Code white on my unit is maternal/fetal emergency...usually resulting in stat c-section. However, I have found that L&D RNs are a raunchy bunch and we may be the ones doing the harrassing...I have yet to see one of our MDs say something that is blatantly offensive without getting some of their own medicine back. I'm sure it happens, but usually the sexuality is so overt on our unit (we deal in vaginas and people arrive there after having sex about 40weeks ago) it's more us than them...not that it's entirely professional, but at 3am the conversation can turn. I'm sure there's a psychological explanation...

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StorkNurse05

http://obrninma.blogspot.com/

StorkNurse05's post forces me to tell a tale on myself.

Last Friday afternoon I had to get an urgent appointment at my HMO to be seen for what turned out to be a fast and nasty urinary tract infection. I got three antibiotics for it, one in the butt with a HUGE needle and two more from the pharmacy downstairs. While waiting in line with my wife at the pharmacy counter, I experienced a little vasovagal syncope, probably from dehydration and a delayed reaction to that needle, and went to the floor fast. My wife, panicking, ran over to the Information desk opposite the pharmacy and yelled to the dear sweet little old lady volunteers to get some help quick. They call in a Code C to the ED in the hospital wing next door and a gurney and a couple of RNs appear in less than a minute and haul me over.

The dear sweet little old ladies apparently weren't up on their codes, because a Code C at the HMO is their emergency c-section
notification, as I found out later. I have a beard and a post-50 largish bit of a belly, but I really wasn't prepared for the amount of laughter at the ED reception area when they wheeled me in and I heard a voice in a disbelieving tone ask "THIS is the Code C?".

I think code white at our place is a bomb threat.

Is that similar to the L&D use of a birthing emergency?

Yes, we have code white here in Canada,and it is a violent patient.

We also have Code red....which is fire; Code Brown which is chemical spill....we recently had this with a man who had drank malathion as a suicide attempt..ended up trached, but went home after a couple weeks on our unit

code black which is bomb threat and then Code Green which is evacuation. Then add in Code yellow for missing patient, Code 25 which is medical emergency on the units and the ER doc has to attend and then code blue....normal resus code.

Code Pink is where a doc is being iggnorant to a nurse, then again, could be management also. Code Grey here is Air exclusion which means something is in the air outside, and they turn off the air intake to the facility.


Cynthia

Nice thread. Thanks for creating it.

At my place of employment we have so many names for codes that we now have laminated cards attached to our ID badges that we refer to when any kind of code is called.

Codes:
White: Infant pediatric abduction
Red: Fire
Orange: Chemical Spill, Avoid Area
Lift: Person has fallen
Green: Bomb Threat
Gray: Hospital lock down, serious threat
Blue: Pregnant woman with emergency
Black: Actual violence in the building
99: life threat

Whew.

Then there are Codes:
Patient Safety Team (out of control patient)
Emergency Response Plan (for mass casualities)
Rapid Response Team (for eval of patient who is suddenly more ill)

What did we do before the advent of overhead paging??

Code Gray or Respond Gray is Threat of Violence (get called nearly every hour in the ED, security personal respond as well as all curious nurses)
Code Black or Respond Black is Actual Violence (the police get called as well, all staff get out of the area or with security tackle the pt to the ground and are restrained on a stretcher)
Red - Fire
Blue - Medical Emergency
MET - Medical Emergency Triage (to try and prevent a code blue)

Most others differ from hospital to hospital, but there is a yellow, purple and orange.

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'Think not of yourself as the architect of your career but as the sculptor. Expect to have to do a lot of hard hammering and chiselingand scraping and polishing. - BC Forbes'