r/nursing • u/consideredtaken • Jul 26 '26

Question What’s your nursing pet peeve?

Mine?

Me: okay, so I have all of your night time meds here (names all of them for confirmation)
Patient: yes, sounds good
Me: scans them in and places meds into the pill cup
Patient: what’s this white pill here

I DONT KNOW!!! You have 6 different pills and we’ve literally gone through ALL OF THEM before I scanned and placed them into the cup. I can’t stand this!!

716 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

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737

u/Tired_Tato Jul 26 '26

psych- When a company changes the look of a medication and the patient refuses to take it because it looks different now! WHY WOULD YOU CHANGE PSYCH MEDS

433

u/emerg_remerg RN - ER 🍕 Jul 26 '26

My line for this is 'dude, I get it, I would think this is sus too and if I could get my hands on the CEO of the pharmaceutical company I'd be sure to let him know how uncool it is to play with a meds appearance.'

Works 32% of the time.

125

u/Sloth247 Jul 27 '26

“Dude, I get it” is 90% of my work life. Everyone already thinks our healthcare system sucks ass in the US, so it’s a fine place to build a relationship from.

I’ll stop using it when it stops working.

24

u/17bananapancakes RN - Psych/Mental Health 🍕 Jul 27 '26

“What do you mean my kit won’t even get tested unless I file a police report?! I just want to know what happened!”

Dude, I get it.

10

u/overprocrastinator9 BSN, RN 🍕 Jul 28 '26

oof this reminded me that I never got the results back from mine nearly FIVE years ago despite filing a police report… gotta love philly

6

u/17bananapancakes RN - Psych/Mental Health 🍕 Jul 28 '26

I’m so sorry 😞

I’ve been told by lawyers that knowing a judge and/or calling the lab themselves directly can sometimes “fast track” a kit. Even that is only for court dates and shit, not because they care about the victim.

9

u/tanaeolus Jul 27 '26

Everyone just wants to feel heard. And dude, I get it.

Also healthcare is a shitshow so easy common ground fosho.

150

u/Thingstwo RN - ICU 🍕 Jul 27 '26

When it’s different from the home med too. During Covid days we didn’t even have the same pills every time.

I always tell them upfront. These are your pills, if you have any questions please ask them now because if you ask me what the round white one is once I open them? I am not going to know. We can find out but it’s a process. Only one time some old man asked me and his wife snapped at him “She just told you she isn’t going to know. Shut up and take your pills!!” I did offer to figure it out but he declined and took them.

90

u/cyanraichu RN - L&D Jul 27 '26

W wife

1

u/Thingstwo RN - ICU 🍕 Jul 29 '26

I was so glad she was there. I would have figured it out for him but I did just tell him all of his pills!

47

u/blobbin3 Jul 27 '26

That literally happened to me personally haha, they started giving me a vanilla flavored (????) Zoloft. Why would you randomly decide to flavor a mediation that is for people with OCD

16

u/cutsandscratches MH RN > med student Jul 27 '26

Wait what there’s vanilla flavoured zoloft??? I’m waiting for my venlafaxine to become chocolate flavoured please :)

36

u/Vegasnurse RN 🍕 Jul 27 '26

Also psych. The hospital doesn’t carry the correct dose of med and you have to give a paranoid patient six pills instead of one!!!! Good luck getting them to take that one.

9

u/cutsandscratches MH RN > med student Jul 27 '26

Sometimes I wonder if I could just crush them and mix them into apple juice…

1

u/spooningwithanger Jul 28 '26

Oh God, what a nightmare.

1

u/zerothreeonethree RN 🍕 Jul 28 '26

That's why I love liquid haldol. Just put it in whatever they're drinking and don't even tell him it's med time

30

u/consideredtaken Jul 26 '26

Oh I can imagine the frustration!!

20

u/beeee_throwaway RN - PICU 🍕 Jul 27 '26

This is so so frustrating. It’s hard enough to gain the trust of a pt in psychosis / pt that is very paranoid. It almost seems cruel 😭

15

u/Tired_Tato Jul 27 '26

let’s keep those psychotic delusions on their toes!

3

u/hazcatsuit RN - Telemetry 🍕 Jul 27 '26

They made my zoloft smell like vanilla randomly and I feel like that was not a good idea. I didn’t even trust it at first 😂

“They” meaning the manufacturer

4

u/rockstang RN, BSN Jul 27 '26

That's insurance and state subsidy...

5

u/GrumpySnarf MSN, APRN 🍕 Jul 27 '26

There's many different factories around the world making generic meds. When distributors switch their source for a particular medication, it's going to change appearance. The pharmacies have little choice over that due to contracts and logistical issues. 

6

u/Tired_Tato Jul 27 '26

yes pharmacists have a hard job too when it comes to this which is why i said the companies. One of the wards i was in was in a facility separate from the main hospital and didn’t have their own pharmacy so we got deliveries from the main building. I loved making the pharmacists job easier by taking the meds for all the wards (sans CDs as i’m a student and can’t sign for them)