5. THE GUY MUST HAVE THOUGHT HE WAS A STUFFED ANIMAL
I was an R1 resident physician when this happened. I was in the ER and two young adult males came rushing to me. They both had this worried look on their faces.
I calmed them down and took the ER triage slip they had, it’s a small piece of paper that gets filled in by the triage physician who’s the first contact for every patient before they go into the emergency room for their full evaluation.
I quickly scanned the triage slip as I usually do before proceeding to ask them what had happened. This particular slip was quite bizarre, it was obviously filled in a rush, all it had was the patient’s vital signs (heart rate, blood pressure, respiratory rate etc.) and a note that said “umbilical hernia” under provisional diagnosis.
So I asked the guy, what seems to be the problem? He said there was this weird “white stuff” coming out of his belly button and he’s really worried about it.
So I proceeded to take his full medical history and then asked him to lay down for an abdominal examination. One of the attending physicians volunteered to help with the examination, thinking it was possibly an infection and the “white stuff” was possibly discharge from an abdominal abscess, which would require surgical drainage.
Any how, we expose the patient’s abdomen and proceed with the examination only to discover that the “white stuff” was fluff/cotton from his underwear.
The attending and I looked at each other for a moment and were about to burst out laughing but somehow managed to contain it.
The attending explained to the guy what it was, calmed him down and gave him some advice about personal hygiene and that was it.
To this day we’re both not sure what exactly happened. Both men were clearly sober and not under the influence of any drug.
Caldoam