When you’re sick and lying in a hospital bed, you’re never at your best, regardless of what you’re hospitalized for. In fact, in most cases, you may be at your worst. For that reason, we have to rely on trained professionals whose job it is to make sure that we’re getting the care we need. However, they’re human beings, too, and misunderstandings can occur in high-stress situations. Doctors and nurses go to school for a long time and they’re dedicated to their professions. Besides that, once you’ve worked in a hospital, there’s not much you’ve not seen and heard. You basically see and hear it all, and experience humanity at its best and its worst. When patients make unusual requests, doctors and nurses aren’t usually surprised. However, in the joke below, a big misunderstanding occurred.
A male patient is lying in bed in the hospital, wearing an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose. A young student nurse appears and gives him a partial sponge bath.
“Nurse,”‘ he mumbles from behind the mask, “are my testicles black?”
Embarrassed, the young nurse replies, “I don’t know, Sir. I’m only here to wash your upper body and feet.”
He struggles to ask again, “Nurse, please check for me. Are my testicles black?”
Concerned that he might elevate his blood pressure and heart rate from worrying about his testicles, she overcomes her embarrassment and pulls back the covers.
She raises his gown, holds his manhood in one hand and his testicles in the other.
She looks very closely and says, “There’s nothing wrong with them, Sir. They look fine.”
The man slowly pulls off his oxygen mask, smiles at her, and says very slowly, “Thank you very much. That was wonderful. Now listen very, very closely:
Are – my – test – results – back?”