Doctors Are Revealing The Most "Haunting" Last Words They've Ever Heard From A Patient
by Liz Richardson · BuzzFeedA while back, redditor u/freeshavacadont asked the medical workers of Reddit, "What were the most haunting last words you’ve heard from a patient?" Here are some of the most eerie, thought-provoking, and heartbreaking responses:
1. "A family friend had a very young niece who was dying from cancer. Her parents were there to comfort her in the final hours, and one of the last things she asked was, 'How do I die?'"
—Anonymous
2. "It wasn't words, but the most haunting death was a patient who was DNR (do not resuscitate), through her and her family's wishes. She was losing her battle, and her family wasn't there. She was getting frantic and looking around and half sitting up in bed, and a nurse with more experience than me took her hand and calmly said, 'It's OK. You're not alone. We're right here with you; it's OK to leave.' The patient immediately calmed, put her head back on the pillow, and died."
"I knew I wanted to be that nurse when I grew up. How the hell did she know just what to do and say? I've never forgotten it."
3. "I'm a nurse and was working in a hospital, caring for a 40-ish man with a brain tumor, coming in and out of consciousness. Not to be resuscitated. His 16-year-old daughter was crying nonstop for 12 hours. His wife, who had been given a few months to prepare herself, was calm and focused on her husband. I had to routinely check his level of consciousness, which involved talking to him in a loud voice (responding to auditory stimulation), which I wouldn't say I liked to do. So, I asked his wife to do the loud voice part so the voice he would hear would be hers, not mine, and she did so without hesitation. The only response we observed was. Her vocalization was that this by now profoundly unconscious patient took her hand to his lips and kissed it."
"He stopped breathing very soon after that. I am haunted, but not in a bad way."
4. "'Thank you' from a little old man with Stage 4 lung cancer. He had no family, so I stayed after my shift ended. He just didn't want to die alone, and I refused to let it happen. I don't know why, but it still makes me cry when I think of it."
5. "RN here. We had a patient on our unit for almost a year. He was so mean, and he thought we were always hurting him when we tried caring for him. Every interaction was very unpleasant. Well, I just had a bad breakup and was 'the-world-is-ending' depressed. The day he died, he was calm and asked me if I was married — which, at the time, made me kind of sad. So I just answered, 'No, I'm not.' And he just said, 'You'll find someone...and I know you aren't trying to hurt me.' It was so concise, to the point, and memorable for me."
"Honestly, it was the sweetest thing he could have said to me, and given the scenario, I would say it was the sweetest thing anyone has said. On his deathbed, he had no formalities, just telling me what he had always wanted to talk to me about. I cried when I left his room, and he passed away right at 7 p.m. when my shift ended. So, I got to be with him."
—Anonymous
6. "'I'm going home tonight, so I won't see you tomorrow, bye!' Damn if she wasn't right."
7. "When I was training, I had a guy go into a massive cardiac arrest. We worked on him for over an hour and a half because we kept getting him back and then losing him again. He had wet himself during the arrest (which is common; it happens), and he just kept apologizing for 'making a mess.'"
8. "'You tell that man to get out of here right now!' she screamed while staring behind me, eyes sharp and focused on something. Me, in the middle of the night — while I was working the haunted hall, by myself."
"All of the heebies, and most of the jeebies."
9. "It wasn't his last words, but the last words he said to me. I am an EMT, and we had a frequent patient — almost once a week. He was a HUGE jerk, but he turned into a sweet and appreciative man towards the end. We were in his house, which ended up being our last day there. He knew it. I didn't. He said, 'Can I just have a beer before we leave for the hospital?'"
"I didn't let him have it. I should have."
10. "With wide eyes, 'Don't listen to my family; they want to keep me around forever, but I just want to die. They won't let me.'"
"She wanted to get off dialysis, which was a death sentence for her."
11. "I'm an EMT. I had a patient say, 'I don't feel so good,' right before they dropped dead of a massive heart attack. It was just the matter-of-fact way they said it."
—Anonymous
12. "'I see the man in the corner again.' There was no one, but she'd seen a dark man in the corner for days and asked about him. Toward the end, this was all she talked about besides crying for her mother. Cancer."
13. "I had a patient in the cardiac ICU during my second month of intern year who had newly diagnosed heart failure, and we couldn't figure out what caused it. He was a healthy guy. In his 60s, he did yoga daily and walked a few miles five days a week, and he was a genuinely nice guy, which is always a bad prognostic sign. With his heart failure, his heart was so stretched out and not squeezing adequately to provide the blood and subsequent oxygen he needed to the rest of his body. A few nights into his hospital stay, I came in the next morning and discovered that the senior resident had to code him for sustained unstable heart arrhythmia (unstable V-tach). I talked with him about it the next morning, and he told me that he was in and out of consciousness during it all (from the low blood pressure), but he compared it to the feeling of jumping out of the plane and sky diving."
"Later that morning, I checked on him again, and he didn't look so good. He goes into the arrhythmia again, drops his blood pressure, and is in and out of consciousness. As I'm charging the defibrillator to shock him again, he comes back around and briefly asks me if I'm taking him sky diving again and lets out a nervous laugh before losing consciousness."
14. "Paramedic here. I was transporting a cardiac patient, and while we were both watching my EKG monitor, he went into V-fib, a lethal heart rhythm. His heart stopped pumping blood effectively at that point, but there was enough blood pressure for a few seconds of consciousness. He looked at me and said, 'But I don't see the light,' and went unconscious."
"Coded him, shocked him a few times, meds by the handful, but he died."
15. "Hospice nurse here. I had a patient who was experiencing terminal agitation. With an expression of complete terror on his face, he said, 'Help me! They are coming to get me.'"
16. "Nursing home. Most older people are at ease as they get nearer and nearer to death. But this old lady, as she deteriorated over her last week or so, would scream, 'I DON'T WANT TO DIE! I DON'T WANT TO DIE! I DON'T WANT TO DIE! I DON'T WANT TO DIE!'"
"Really heartbreaking to see."
And finally...
17. "A 4-year-old told her mother, 'I'm ready.' I still cry like a baby."
Fellow medical professionals and first responders, what are the most "haunting" last words you've heard from a patient? Let us know in the comments below.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.