True Story.
Yesterday I had the unique experience of actually having to pause the patient history I was dictating because I could not get through it without laughing.
The patient I was admitting? He had swallowed four pencils. Whole. On purpose. And he was not 2, not 4, and not even 11 and doing a stupid dare. He was 22. Now we could actually only see two of them on the ct scan, so the actual number is somewhat debatable. I have a hard time imagining why someone would lie to say that they had swallowed more pencils than they actually had (bragging rights??), but since he came from the local detention center, who really knows.
I asked him why he ate them, and he told me that "someone made him really mad, and he got really upset, and grabbed the pencils, and didn't really think about it."
Okay.
I later discovered that he actually has a history of ingesting things when he gets mad, including a box of gloves, a nail, and a bolt.
Sometimes I have a weird job.
The patient I was admitting? He had swallowed four pencils. Whole. On purpose. And he was not 2, not 4, and not even 11 and doing a stupid dare. He was 22. Now we could actually only see two of them on the ct scan, so the actual number is somewhat debatable. I have a hard time imagining why someone would lie to say that they had swallowed more pencils than they actually had (bragging rights??), but since he came from the local detention center, who really knows.
I asked him why he ate them, and he told me that "someone made him really mad, and he got really upset, and grabbed the pencils, and didn't really think about it."
Okay.
I later discovered that he actually has a history of ingesting things when he gets mad, including a box of gloves, a nail, and a bolt.
Sometimes I have a weird job.
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