On a regular basis one nurse or another will come to me to complain that 2008k test is failing. Today one came to me and said the level detector test was failing on the " stupid machine ". So I went in the unit and repositioned the venous drip chamber and stuck my torpedo level that I have on top of the machine. When she came over I restarted the test and showed her the level on top of machine and explained that I had found the machine out of level and that was the problem. Her response was " Oh I should have Known". Anybody else have any stories like this ?

I was working in a unit that monitored arterial pressure post blood pump. A nurse came to me and said, "the arterial tubing is defective. It is flat all the way to the blood pump."

She was later fired.

A clinical staff member once asked me why connectors are sometimes referred to as male or female. I told her because they were anatomically correct. She thought this was sexist. Boy did I laugh.

Then there's the folks that think the 9 volt battery will run the whole machine when the power fails!

When staff members report a problem the first thing they say is " I have a machine " Well I always interupt and say "No you have 21 machines. As stupid as it is it always brings a little chuckle even to the most miserable staff member.

I showed up on a Sunday to disinfect the RO. I found the back room flooded big time (floor drains are up hill). After spending time cleaning up the water and looking for broken pipes, I did my disinfect and went home. The next day an RN asked me how do you change the Tempter on the drench shower? (23+GPM) Not putting 2 and 2 together I told her in an emergencey the temp does not mater. She replied that the tempter maters when I am trying to take a shower after work.

here is a good one , I got a call at 5:00am one morning , a pct was doing the water test on the R.O. and she told me that water was going down the drain.........I simply replied "Where do you want it to go on the floor"............It was the waste water going to drain.

here is an even better one .....I came in one morning to a pct looking for her glasses, she asked me to help her look for them. I asked her where she last remember having them....she replied i made bicarb and purged the stations came back and noticed they were gone..........so I looked in the bicarb tank and there they was at the bottom of the tank...when she was checking the bicarb they fell off her head and she did not even notice.

Machine was giving a 24v low. PCT replaced the 9volt battery and said I need to get new batteries because the last two she tried were dead. here's your sign

my all time favorite is TMP problems and I told her it was the flux capacitor when she asked how I knew that I told her it wasn't fluxing. I overheard her tell the patient that and the patient started laughing but never told her the truth.

When using acid and bicarb jugs, "This stupid machine won't come up to condo and I've tried everything!"
crouched down, pulled the acid connector out of the bicarb jug and dropped it in the acid jug, pulled the bicarb connector out of the acid jug and dropped it in the bicarg jug. looked up to a sheepish grin....nothing needed to be said.

A co-worker and I were amazed at how little our Director knew about Biomed in general, let alone Dialysis. I dared my co-worker, adn he pulled it off,...

he got the Director to sign off on his parts order, and even initial one line item because of its expensive cost,...

30 GW (jigga watt) flux capacitor to be ordered from Brown Industries for $500!

I bought him dinner, and kept that order approval for giggles.

Extra points to RK for pulling it off!

Yes, I did need a smile, with the kind of day I've had. Thanks, guys!

I once had an RN tell me that the blood leak detector was going off because it was detecting dialysate!! She was SERIOUS because she tested with the strips and there was no blood present. She got angry with me.

I had a nurse call me at 5:30am because there was no paper towels in the towel dispenser...I go in to work at 8:00 WTF...How is that a tech. emergency