My coworker and I were changing Mr. Smith’s attends (adult diapers…I’m not sure if brand names are the same everywhere). He had come to us for a simple procedure. Unfortunately, he had aspirated some of his own stomach contents a couple days earlier and had gone septic. Since then, he had been completely confused; oriented to person only.

*On a side note. It had me that had walked to his room at the beginning of my shift two days earlier, heard audible fluid in his lungs before I even entered the room, and was unable to rouse him except (barely) with painful stimuli. I had to call a code. I hate calling codes on patients that I’ve known for a grand total of sixty seconds.

While changing his attends, the patient was mumbling strange, incoherent phrases that were sometimes inappropriate and at other times simply funny. But the strangest comments were about his frustrations at the woman who was standing beside the bed and wouldn’t stop talking!

My coworker and I laughed as you can only laugh at the strange things confused patients say, did up is attends, turned him and left the room.

About thirty minutes later, another coworker came to me and said, “Something strange happened just now.” That’s never something you want to hear in the middle of a night shift! “Mr. Smith just called on the intercom, but he didn’t say anything.”

“I know” I said with a roll of my eyes, “he keeps doing that. He’s completely confused and keeps hitting the button. It’s getting frustrating!” I replied.

“No no…I know that, but when he called, I listened to his room for a couple minutes. He started talking to himself, which I know is normal…but then I heard a woman’s voice. He was having a conversation with a woman.”

“Did the lab come for the bloodwork?” I asked.

“That’s just it! I went down there to see who he was talking to and there was nobody down there! And the TV wasn’t on. I checked, and his TV isn’t even hooked up. If someone was down there, there’s no way I would have missed them!”

I couldn’t help but immediately remember that he had complained of a woman standing beside his bed who wouldn’t stop talking to him. I was officially freaked out! I refused to go down there alone for the rest of the night! I made coworkers go with me even to hang his IV antibiotics.

YIKES!

Anyone else have ghost stories?