a champagne bottle popping off inside someone, but thats another story.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
please don't shake the fox, there worried about the man's bum too
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Bananaramamama 3 years ago
A deleted comment on this subject....I'm dying to know
Load More Replies... #35
Not an RN, but my diabetic grandpa used to eat all the bread/sugar he wanted, and then eat lemondrops after everything. According to him, the real lemon juice acid would counteract the sugar he had just eaten. He was convinced. The nurses disagreed and fought with him for years, but eventually gave in and let him do what he wanted because he was 97 and the food made him happy.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
hell at 97 i would just take him to a candy factory and go ham on anything he wanted!
Tim B 2 years ago
"Hey grandpa,let's go to the candy store and get what you want,but we have to stop at a lawyers office to modify your will first". Lol
Load More Replies... Jaekry 3 years ago
At that age... Let ppl be. If they are drinking... Just let them. Detoxing at that age is kinda pointless, and might rob them from their daily pleasures. (My fathers doctors, said he could still have a drink if he wanted. (He's 85) But my father being a person that does extreme, abruptly stopped. Made him sick for a period, but okay, stopped even the occasional drink. But he is sssssooo uptight (age seem to do that to ppl) that we (the children) sometimes think: relax! this stressing is no good either, just have a damn beer on a sunday afternoon!
#36
My first night as an intern, this old man came in the ER with his daughter complaining of fainting while at home. He was just feeling dizzy now so the resident admits the patients and since he is not cooperative we start taking history from his daughter. While we are inteviewing her the patient starts vomiting some brownish material (it looks like clotted blood which is usually seen in a bleeding stomach ulcer). So we ask the daughter about it and she says: "Oh no! this is just 'melted suger' that I gave him an hour ago". Turns out she heat some sugar until it started melting and fed it to the poor guy. So we spend an hour convincing the lady that this can be a GI bleeding and we have to do so and so, and she is not convinced. Meanwhile the patient went into cardiopulmonary arrest and died. Turns out it WAS a GI bleeding, exacerbated by pouring hot sugar in patients mouth. GOD people are idiots sometimes.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
I don’t know whether to think that the daughter was a complete moron (WTF did she think “melted sugar” would do for her father?!) or that she knew dingy-dang well what she was doing and wanted to hurt/kill her father.
#37
ER nurse here.
I was working in triage. Another triage nurse called me over to show me a horribly rotten foot. The first thing I noticed was that there was no detectable odor. Normally the smell is quite pronounced. I wondered out loud why there was no smell.
That's when the patient spoke up. She said, "Bleach. I've been soaking it in bleach every night."
Michelle Carlson 3 years ago
"sweet fancy moses" - that's a great phrase. I'm gonna use it! :>)
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And i was like WTF!! 3 years ago
When i said i think that people cant be more stupid, i read something like this to prove me wrong. I DID NOT MEANT IT AS A CHALLENGE!!!
#38
I work in the ER and not too long ago I had a lady come in with a HUGE swelling on her arm and a really really upset stomach. As we began to examine her arm we found two small puncture wounds. I asked her what had happened and she said she was out working in her garden and she was bit by a snake.....THREE DAYS AGO!! And that she had heard that drinking vinegar would cure the bite. Not only did the bite become infected only drinking vinegar for three days is not a very good idea!!
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
What a basic bítch. (yes, vinegar’s pH makes it acidic and not a base, but I couldn’t resist!)
#39
So my dad was an EMT for the longest time and he would always tell me stories about the weird s**t he happened upon, but the most f****d up one was told about 5 months after my 18th birthday. So my dad walks into an apartment downtown where he is immediately greeted by a pack of about 16-20 elderly swingers in various stages of nudity and bdsm wear. They were all huddled around a single man strapped into a sex swing who was holding his genitals and moaning. When my dad asked what had happened the man responded by removing his hands and displaying his penis which had swollen so much that the skin had actually ripped all along the length. He said that he had ED but mistakenly left his Cialis at home, so thinking on his feet he decided to use a c**k-ring. He asked around but nobody had one. But nobody comes to orgy to sit on the couch so the man improvises, lubes up his wedding ring and manages to get the sucker on. It did it's job though, blood went in but didn't go out. Problem was the ring was 6 sizes too small so when the deed was done his penis had swelled so much that the ring wouldn't budge. He played it off though and suffered in silence for THREE HOURS while the orgy continued until a rough Handy-J backed by the immense blood pressure caused the skin to split. The man was rushed to the hospital but nothing could be done to remove the ring and his penis had to be amputated. TL;DR- Don't put your wedding ring on your d**k.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
I think what all we want to know is..... was he really still married or was his wife/husband there with him or did he come alone? also.... are you allowed in a swinger party if your partner is gone and you are single? are you a swinger if you are single? SO MANY QUESTIONS!
3 Owls In A Coat 3 years ago
If you’re a single swinger, are you swingle?
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#40
This guy had a scabies infestation and poured rubbing alcohol over himself to kill the mites. Then he lit a cigarette while he waited for it to dry. Second and third degree burns over 80% of his body.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
at first i was like, oh well that's not too bad, rubbing alcohol is a good cleaner..... ummm wait no... not the cig!
Katy Cordeth 3 years ago
This is why vaping is better for your health if you have a nicotine addiction, people.
#41
One of my patients had put Nair on his a**s and left it on overnight. As one would think, when he woke up he had burns that looked like a pressure ulcer. Instead of coming to the ED right away he decide he would soothe the pain with honey. When that didn't work he tried to remove the honey using vodka. Teaching his roommate how to do those dressing changes was the most awkward experience I have ever had professionally.
Pixie 3 years ago
I checked the original reddit comment - bp censored a n u s. Other question, what is nair?
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#42
Diabetic patient, went to vacation in the Caribbean, left her insulin on a cruise ship, hasn't taken any for a week... Gets back to states and Medicaid won't pay for lost or stolen meds, and she refuses to pay for another bottle, because she "doesn't have any money". Realizes that no insulin = more sugar in blood, somehow gets the idea in her head that more sugar in blood means that her blood is now "thicker" so she decides to take a bunch of plavix, warfarin, and aspirin (all blood thinners that cause bleeding and high doses can and will lead to internal bleeding and death) to thin her blood. I get the story when she comes into the pharmacy to get refills on her warfarin and plavix and ask her why she needs those early. Told her to immediately go to the ER. I have no idea if she actually did...
-plavix, sorry bad typo thanks for pointing that out, and causes blood thinning ( I need to proof read more)
Katy Cordeth 3 years ago
Fork the U.S. medical system and the GOP right in the ear. Richest country in the damn world. But it would be sOcIaLiSm to make insulin, and other drugs, less prohibitively expensive.
DippityDooDerp 3 years ago
Costplusdrugs.com Majorly discounted medication. Started by Mark Cuban. Cheaper than GoodRx. You can get $2000+ cancer meds for less than $20
#43
Not a medical professional, but I once shared living quarters with medics at a small outpost in Afghanistan. Whenever they weren't busy otherwise they'd see as many locals as they could. I'm working in the back room one day when I overhear this little gem of a conversation: Patient, through interpreter: "I caught an STD recently during a vacation in Pakistan." Context: The locals tend to look at Pakistan like Americans view Las Vegas; a way to get away from it all for uninhibited hedonism when desired. Medic: "How bad are the flareups?" Patient: "Pretty bad, but I'm trying to treat it naturally." I lean in at this point, ready for whatever explanation is coming. Long silence from the medic, who is trying to process the situation. Medic: "How...does one treat a STD naturally?" Patient: "I'm eating a lot of cheese."
Samyan Elrod 2 years ago
"How are you naturally treating your cancer?" "Cheese, darling, cheese." "And your acne?" "A good ol' hunk of Swiss" "Your myriad of mental health issues?" "DAMMIT JANICE DON'T YOU KNOW CHEESE MAKES YOU INVINCIBLE?!?!?!?"
#44
Ophthalmologist here - I've had a patient who would rewet her contact lenses when they felt dry by putting them in her mouth. Ended up with a central corneal ulcer requiring a transplant.
wowbagger 3 years ago
My mother "cleans" her contacts this way ALL THE TIME. Just puts them in her mouth, "cleans" them off, and pops them back in her eyes. It drives me absolutely crazy.
EJ Morrow 3 years ago
wowberger, please tell her to stop. If she doesn't believe you, make sure she asks her optometrist. I'm willing to bet her optometrist might even be willing to call her directly and tell her to stop, if you call them first. (I work for an optometrist.)
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Kristie French 3 years ago
I have actually done this before…..contact falls out on ground pit in mouth to clean off, pop in back in.
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
This is something I have heard for the past 20+ years. I have no idea if it's just outdated or crazy
#45
Pour straight bleach onto poison ivy...at the suggestion of a pharmacy tech. Edit: I didn't do this to myself, I saw the aftermath on someone.
#46
This guy slightly burned both his feet while burning leaves. The burns got horribly infected. He knew he needed to drain them. He pulled the toothpick out of his mouth and drove it through the wounds. A USED toothpick. He ended up in the hospital of course.
Balso Steele 3 years ago
My grandpa stepped on a toothpick on a sub like 60 yrs ago that got infected. The bacteria had absolutely wrecked his heart valves & the surrounding tissue so bad he couldn't get replacements when they became available because all there was to attach to was scar tissue. Still lived to 83, but damn near had more mini-attacks than he had grandkids. Human mouths are filthy.
#47
I once stitched up my own wound. I was under the impression that if my dad took me to the hospital, I wouldn't be covered by my mom's insurance. So, I took some string and a sewing needle and stitched it up. It hurt like a b***h. Afterwards, I wrapped it with gauze and no one was the wiser. Until my grandma asked about it. I, being an evil child and fully aware my grandma is extremely Squamish, took the gauze off and showed her. She promptly told my mom and I was taken to the hospital. Doctor told me I did a decent job with the stitching but to let a professional take care of it next time.
Brenda Spagnola-Wilson 3 years ago
I once had to restitch a wound on my husband's shoulder when he ripped it out. Had paramedic friend there but he would only let me do it. The next day his Dr said I did OK, but next time just wrap gauze around it and leave it alone till we saw a Dr. They had to remove it and redo it
#48
A sixty year old woman self diagnosed herself with leg cancer and decided to treat it herself by periodically "squeezing the cancer out" of a centimeter wide hole in her leg.
Yeah, that was a pretty stupid one. @_@
Jami M. Cox 3 years ago
Eww, that makes cutting seem mild. I hope the lady got a really helpful psych consult.
#49
Not a medical worker but I still have a pretty good story.
My first year going to Boy Scout camp I wasn't able to go the week the rest of my Troop was going so I had to go with the provisional group (all the people who went without their Troop). Being that way I didn't know anyone in it but soon made some friends. This one kid loved holding his extremely sharp pocket knife in his hand and then throwing it into the ground in front of him. One day he got the idea that the ground wasn't fun enough and decided to try and stick it into trees. We were all just sitting around relaxing in between classes watching him and he throws his knife directly at the tree in front of him. It didn't stick into the tree. Instead it ricocheted off of the tree and sliced his shin. Since he was working toward his first aid merit badge he decided he could handle it himself and tied a tourniquet **below** the cut. We tried to tell him he was wrong and he assured us he was fine and started limping toward the first aid hut with someone helping him. He passed out on the way there.
TL;DR: Kid throws knife, gets cut, mends it horribly, and then passes out.
Pumpkin Spice 3 years ago
I've never even been to med classes and I'd know to tie a tourniquet ABOVE the wound! Or closer to the heart than the wound is. Come ON!
Lawrencium 3 years ago
A tourniquet was probably not the right call to begin with, as it's designed to stop all blood flow... in other words: you're setting it up for amputation.
#50
When I was a nursing attendant at a hospital, I brought a patient from emergency to the OR for emergency surgery. This unfortunate chap had somehow managed to put a lubricated apple into his r****m. After discovering that this was a bad idea, he decided that a good way to extract this object would be to take a fork and a knife, cut it into smaller pieces, thereby making extraction a breeze. This brilliant idea didn't work so well for him, and he ended up in the emergency department with some nasty lacerations to the inside of his colon. Oh, and a still mostly intact apple in place. TL;DR: Apples + A**s = No fun.
Cold Contagious 3 years ago
Hahaha 😁 absolutely right! No one ever said how it was intended to be used, lol 😆...
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KING ILLEGAL FOREST 3 years ago
WHYYYYYY do so many people stick random objects up their bums?!?
#51
While working in the ER, an older woman came in and complained of a headache and rectal pain. Nothing too out of the ordinary by themselves, but an odd combination of complaints. A few questions in, we find out that patient has been attempting to treat her headache with over the counter ibuprofen... Rectally. She was pretty embarrassed when we told her over the counter meds can't be taken rectally unless specified.
#52
My Uncle had a rotten tooth, and was scheduled to get a proper surgical removal the next day, but it was just too painful. In the middle of the night he attempted to remove the rotten tooth himself with a pair of needle nose pliers. He didn't realize that the rotten tooth was very weak, so when he attempted the removal, the tooth shattered. This made him have to get in his car and drive himself to the hospital (while biting down on a blood-soaked cloth) to get much more expensive emergency surgery to remove the shards of tooth. That was truly idiotic.
Strings 3 years ago
Having had teeth in terrible condition, the pain can make you loose IQ points
SweetCheesySpaghetti 3 years ago
Agreed. Oral pain is absolutely maddening.
Load More Replies... Brenda Spagnola-Wilson 3 years ago
Dental pain is one of the worst kinds of pain. I had bad teeth despite taking care of them (some of us just have bad teeth). Woke up one morning with the right side of my face swollen - hairline to chin, ear to left side of mouth. Came out of nowhere. Had tons to do, went about my day. Ended up in the ER about 9pm. Dental surgeon was called in. I had micro abscesses across the entire top of my mouth. Dr told hubby it was going septic but caught in time. We had no Dental insurance so he told us to come back next week complaining of pain again. Under medical he was able to remove all but 2 top teeth. That was the worst pain I ever experienced.
#53
BURNS, BLOOD, AND ICE CREAM. While working in Buffalo, NY as an EMT, I once responded to the scene of a fireworks related injury. Upon entering the premiss it noticeably was filled with only very drunk, very scared, very high school age kids, of course no adults. After convincing one party goer that we were not the police, and did not care about their drinking, they showed us to the injured boy. He was 14, his hands charred, chest skin pealing, face very bloody and rearranged. The story as to how this happened was that the kid made an improvised explosive out of at least 20 motor ball fireworks...when lighting it things did not go as planned. Now 3rd degree burns are indeed very very painful, but under no circumstances should you try to alleviate the pain as this young kid did... His solution; chocolate ice cream! F*****g chocolate ice cream everywhere, on his face, on his chewed up hands, smeared on his chest. It was like a chocolate BBQ o'child! Dairy products are never the answer to serious wounds folks, teach your children. (and maybe that golden rule; "No more than ten mortar balls per improvised explosive")
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
strawberry ice cream would have healed him and they wouldn't have needed t cal 911! All because of the wrong ice cream, always bring more than one type folks!
Brenda Spagnola-Wilson 3 years ago
Had 3rd degree burns on the back of my hand from 200 degree water (to keep food hot). I remember the pain. Can't imagine it that bad.
SheamusFanFrom1987 3 years ago
I will likely never look at chocolate ice cream the same again...
#54
Had a make patient, late 50s, hated doctors and hasn't been to see one in decades. He started developing urinary retention, likely due to an enlarged prostate. After a time, his bladder was so full of urine that couldn't come out that he found he was constantly dribbling out urine 24/7. Instead of making an appointment, he dealt with it by limiting his fluid intake to no water and "just 1-2 beers" a day, and then wearing diapers and sleeping on an absorbent pad. When he finally came in (by ambulance, called by his wife), the ER doc put a Foley in and drained literally 3.5 liters of bloody urine.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
FYI: A “Foley” is a type of catheter. It’s a little tube that they pass up through your urethra and into your bladder to drain urine.
Balso Steele 3 years ago
More properly, a Foley has an air-inflated bulb (AFTER insertion!!) that holds the cath in place in the bladder.
Load More Replies... #55
Nurse here: had a man decide to self treat an abscess in his stomach by stuffing it with clorox bleach soaked socks. Yup yup. Needles to say after 4 months it was pretty disgusting. Needed treatment for MRSA, surgery and packing for the wound, and finally closure.
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
I'm sure its just an autocorrect but I have seen so many people calling it MARSA when it's actually MRSA. LOL. MARSA is accurate for the city or as a military aircraft term
Load More Replies... #56
Orthopedic Nurse here. When someone breaks their hip the typical presentation is a shortened and externally (sometimes internally) rotated leg. I had a lady that thoughr her hip had simply popped out and had her kid pull on her leg to try and pop it back in. That didn't work, but regardless she didn't believe anything serious was wrong at the time. She waited 3 months before coming to the hospital. She only came in after she couldn't feel her foot anymore and her leg was swelling up from a deep vein thrombosis. TFW needs treated for DVT and needs surgery.
#57
Had a story from a friend who was a first responder. Gets a call to go to an address, with a 16 year old girl calling for help and refusing to divulge more. He shows up to the location, finds the girl with her pants off, washcloth covering the genitals. After a brief examination, he finds the reddest, swollen, puss discharging mess I could only begin to imagine. Turns out her bf gave her crabs, and her dyi method to try and solve the problem was to attempt to insert the nozzle of a raid bottle, and douche away while spritzing the exterior as well.
Cold Contagious 3 years ago
Holy Shîtballs! There are far too many teens trying to fry their gênitals off with chemical burns from hazardous and poisonous products. They're in dire need of some sex ed or a hotline where they can call and ask questions or even a website with a response team and possibly live chat available. This is horrifying and so serious 😢. I feel horrible for these kids.
#58
Had a homeless patient in med school with venous stasis bilateral lower limbs...gets a wound...gets infected...it spreads. So he thinks that he can beat the infection with toilet bowl cleaner. By the time we admitted him from the ED, not only were his legs stained blue from the cleaner, they were also completely infested with maggots. The smell was something I'll never forget....I had to put a mouthful of altoids in before I put my mask on, and huff my own spicy breath, as I approached his room. Poor guy wound up leaving AMA because he didn't want an amputation, and died from a DVT that week. Edit: spelling, yikes.
Cold Contagious 3 years ago (edited)
Sounds like a nightmare experience for him to endure. I'm sure an amputation scared the hêll out of him. I feel like that to a homeless person, their independence, or lack of, would be terrifying. They'd be dâmned if they do and dâmned if they don't. Such a sad situation.
Bored Trash Panda 2 years ago
This is why I became a medical biller instead of the hands on side of healthcare.....
#59
Nurse here. A mom was caring for her son who had a G-tube most of his life. (A feeding tube that goes into his belly) Sometimes when it would get clogged she would put Coke into it to dissolve the clog, a common practice with G-tubes. At one point he child went home on IV antibiotics. The IV goes into the blood stream as opposed to the stomach. At home he IV got clogged. So the mom tried injecting Coke into it in order to dissolve the clog. Luckily it did no work. Coke into the blood could probably have killed the child. In the mom's defense, I guess all tubes look the same to her.
Cold Contagious 3 years ago
OMFG how could anyone think that Coke could enter the bloodstream along with IV fluids, that's insanity!
Got Banned But Now I'm Back 3 years ago
I would imagine the mother of a chronically ill child, who is so exhausted, she doesn't know left from right.
Load More Replies... #60
I work at a veterinary clinic and we once had a gruff, old country guy come in with his Australian shepherd. The dog had a huge hanging growth under his neck that was rubbing against the ground and just looked horrible. The doctor strongly recommended he have it removed, and the owner said he could do it again. Again!? Apparently, the dog had a smaller growth in the same spot years ago that the owner removed with a pocket knife and bottle of alcohol. No closure, no antibiotics. We were so shocked! The doctor went on to educate him as to why that is NOT a good idea. He eventually agreed to let us do the procedure, but MAN was he a difficult son-of-a-b. We're still not sure how the dog survived the last removal without any problems.
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
had this with an old dog, I thankfully was going through veterinarian school and was able to remove a cyst from my dog and treat him, but since I had no money for him he got everything second handed, I had teachers sign off on like shots that i gave for him and stuff, and he lived to a ripe old age~ Sadly i had to drop out of the school ..... I couldn't take putting animals to sleep, I was too much of a "bleeding heart toward animals", I still use a lot of it on my pups now, one just passed away cause he was too sick, and I wasn't able to get him to the actual vet, so I just made him comfy the last few days, and I'm tending to his brother now that has seizures and mental problems, I would rather die than let a animal go in pain
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago (edited)
Except you DID let your animals “go in pain” because you let your dog suffer for days since you “couldn’t” get him to the actual vet at any point during his “last few days”. That dog was dying slowly. If you can’t afford medical care for your animals, don’t get animals. Or ask for help - many vet clinics will do low-cost treatment or have other methods of helping financially, if it’s a financial issue.
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#61
Im not a medical worker but I did something pretty dumb. I was maybe 10 years old. I had an outward grown birth mark on my body. I dont know how to describe it but it was sticking out of my skin a bit and was darker colored. It was in a rather embarrassing area of my body. I did not want to show or tell my parents about it cause i was embarrassed. Remember, I was 10 or so. I took ice, held it against it until I could no longer feel it and it was numb. I then took a pair of scissors, Soaked it in rubbing alcohol to make sure it was as clean as possible. Then I cut it off. Wrapped myself in bandages and it was over with. When I reflect on that, im proud of myself for making sure it was done cleanly....but its dumb to do self surgery.
3 Owls In A Coat 3 years ago
When I was younger I pierced my own ears with a pin….I have no idea how I was so brave because the thought makes my stomach turn now. I had ice and rubbing alcohol too, and they healed just fine - still pierced today. Still, do not try this at home kids.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
It’s cute that OP thought that his parents didn’t know about that “birthmark”… if it WAS a birthmark… because, you know, BIRTHmark? XD But I too was 10 once and similarly dumb!
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
truth be told, my aunt had me do that with a huge skin tag on her back when I was like 15, told me to take scissors and just snip it, and I did, we got it to stop bleeding hours later, and it took 3 months to heal, it didn't hurt she says, but we called it "Black Back Rot" till now, and it never came back, now i know how to actually get rid of them no pain no cutting with a string
Huddo's sister 3 years ago
I removed a skin tag by squeezing into the edge with my fingernails, all the way around, as hard as I could, when I was a teen. I recently was tempted to do it again with another one but found I couldn't urge myself enough to do it. The first one didn't even bleed.
Load More Replies... Brenda Spagnola-Wilson 3 years ago
I pierced my ears twice as a kid. Mom made me let them close up. Used ice and a needle. I shudder to think of it now
lee hooni stan (look him up) 2 years ago
HOW DO KIDS FIGURE OUT HOW TO DO SELF-SURGERY BETTER THAN ADULTS
Lydia Holmes 2 years ago
I fixed my own ingrown toenail. it healed fine and caused me no future trouble.
#62
Firefighter/Paramedic here: We were called for a diabetic patient in a private residence. We walked into the pts bedroom to find him laying in bed with sugar all over is face and the bed. The teenage son admitted to poring a bag of sugar into his dad's mouth after the dispatcher told him that his sugar may be low.
Cold Contagious 3 years ago
JFC! Sounds like the 911 dispatcher should have been very clear in what they told him to do for the low blood sugar...
#63
An elderly lady brought her husband in with severe diarrhea. She had stoppered his a**s with a '00' rubber cork. He died of sepsis.
#64
My mom got a huge abscess on a wisdom tooth and had such a bad infection that they were worried about it reaching her brain or heart. Two years later she tells me she had an abscess there before, but had no insurance, so she used a (clean) veterinary scalpel and tequila to take care of it. She also bit off a chunk of skin that was hanging from her hand after she scraped it.
#65
acid/chemical from car battery on poison ivy. It got rid of the poison ivy and some skin.
#66
Not me personally, but when I was in EMT school our instructor told us of a woman who thought she was having a heart attack, then after calling 911 she took her husband's nitro. For those of you who don't know, nitro is used by medics and also prescribed to patients in order to lower blood pressure. It is also prescribed according to your body size. This little old lady took nitro that was meant for a full grown man twice her size. Apparently she was just sitting on the couch about to pass out when they showed up.
#67
Admitting a patient in the ED for unstable angina. He had great ST depressions during chest pain that resolved with aspirin and nitro. Earlier that morning he had crushing chest pain with radiation to his jaw. Thinking somehow it was due to hunger pains, his attempted cure was to eat an everything bagle with lox and cream cheese. Didnt work, but sounded delicious.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
There’s few things that cream cheese CAN’T cure! …except obesity.
#68
A friend of mine superglued his teeth back into his mouth after drunken shenanigans once.
Vix Spiderthrust 3 years ago
Try not to ingest superglue. The reason we don't use it for emergency wound closure is because it contains potassium cyanide, which is potentially lethal.
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago (edited)
I question the efficacy of this “fix” as I once looked into a tube of superglue while squeezing it (it was clogged) and I managed to spray superglue into my eyes and mouth and all over my face. The ER doc laughed at me (in a kind way) and said I didn’t have to worry about “gluing my eyes/mouth shut” as superglue won’t glue moist surfaces together, it’ll just sort of clump into bits and sit there. So yeah, I had nasty clumps of superglue in my eyes. But it didn’t do anything in my mouth - only glued the dry parts of my lips together. Unless this dude got his, uh, drunkenly-extracted teeth dry of spit and then glued them to his still-attached teeth (also dry of spit), I’m not sure the superglue would adhere. Also: yes, I was dumb. I was in my early 20s. No, I haven’t lived it down with my friends/family yet XD
Bananaramamama 3 years ago
The whole theme of this thread is a question of "efficacy"
Load More Replies... Brenda Spagnola-Wilson 3 years ago
I thought super glue was originally developed for emergency wound closure (battle field). Like for medics to use until wounded could be seen by Dr or transferred to a hospital?
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
I have before super glued a tooth back in my mouth on temp, it has worked but I have been very careful, thankfully I can hold my breath about 2 mins {less now that my lungs are bad tho, but this was a long time ago and i was a good swimmer} so I didn't breath in fumes and I only used a lil bit so none got in my actual mouth
#69
I work in a retirement home, and I caught one of my residents with a spoon inside her butt. Apparently she tried to cure her constipation by sticking a spoon up her booty and trying to scoop the poop out.
Brooklynn Jackson 3 years ago
Sounds like something I've always thought of doing but had the common sense not to
#70
While in China a Chinese female engineer had a cold. To cure the cold she attempted to burn it out using a curling iron. She had large burn all across her back from burning herself repeatedly...
Well-Dressed Wolf 3 years ago
Having once dated the son of Chinese immigrant parents for 20+ years, I’ve heard about (and tried) many traditional practices of Chinese medicine. BBQing yourself with a curling iron is not any form of traditional Chinese medicine.
Load More Replies...
#71
Community Health Nurse reporting in. I love my clients, but sometimes they are a little crazy :-) Patient had diabetes and urinary incontinence. Would often take insulin without eating to "cure the diabetes", and to avoid incontinence, would stick tampons into her urethra. The most interesting part of this is that the raging urinary tract infection she acquired from the tampons probably helped keep her blood sugar high enough so she wouldn't have crippling hypoglycaemia.
Blitzø 3 years ago
I- wait- how do you put a tampon in your urethra??? That's not- I don't- what???
3 Owls In A Coat 3 years ago
What’s that old saying, “like a camel through the eye of a needle?”
Load More Replies...
#72
A slightly crazy guy in my town developed numerous decayed teeth over the years. As they became painful, in their turn, he would "extract" them using pliers. This usually just broke off the crown of the tooth, leaving the roots in place. Then, one fine day, one or more of them caused a severe infection and he had to be medevacked. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig%27s_angina
Leoninus Fate 3 years ago
I used to do this, but I would have to dig into the root to pull the rest out, it was almost 5K to pull but like $800 to replace, had to do that a few times, it wasn't fun, {my dad thankfully got wind of it and now pays for medical since my stepmom ... kinda caused all of it} so I'm good on it now, all fixed now
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What do you think ?
Chich 3 years ago
You read one and think nothing can be worse and then you read the next one. Holy c**p Batman!
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Oh, you learn in med school not to say, "This has to be the worst". It's tempting the stupidity of humankind.
Load More Replies...
Waite Forit 3 years ago
I’m a retired nurse. One time I had a hospital patient with a serious infection in a leg wound. His girlfriend came to visit with something she had printed off social media. It said an infection can be treated by exercise because it increases blood flow to the infected area. I’m certainly in favor of being physically active, but this patient desperately needed IV antibiotics. Myself and the doctor tried to convince him to stay, but his girlfriend talked him into leaving and told us “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure he gets lots of exercise.” The patient returned to the hospital by ambulance a few days later and died in the emergency department.
Kevin J. Henning 3 years ago
Some of these situations may be caused by the high cost of medical care in U.S. Some situations might be caused by people believing the stupid articles they read on the internet without first verifying the information. Personally, I'd like to see any website dispensing medical advice without the proper qualifications to do so, be shut down and the people running it arrested and heavily fined.
SMom 2 years ago
Sure, spend money on law enforcement NOT basic education including critical thinking skills. You can fix a lot with that one skill.
Load More Replies...
John Carr 3 years ago
Think so many of these were caused by the ridiculously unaffordable cost of medical help in the US......
DumYum 3 years ago (edited)
I knew a former nurse who was deep into alternative medicine and married to a “healer shaman.” About 15 years ago she had a mole appear above her eyebrow. Years go by and the mole is irregular and growing. Friends urge her to get it looked at and biopsied. But the “nurse” says, no, it’s under control because she concocted a daily ointment for it. After 8 years the mole looks like a tiny finger hanging over her eye. It smells. Again she claims it’s under control because her husband, the shaman, is performing healing rituals with her. Friends keep urging her to go to a doctor. But this former nurse says the medical profession is just a big scam and her diet and spiritual healing remedies will take care of it. At 10 years, her eye is affected. She finally goes to the doctor to have it checked at urging of friends. It’s cancer. She finally gives in to having surgery to save her life. Her eye is removed as well as part of her face. She and hubby still believe in some of the craziest alternative medicine. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against some alternative treatments but they have fallen into the rabbit hole.
Chantay Robinson 2 years ago (edited)
Dog drool from a rabies positive dog... to treat autism... I'm in the veterinary field, it's unimaginable to me why anyone would do this. On a practical level, I have some serious questions..
Load More Replies... JL 3 years ago
There was this one guy once who thought you could kill COVID by injecting bleach into your veins.
EJBWritesBooks 3 years ago
This one guy who led the executive branch for four years...
Load More Replies... Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
Worked in a pharmacy for a while in college, and there were all kinds of facepalm stories. I heard one about a man who came in for liquid amoxicillin for his daughter's ear infection. The tech asked if he wanted a syringe to measure the medicine with. His response? "But won't that hurt if I put that in her ears?"
MeowMix 3 years ago
My dad told me once when he was a kid at a family dinner his cousin cracked his tooth on something they were eating. He was in agony and my grandmother's idea was for him to gargle with GASOLINE. She had some insane home remedies but this one was the worst
Chantay Robinson 2 years ago
That and turpentine were very very popular during the Spanish flu.
Load More Replies... Lene 3 years ago
Why are so many ppl shoving things into holes where you're not supposed to shove up things (unless a doctor prescribed something)? And all that bleach!?! I sometimes feel a bit crazy for relying on tea for colds and extra water+sleep for headaches... but the ppl on this list makes me feel so so normal. 😏
Chich 3 years ago
You read one and think nothing can be worse and then you read the next one. Holy c**p Batman!
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Oh, you learn in med school not to say, "This has to be the worst". It's tempting the stupidity of humankind.
Load More Replies... Waite Forit 3 years ago
I’m a retired nurse. One time I had a hospital patient with a serious infection in a leg wound. His girlfriend came to visit with something she had printed off social media. It said an infection can be treated by exercise because it increases blood flow to the infected area. I’m certainly in favor of being physically active, but this patient desperately needed IV antibiotics. Myself and the doctor tried to convince him to stay, but his girlfriend talked him into leaving and told us “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure he gets lots of exercise.” The patient returned to the hospital by ambulance a few days later and died in the emergency department.
Kevin J. Henning 3 years ago
Some of these situations may be caused by the high cost of medical care in U.S. Some situations might be caused by people believing the stupid articles they read on the internet without first verifying the information. Personally, I'd like to see any website dispensing medical advice without the proper qualifications to do so, be shut down and the people running it arrested and heavily fined.
SMom 2 years ago
Sure, spend money on law enforcement NOT basic education including critical thinking skills. You can fix a lot with that one skill.
Load More Replies... John Carr 3 years ago
Think so many of these were caused by the ridiculously unaffordable cost of medical help in the US......
DumYum 3 years ago (edited)
I knew a former nurse who was deep into alternative medicine and married to a “healer shaman.” About 15 years ago she had a mole appear above her eyebrow. Years go by and the mole is irregular and growing. Friends urge her to get it looked at and biopsied. But the “nurse” says, no, it’s under control because she concocted a daily ointment for it. After 8 years the mole looks like a tiny finger hanging over her eye. It smells. Again she claims it’s under control because her husband, the shaman, is performing healing rituals with her. Friends keep urging her to go to a doctor. But this former nurse says the medical profession is just a big scam and her diet and spiritual healing remedies will take care of it. At 10 years, her eye is affected. She finally goes to the doctor to have it checked at urging of friends. It’s cancer. She finally gives in to having surgery to save her life. Her eye is removed as well as part of her face. She and hubby still believe in some of the craziest alternative medicine. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against some alternative treatments but they have fallen into the rabbit hole.
Chantay Robinson 2 years ago (edited)
Dog drool from a rabies positive dog... to treat autism... I'm in the veterinary field, it's unimaginable to me why anyone would do this. On a practical level, I have some serious questions..
Load More Replies... JL 3 years ago
There was this one guy once who thought you could kill COVID by injecting bleach into your veins.
EJBWritesBooks 3 years ago
This one guy who led the executive branch for four years...
Load More Replies... Stephanie Paich 3 years ago
Worked in a pharmacy for a while in college, and there were all kinds of facepalm stories. I heard one about a man who came in for liquid amoxicillin for his daughter's ear infection. The tech asked if he wanted a syringe to measure the medicine with. His response? "But won't that hurt if I put that in her ears?"
MeowMix 3 years ago
My dad told me once when he was a kid at a family dinner his cousin cracked his tooth on something they were eating. He was in agony and my grandmother's idea was for him to gargle with GASOLINE. She had some insane home remedies but this one was the worst
Chantay Robinson 2 years ago
That and turpentine were very very popular during the Spanish flu.
Load More Replies... Lene 3 years ago
Why are so many ppl shoving things into holes where you're not supposed to shove up things (unless a doctor prescribed something)? And all that bleach!?! I sometimes feel a bit crazy for relying on tea for colds and extra water+sleep for headaches... but the ppl on this list makes me feel so so normal. 😏
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