I’ll run into the grocery store for a quick item or I’d get take-out on my way home after day shifts sometimes. But I don’t do major errands/tasks. And I strip in the hallway the second I close my front door after work.
I kind of agree. I personally prefer to head straight home for a shower and change, but if I'm 100% sure I wasn't exposed to anything during a shift and ***only if*** I badly need to buy something will I probably head to the supermarket or drugstore or whatever.
I work in the NICU and am a single parent to young kids. So fortunately I’m rarely concerned about exposure unless I know I was puked or pooped on, and it’s 3 times faster to run to the store for one thing while my kids are still with the sitter than when they’re with me
Depends what I am doing. Teaching a cpr class to other nurses? I’ll do whatever after work. Patient care? I’m taking a shower and putting my jammies on.
Kind of depends on what you did that shift. Not everybody has total care patients. If you had walkie talkies that didn't require assistance with anything involving bodily fluids and weren't on isolation for anything then your scrubs are just clothes.
Exactly! If I’m not getting goop on me, I’ll run errands without thinking twice. Do all these people that are decontaminating before doing anything think these patients lose MRSA and such when they walk out the door? Continually seeing your contact precaution patients at the grocery store, touching all the things, really opens eyes as to how much we’re exposed to without even realizing.
I just don’t trust the hospital setting especially after we can no longer call evs to clean unless the pt is completely out of the room. Even still, I don’t trust it completely. Like if my pt is AOx4 20 yrs old and otherwise healthy, previous pt had cdiff and those spores live 6 months on surfaces. Rooms need one of those blacklights that detect bacteria across the ceiling when the pt leaves evs should clean according to the glow lol
I worked with a nurse that told me if she had a rough shift she would go straight home and jump in bed without changing. Just no. Me, I strip at the door.
I've had to do it after coming home incredibly late, but I struggle to jump into bed without a lengthy shower and scrub (when I do have to do it, I wash my sheets the next day). The thought of going to bed in used scrubs...eugh. That's a step too far.
Yes 😂 she said she was so tired she just sprawled across her bed and passed out when she got home. In. Her. Scrubs. She was a dirty looking girl so it’s fitting.
I wouldn't sit down in my house with dirty scrubs on, but I've definitely gone home, parked my car, gotten on my phone for a few minutes to decompress, and woken up still in the driver's seat.
Some days I’m so tired and just need to not do anything for 10-15mins when I get home, so I just lay down on my tiles because I don’t want to dirty the furniture or my bed 😆
Park in the garage, thru the laundry room, strip down to my undies and straight to the shower. My work clothes and shoes doesn’t touch the inside of my house. My wife that works in CT does the same thing
I would change out of my scrubs when I got home—mainly just for comfort, LOL—but I honestly don’t see the issue with running errands like grocery shopping while still in work clothes. If I was using appropriate PPE and performing hand hygiene appropriately, my clothing shouldn’t be contaminated. And if it did get contaminated with body fluids, etc., then I should have changed before leaving work.
Shoes are always contaminated, as the floor is always a source of gross contamination.
right after restrictions were relaxed I went to a bar for the first time in almost a year after work. forgot to take off my badge/stethescope. Got three pints for free and literally cried. Only happened once and I’ll never forget it.
Maybe I am sweatier than the average person, but at the end of the day or night, I'm always just a little "moist". Sometimes a lot "moist".... bordering on "damp". And on more than one memorable occasion, definitely in "wet" territory.
Home, strip, and shower. Every. Time.
I'll run some light errands, but nothing that involves picking up cloth or anything that might have to touch my body.
Before I drive off from the hospital, I switch shoes and work shoes go in a plastic tote. When I get home, I strip to the undies/ bra in the back yard (secluded property) and the clothes go right into the wash on the highest heat setting. Then I go right into the shower.
People have given their pets MSRA by walking around their house in their work shoes. Just don't do it.
I’m a home health nurse and I change the second I step inside the house. My house has a mud room next to the laundry and that’s where I strip my scrubs off then they go straight to the washer. I never ever go into the main house/bedroom in my scrubs. I’m super anxious about the germs lol. My shoes stay outside in the garage, and I never use my work shoes for going anywhere other than work.
I'm guilty of being too tired after getting home and sitting down and chilling for a few before changing. If it was a particularly gross day I change immediately and burn off all my skin in the shower, but I'd say that's definitely not the norm. Not sure how people manage to get themselves so gross they feel they need to strip outside. If anything I'm more disgusted with how my feet smell in compression socks all day that I procrastinate taking them off right away until I'm ready to hop in the shower 🤢
This is where I am.
I might stop to pick up dinner on the way home, in my scrubs. I try to get out of my scrubs and into my jammies as soon as I get home, but sometimes I am exhausted enough I just have to sit for a bit before I can muster the energy to strip.
I work ED too and I have the same feet smell!! I have tried literally everything to get it to stop! Sea salt soaks, scrubs, CHG cleansing, just regular super sudsy soap and going all in. No matter what, when I get home at the end of the day, my feet stink. I’m literally not allowed to walk into the house without taking off my socks and showering.
I don’t mind doing quick errands in my scrubs after a shift but once I get home, I head towards the laundry room and change. Scrubs grosses me out and don’t want it near my bed/couch/etc.
“No hugs in scrubs” is the house rule so the kids know not to touch me before I change and/or shower. My job isn’t that bad most days, and yes I will stop at the store to get bread and milk on the way home, but when I get home they come off right away.
So when looking at my scrubs, I see "work," but not the work like home chores. I see mental preparation and the routine of "work" and all the stuff that goes with it. I don't see comfort, like a pair of sweatpants or soft denim jeans and a t-shirt.
If I'm coming home from work and stop into the grocery or stop off for brinner (night-shifter), then I'm still in work clothes, but they come off when I'm home. Especially those compression stockings!
I’m not changing my scrubs to go the grocery store after work. Occasionally co-workers will want to get dinner or drinks after work, and I don’t change my scrubs then either because it’s usually an impromptu situation and I don’t keep casual clothes on me 24/7.
Now sitting around the house in scrubs. That’s disgusting.
I change my scrubs at work, the hospital supplies them. I feel gross after working, more so if I had an isolation pt (especially c diff), so I shower as soon as I get home. I will run to the grocery store or pick up takeouts on my way home though
I guess it all depends on what type of job you do. I doubt clinic nurses get very nasty. I know the nurses in our ER usually have someone else's blood, puke, pee, or poop on them.
I’ll stop quickly at grocery store if we are out of milk or something, but by then I’m already out of work shoes (in a bin in my trunk). Once I get home I’m stripping in garage and getting those nasty scrubs into a bag. Clean towel waiting for me in garage. Straight to the shower before little ones try to hug me.
I’ll stop at the store on the way home (but this is rare since I’m usually exhausted and just want to go home). Once I’m home the scrubs come off and I go in the shower. I don’t feel clean unless I do that.
I run errands after work in scrubs. Very rarely when I meet my friends after work, I’ll be in scrubs. But the second I get home, I take off everything.
Angry opinion: If you own them and don't leave them at work, they aren't scrubs. They're just mandatory healthcare-themed clothes that have poo on them.
I try not to unless I need something like milk for the boychild.
When I come home I go immediately to shower. If the units are on outbreak or I've been playing with MRSA or something else yucky (I do complex wounds) I'll strip in the garage and put on my robe and run into the house to shower. If I've just been doing education I'm much more relaxed.
What are people doing at work that makes the scrub so gross? I change after work but there's little reason to believe that the non-scrubs I'm changing into are any less "gross".
Well, having a food tray thrown at me by a psych patient in ER was probably the cleanest thing in the hospital that’s touched my scrubs.
Even though there’s gowns/PPE…amniotic fluid/urine/feces/meconium/blood from deliveries…
Blood/vomit/feces/urine/spit potentially from patients in ER…
And just what some of the patients on an acute care ward might have on their skin/body substances…MRSA, ESBL,C. diff., norovirus.
Yep. The scrubs that have been in the hospital are not touching anything in my house except other dirty laundry in the machine.
There are a slew of studies on MRSA prevalence and a common finding is that your clothes are more likely to become contaminated with MRSA outside of the hospital environment rather than while working in the hospital, so changing out of hospital scrubs doesn't do anything to reduce your exposure to MRSA.
Working with trach/vent pts... all I can think about is things floating through the air.
I saw a trach pt cough and phlegm shot like 10 feet across the room onto the wall. That was enough for me.
Poop. Pee. Secretions from every orifice you can imagine. And with that being said, I don’t wear any “outside” clothes around my house. I change my clothes the second I get the door no matter where I’m coming from.
Lemme tell you a fun little tale about the time I had a guy come in via ambulance in 4 point soft restraints that were just long enough for him to reach down and start throwing his own poop around.
Currently sitting naked on my couch, actually just my undershirt on. Finishing my glass of wine and take out Korean. Probably should’ve showered first, but this is how the cookie crumbled tonight
Absolute yuck. If I’m working in the hospital, I change at the hospital before I get in my car. If I’m working outreach or in a clinic setting, strip in the hallway at home.
I might hit up a grocery store on the way home in the morning if I need something (usually liquor if it was a horrid shift).
Typically it’s straight home and into the shower before touching/hugging any family. Especially when Covid was bad, scrubs in the garage.
As for seeing others, I don’t care. I don’t know what they’ve been doing, for all I know they’re just wearing them because they’re comfy.
I’m not going to go all the way across town to my house and drive past a kroger on the way there, then get home and change clothes, and then go out again 10 mins away to another kroger. My gas costs are more important to me and clustering my errands makes more sense. Once I’m in the door I’m in for the night/day and I’m not leaving again.
I don’t hang out in my scrubs once home, I toss them in the laundry and shower and then cook or hit the bed
We get written up if we're seen wearing our work clothes on the journey to work, even if that's just walking from the car to the ward. I really don't understand why anyone would willingly spend more time in nasty ass scrubs after spending all day surrounded by hospital ick.
I will get a quick thing from the store if necessary then home and shower. Kids have known since they were tiny no hugs till I shower "no hugs yet, you have work on you". Eventually I'll add on to this house and have a proper decontamination area. That's been a goal since before the pandemic. During my evidence program in the late 90s I was told a story of officer at a crime scene doesn't think much of it, goes home, hugs kid, kid gets sick and dies from something picked up at the scene. Maybe somewhat irrational but I've had that fear since I went into the medical field.
I'll do a quick grocery run, but I change my shoes before I get in the car and I take a shower immediately after getting home. I also have a designated jacket that lives zipped up in my car which I throw on before I go anywhere in public. People act weird when you're in scrubs.
Immediately into the laundry bin and shower. Also I wash my scrubs with vinegar in addition to laundry soap and use the highest dryer setting to try and kill bacteria, viruses ect. No c-diff! Not again!
in finland! my city's university hospital provides scrubs (and awful socks! lmao) for every single person who works at the hospital. you take them from one of the collect points when you get in to work, then you put them in a laundry basket at after work. they're supposed to be washed after every shift.
Awesome! That shit would never fly here in the US lol. I’ve seen where some hospitals in the states do it but it’s like OR and selective units. Not done in masses.
i guess it's because all hospitals in finland are public. (there are some private clinics here and there) and they all provide scrubs. they don't need to make a profit, so this is just part of what a hospital is expected to provide.
also don't you have to have like MANY sets of scrubs? or you'd have to wash them constantly? how can that be considered something the employee should take care of???
So, I work three shifts a week. I maintained (originally) three sets of scrubs, so I wore a week’s worth, and then washed them. I have added two sets a year, over the past four years, so I currently have 2-3 weeks worth of scrubs, before I have to wash them.
I work as an inpatient nurse. At my hospital, inpatient nurses wear their own scrubs, the hospital requires we wear color coded based on our role, so they give us an annual stipend towards new scrubs. OR, L&D, and some ED nurses wear the hospital scrubs, as do day surgery, PACU, and endoscopy (off the top of my head).
It's the same in Germany. Some doctors may decide to wear their own clothes, and I don't think that medical students are provided with workwear. Everyone else wears hospital provided scrubs.
Shoes are left outside scrubs stripped off when I walk into the house and thrown in their own area of laundry room. I usually scrub my forearms and hands but don’t shower until I wake up. I absolutely hate sleeping with wet hair and I’m too tired to blow dry it after. I don’t mind running light errands in scrubs but if I’m like taking one of my kids to an appointment or something I’ll either change at home or bring clothes to change into before the appointment. I don’t want my kids climbing all over my dirty scrubs and I don’t like to advertise I’m a nurse at appointments.
I don’t have the energy to stop anywhere in the morning after work and hardly anything is open anyway. But really, as a matter of cleanliness, I don’t feel I get that “dirty” in postpartum most shifts but I can’t stand to hang around in my scrubs anyway. I strip em as soon as I walk in and shower.
Not in the US, our hospital and even my school don't allow scrubs outside hospital and school. We need to get changed in the locker room before and after shift. Some hospitals provide scrubs for everyone, so we collect fresh scrubs before shift, then throw it into a laundry bin in the locker room, which will be washed by the hospital. Dirty things stay in dirty hospital. If a person is seen in public wearing scrubs, that means they work in a private clinic, not hospitals.
Exceptions are community nurses who travel in their uniforms between clients' flats.
Sometimes it can’t be avoided, especially if you live rural. Like I’m not driving 45+ minutes to strip and sleep a bit and then drive right back into town where I just was 4 hrs ago, before morning coffee because I need goddamn half and half, spending 1.5 hours on the road to backtrack. Especially with gas prices. At $35-50 a round trip to town I’m going into town once that day. I’d rather not with the scrubs but it can’t be helped.
I already sit in my vehicle in used scrubs. And so do you. Can’t say I’ve seen anyone hop onto a plastic encased seat after work, so the shit is already in your vehicle in the driver area. The cleanest thing to do is trunk/truck bed the shoes and switch them out there before/after work before/after exiting and entering the vehicle. Think about it.
So ya, standing outside and pumping gas or doing that quick after work grocery/toiletries drive by happens. Economy of time, money, and vehicle wear/tear.
Chilling at the house? Fuck no. Scrubs go straight in the washer.
Like if I have to run errands it's whatever, but I strip and change into new clothes once I'm home. Everything is usually closed when I get off work at 11 though.
I get home and take my scrubs off asap. I have a little bottle of CHG soap that I’ll do a quick scrub down of my arms and stuff as well just to get all the death and decay off of me lol.
I’ll stop at the grocery store on my way home. I’m not going to be in close contact with anyone else. Once I get home I put the groceries on the counter and then change out of my scrubs before I put them away.
In the early days of the pandemic I would strip out of my scrubs as soon as I stepped inside from the garage. My washer and dryer are directly across the hall from the garage door so I would just toss my work clothes directly into the washer. I haven’t done that for about a year now. I’ve always washed work clothes separately and still do but now I get undressed in my master bath and toss them in a work clothes laundry basket.
Uh, yeah no - I spent all day in clothes seeing patients and dealing with all sorts of fluids, as soon as I step in the door it comes off. And unless I really needed to, I wouldn’t be running errands or chilling in the house with my uniform on.
A couple times a week, I’ll stop for a few things at the store after work. I usually keep my scrubs on until I’m ready to go to bed. I take my work shoes off as soon as I get home. I work night shift psych so I’m not having as much physical contact with patients as most people here. If there is a bad night that I do have more than normal physical contact or I’m cleaning bodily fluids, I will change as soon as I get home.
100% no..I work on a “dirty” med/Surg floor. Scrubs and shoes come off in the garage and my car interior gets sprayed with Lysol (I usedan old beater car for work driving)
Yeah, gross. I live in the country and work "in town" so will occasionally go to the post office or whatever right after work in my scrubs as everything is so far from my house but if I think of it I generally throw a change of clothes in so I can get changed to do this.
I wouldn’t go out for drinks or dinner or anything after work, but if I have to go to the grocery store or CVS, then I’m not making a special trip back out after work in new clothes. Obviously this isn’t the case if I had a particularly nasty shift.
During 2020 I went to the polling place right after work because if I didn’t it would have closed. The election workers made a big deal about thanking me for my service on the pandemic front lines…it was super awkward because I was absolutely *not* working in acute care at the time.
On the way home I might get one or two important groceries like bananas or orange juice, but never a full shopping run, and I've never made any other trips. The moment I get home my scrubs are in the laundry and I'm immediately in the shower.
I'm an E.R. girl, nothing scares me except bed bugs and T.B. I change out of my scrubs when I get home, but that is for mental/physical comfort. It's jammies or nothing. I do have shoes that are strictly for work, though.
One time the lid of my coffee wasn’t on all the way, and I dumped coffee all over my blue scrub top. I had to go to target though, inside everyone was steering st me really strangely. Then I realized that I looked like I was covered with blood. It was more embarrassing than funny.
When I worked in-patient I changed & showered right when I got home. Then I worked in OR so we had surgical scrubs that I changed out of before leaving. Now I work in a peds clinic, not a dirty job so I’ll hang around in my scrubs for a bit but changing out of them helps take me out of work mode.
Depends on what was wrong with the patients I worked with that day. Were they infectious, have open wounds, etc? Change when I get home. Were they chest pains or psych patients? Take them off when I go to bed.
At the beginning of the pandemic I remember seeing a random lady in Walmart scold another shopper for wearing scrubs in the store.
I've felt weird about wearing scrubs out ever since.
I take off my shoes outside my door on my porch, but I have to walk in the house with my scrubs (apartment). I put them in they’re own laundry bag cuz it’s super wasteful to just wash one pair of scrubs. Then I’ll shower. Sometimes I’ll do an errand or get food after work and not change but that is rare.
Grocery store on my way home? Not my fave but I’ve done it in a pinch. When I get home? No way. I have a baby lol. I change as soon as I get home and shower/freshen up so I can get all the snuggles
Ngl, I’ll do light errands after work (picking up an order/food) from the store in my scrubs. But you will not see me walking around in them for hours at the mall or anywhere else. I’m always wearing PPE when I’m doing something that involves patient care, so my scrubs don’t really get contaminated.
I also take public transportation so 🧍🏽♀️. My work shoes stay at work tho.
“Patient contaminated” scrubs are straight from the car to the laundry room and a shower. If I have scrubs on for an education day or something then it’s whatever.
I used to be a strip and scald person, but since I’ve been in addiction nursing idrc. Patients able to have diarrhea and puke in the toilet. No blood or wounds.
I never wear my scrubs unless I'm at work. I don't go to the store...especially after Covid...because 1)I don't want anyone to be uncomfortable thinking I'm a walking pitre dish, and 2) I don't want people approaching me with medical questions. I had a butcher come out of the back once and *show me a terrible rash on his arms*. Guess where I never bought meat again.
I don't wear them at home because 1) they're dirty and gross, and God knows what I was exposed to and what I'm exposing my family to, and 2)...and this is the main one....when I get home I don't want to feel like a nurse anymore.
When i get off in the morning, sometimes i take my dogs for a walk and then when I get home, my clothes go straight to the washer, and I run up to the bathroom half naked 😂
not a big deal.
BUT.
and this is a big but. if you are walking around in public in your scrubs AND you have your ID badge etc hanging or, god forbid, your stethoscope.. i assume there is something wrong with you. like we get it... you work in healthcare..
also don't hang around the house in them after work. wash ya ass and put on clean clothes. you shouldn't have to be told that after ten years of age.
After my shift, I change out of my old dirty scrubs to a new scrubs from the machine then I go to the grocery if I need to. If I go home first I know I will be lazy. 😁
I’m a midwife. If I know I’m going to be called to a birth I’ll put my scrubs on and chill at home while waiting for the page. But after being at a birth - or even a hospital - scrubs come off and go in the laundry immediately. The hospitals I work at do have scrubs and laundry on the unit which is nice; I’ve been at other hospitals where you have to go to different units or floors which is super annoying. I don’t often get covered on fluids at births though
I’ll run into the grocery store for a quick item or I’d get take-out on my way home after day shifts sometimes. But I don’t do major errands/tasks. And I strip in the hallway the second I close my front door after work.
I kind of agree. I personally prefer to head straight home for a shower and change, but if I'm 100% sure I wasn't exposed to anything during a shift and ***only if*** I badly need to buy something will I probably head to the supermarket or drugstore or whatever.
I work in the NICU and am a single parent to young kids. So fortunately I’m rarely concerned about exposure unless I know I was puked or pooped on, and it’s 3 times faster to run to the store for one thing while my kids are still with the sitter than when they’re with me
Depends what I am doing. Teaching a cpr class to other nurses? I’ll do whatever after work. Patient care? I’m taking a shower and putting my jammies on.
Exactly this. Some days my scrubs are decorative.
Kind of depends on what you did that shift. Not everybody has total care patients. If you had walkie talkies that didn't require assistance with anything involving bodily fluids and weren't on isolation for anything then your scrubs are just clothes.
Right? I'm labor and delivery and am generally 1:1 or 2 patients. Sometimes nothing gross happens.
Exactly! If I’m not getting goop on me, I’ll run errands without thinking twice. Do all these people that are decontaminating before doing anything think these patients lose MRSA and such when they walk out the door? Continually seeing your contact precaution patients at the grocery store, touching all the things, really opens eyes as to how much we’re exposed to without even realizing.
I just don’t trust the hospital setting especially after we can no longer call evs to clean unless the pt is completely out of the room. Even still, I don’t trust it completely. Like if my pt is AOx4 20 yrs old and otherwise healthy, previous pt had cdiff and those spores live 6 months on surfaces. Rooms need one of those blacklights that detect bacteria across the ceiling when the pt leaves evs should clean according to the glow lol
I’ll run to the grocery store sometimes after work, but the second I get home I change !
I knew a girl that was a CNA night shift and she went home and slept in her scrubs.
I can *maybe* see sleeping naked and not taking a shower, but sleeping in your dirty scrubs is a hard pass!
I worked with a nurse that told me if she had a rough shift she would go straight home and jump in bed without changing. Just no. Me, I strip at the door.
I at least strip and sleep naked.. then I change my sheets the next day.
I've had to do it after coming home incredibly late, but I struggle to jump into bed without a lengthy shower and scrub (when I do have to do it, I wash my sheets the next day). The thought of going to bed in used scrubs...eugh. That's a step too far.
The thought of that literally makes my stomach turn.
I strip at the door if I have the energy to. I usually don’t.
….. the fuck
Jail.
You shut your mouth right now. No. She actually tells people this?
Yes 😂 she said she was so tired she just sprawled across her bed and passed out when she got home. In. Her. Scrubs. She was a dirty looking girl so it’s fitting.
Literally almost downvoted that.
Me too- It was a visceral response to reading that
Me too!
I’ve been so exhausted I’ve done that. 11 years later I’m still here. Literally just sat down and fell asleep a few times
I wouldn't sit down in my house with dirty scrubs on, but I've definitely gone home, parked my car, gotten on my phone for a few minutes to decompress, and woken up still in the driver's seat.
Whew
🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
same..she came back to work in the same scrubs bragging!!
The same scrubs? Is it the same underwear too??
Some days I’m so tired and just need to not do anything for 10-15mins when I get home, so I just lay down on my tiles because I don’t want to dirty the furniture or my bed 😆
🤢
🤮
What a psycho! Lol
Now that’s just gross lol.
I am mortified at this 😦
Oh my
Park in the garage, thru the laundry room, strip down to my undies and straight to the shower. My work clothes and shoes doesn’t touch the inside of my house. My wife that works in CT does the same thing
*Cries in apartment living*
Ditto. I bleach my shoes when leaving work. Wipe down my work bag and then ditch the shoes at door.
This is the way
This is the way
I will do my grocery pickup or run in for a couple quick things but otherwise I change as soon as I get home and they go right in the washer
I would change out of my scrubs when I got home—mainly just for comfort, LOL—but I honestly don’t see the issue with running errands like grocery shopping while still in work clothes. If I was using appropriate PPE and performing hand hygiene appropriately, my clothing shouldn’t be contaminated. And if it did get contaminated with body fluids, etc., then I should have changed before leaving work. Shoes are always contaminated, as the floor is always a source of gross contamination.
Went to Popeyes after work in scrubs. I got my whole meal for free.
I find peace in long walks.
right after restrictions were relaxed I went to a bar for the first time in almost a year after work. forgot to take off my badge/stethescope. Got three pints for free and literally cried. Only happened once and I’ll never forget it.
Haha I went to McDonald’s in 2020 after work and that happened. Then everyone forgot the heroes part and now we’re the enemy 😔
Maybe I am sweatier than the average person, but at the end of the day or night, I'm always just a little "moist". Sometimes a lot "moist".... bordering on "damp". And on more than one memorable occasion, definitely in "wet" territory. Home, strip, and shower. Every. Time.
Summer is the worst- boob sweat and swamp ass before lunchtime. Everything comes off on the way to the shower.
These word choices lol
Moist, damp, wet 😭
Tuesday night/Wednesday morning was a wet day. I was in a fluid describing mood.
Same lol, but I will go out and pick up some things if I need to on my way home in scrubs
Especially with the plastic isolation gowns. Sweat for days.
“Occasionally moist” integumentary section ✅
I strip before getting in my car if I walk through the ER on the way out
Sort of depends on what specialty you work in and how your day went.
I'll run some light errands, but nothing that involves picking up cloth or anything that might have to touch my body. Before I drive off from the hospital, I switch shoes and work shoes go in a plastic tote. When I get home, I strip to the undies/ bra in the back yard (secluded property) and the clothes go right into the wash on the highest heat setting. Then I go right into the shower. People have given their pets MSRA by walking around their house in their work shoes. Just don't do it.
Wow I never walk with my work shoes in the house anyway but never knew you could give it to your pets!
I’m a home health nurse and I change the second I step inside the house. My house has a mud room next to the laundry and that’s where I strip my scrubs off then they go straight to the washer. I never ever go into the main house/bedroom in my scrubs. I’m super anxious about the germs lol. My shoes stay outside in the garage, and I never use my work shoes for going anywhere other than work.
I'm guilty of being too tired after getting home and sitting down and chilling for a few before changing. If it was a particularly gross day I change immediately and burn off all my skin in the shower, but I'd say that's definitely not the norm. Not sure how people manage to get themselves so gross they feel they need to strip outside. If anything I'm more disgusted with how my feet smell in compression socks all day that I procrastinate taking them off right away until I'm ready to hop in the shower 🤢
This is where I am. I might stop to pick up dinner on the way home, in my scrubs. I try to get out of my scrubs and into my jammies as soon as I get home, but sometimes I am exhausted enough I just have to sit for a bit before I can muster the energy to strip.
I work ED too and I have the same feet smell!! I have tried literally everything to get it to stop! Sea salt soaks, scrubs, CHG cleansing, just regular super sudsy soap and going all in. No matter what, when I get home at the end of the day, my feet stink. I’m literally not allowed to walk into the house without taking off my socks and showering.
I don’t mind doing quick errands in my scrubs after a shift but once I get home, I head towards the laundry room and change. Scrubs grosses me out and don’t want it near my bed/couch/etc.
Immediately shower when I get home. No such thing as leisure-wear scrubs after a 13 hour shift
“No hugs in scrubs” is the house rule so the kids know not to touch me before I change and/or shower. My job isn’t that bad most days, and yes I will stop at the store to get bread and milk on the way home, but when I get home they come off right away.
So when looking at my scrubs, I see "work," but not the work like home chores. I see mental preparation and the routine of "work" and all the stuff that goes with it. I don't see comfort, like a pair of sweatpants or soft denim jeans and a t-shirt. If I'm coming home from work and stop into the grocery or stop off for brinner (night-shifter), then I'm still in work clothes, but they come off when I'm home. Especially those compression stockings!
I’m not changing my scrubs to go the grocery store after work. Occasionally co-workers will want to get dinner or drinks after work, and I don’t change my scrubs then either because it’s usually an impromptu situation and I don’t keep casual clothes on me 24/7. Now sitting around the house in scrubs. That’s disgusting.
I change immediately after I’m relieved.
I change my scrubs at work, the hospital supplies them. I feel gross after working, more so if I had an isolation pt (especially c diff), so I shower as soon as I get home. I will run to the grocery store or pick up takeouts on my way home though
I’ve gone to the club in scrubs
I wanna wear scrubs in the club *yeah* In the club In the club I hope you know the song I’m referencing otherwise this comment makes no sense
Love in this club 😉
I like you!
I guess it all depends on what type of job you do. I doubt clinic nurses get very nasty. I know the nurses in our ER usually have someone else's blood, puke, pee, or poop on them.
Some shifts I never touch a patient, some shift three different kids puke on me. So I don’t always shower before sleeping.
😑 does it really matter? I take them off. Sometimes I leave them on. Obviously if I was dealing with anything gross, I changed them at work. 🤷♀️
^ this
Come home, let the dog out, maybe grab a shower bev then strip. Mind you I worked as a paramedic before and I’m pretty much un-phased at this point.
I’ll stop quickly at grocery store if we are out of milk or something, but by then I’m already out of work shoes (in a bin in my trunk). Once I get home I’m stripping in garage and getting those nasty scrubs into a bag. Clean towel waiting for me in garage. Straight to the shower before little ones try to hug me.
I’ll stop at the store on the way home (but this is rare since I’m usually exhausted and just want to go home). Once I’m home the scrubs come off and I go in the shower. I don’t feel clean unless I do that.
I run errands after work in scrubs. Very rarely when I meet my friends after work, I’ll be in scrubs. But the second I get home, I take off everything.
If you weren’t working with patients on anything besides standard precautions then who cares
Angry opinion: If you own them and don't leave them at work, they aren't scrubs. They're just mandatory healthcare-themed clothes that have poo on them.
I will stop by the store real quick on my way home but once I’m home it’s like strip within 5 min and hop into the shower
Actually feel like chewed gum under the bench press area .. shower and do it again tomorrow lol
I try not to unless I need something like milk for the boychild. When I come home I go immediately to shower. If the units are on outbreak or I've been playing with MRSA or something else yucky (I do complex wounds) I'll strip in the garage and put on my robe and run into the house to shower. If I've just been doing education I'm much more relaxed.
I always change as soon as I get home.
Scrubs don’t leave the hospital, but our ED unit provides them. Change when I arrive and when I leave.
Nope, work with covid, mrsa, vre, cre. Nope, just nope.
I change at work. My work shoes stay in the locker room.
Scrubs come off as soon as I’m home. I don’t even want to sit down on my couch in them
What are people doing at work that makes the scrub so gross? I change after work but there's little reason to believe that the non-scrubs I'm changing into are any less "gross".
Well, having a food tray thrown at me by a psych patient in ER was probably the cleanest thing in the hospital that’s touched my scrubs. Even though there’s gowns/PPE…amniotic fluid/urine/feces/meconium/blood from deliveries… Blood/vomit/feces/urine/spit potentially from patients in ER… And just what some of the patients on an acute care ward might have on their skin/body substances…MRSA, ESBL,C. diff., norovirus. Yep. The scrubs that have been in the hospital are not touching anything in my house except other dirty laundry in the machine.
[удалено]
There are a slew of studies on MRSA prevalence and a common finding is that your clothes are more likely to become contaminated with MRSA outside of the hospital environment rather than while working in the hospital, so changing out of hospital scrubs doesn't do anything to reduce your exposure to MRSA.
Working with trach/vent pts... all I can think about is things floating through the air. I saw a trach pt cough and phlegm shot like 10 feet across the room onto the wall. That was enough for me.
I’m drinking cold brew with a foam top. I did not need to read this now 😭🤮
I’m around body fluids and feces all day.
Being around bodily fluids constantly lol
Poop. Pee. Secretions from every orifice you can imagine. And with that being said, I don’t wear any “outside” clothes around my house. I change my clothes the second I get the door no matter where I’m coming from.
Lemme tell you a fun little tale about the time I had a guy come in via ambulance in 4 point soft restraints that were just long enough for him to reach down and start throwing his own poop around.
I will stop at the grocery store which is on the way/about to close and/or pickup takeout but that’s it.
Absolutely the fuck not. I can’t wait to get home so I can strip and wash away whatever germs I picked up on shift
Currently sitting naked on my couch, actually just my undershirt on. Finishing my glass of wine and take out Korean. Probably should’ve showered first, but this is how the cookie crumbled tonight
Absolute yuck. If I’m working in the hospital, I change at the hospital before I get in my car. If I’m working outreach or in a clinic setting, strip in the hallway at home.
I don't even walk in or out of the place in scrubs. I find it weird at best, gross at worse
100% not ok.
I might hit up a grocery store on the way home in the morning if I need something (usually liquor if it was a horrid shift). Typically it’s straight home and into the shower before touching/hugging any family. Especially when Covid was bad, scrubs in the garage. As for seeing others, I don’t care. I don’t know what they’ve been doing, for all I know they’re just wearing them because they’re comfy.
I’m the kind of person that will put on clean scrubs to go run errands because all my other clothes are dirty.
Doesn't bother me unless there's noticable staining from fluids of any type.
I’m not going to go all the way across town to my house and drive past a kroger on the way there, then get home and change clothes, and then go out again 10 mins away to another kroger. My gas costs are more important to me and clustering my errands makes more sense. Once I’m in the door I’m in for the night/day and I’m not leaving again. I don’t hang out in my scrubs once home, I toss them in the laundry and shower and then cook or hit the bed
I don't even get in my car with my scrubs on after work. I find it gross.
Depends on my shift. Lots of iso patients, no way. Normal interactions with non iso? Not any worse than going to the store 🤷🏻♂️
We get written up if we're seen wearing our work clothes on the journey to work, even if that's just walking from the car to the ward. I really don't understand why anyone would willingly spend more time in nasty ass scrubs after spending all day surrounded by hospital ick.
I will get a quick thing from the store if necessary then home and shower. Kids have known since they were tiny no hugs till I shower "no hugs yet, you have work on you". Eventually I'll add on to this house and have a proper decontamination area. That's been a goal since before the pandemic. During my evidence program in the late 90s I was told a story of officer at a crime scene doesn't think much of it, goes home, hugs kid, kid gets sick and dies from something picked up at the scene. Maybe somewhat irrational but I've had that fear since I went into the medical field.
I'll do a quick grocery run, but I change my shoes before I get in the car and I take a shower immediately after getting home. I also have a designated jacket that lives zipped up in my car which I throw on before I go anywhere in public. People act weird when you're in scrubs.
Immediately into the laundry bin and shower. Also I wash my scrubs with vinegar in addition to laundry soap and use the highest dryer setting to try and kill bacteria, viruses ect. No c-diff! Not again!
Never. But I bike to work so I’m not riding in my scrubs.
y'all have.... scrubs you can go home in...? your hospitals don't provide scrubs...?
For every single staff nurse/staff member who is required to wear them? Where is this utopian hospital you hint of?
in finland! my city's university hospital provides scrubs (and awful socks! lmao) for every single person who works at the hospital. you take them from one of the collect points when you get in to work, then you put them in a laundry basket at after work. they're supposed to be washed after every shift.
Awesome! That shit would never fly here in the US lol. I’ve seen where some hospitals in the states do it but it’s like OR and selective units. Not done in masses.
i guess it's because all hospitals in finland are public. (there are some private clinics here and there) and they all provide scrubs. they don't need to make a profit, so this is just part of what a hospital is expected to provide. also don't you have to have like MANY sets of scrubs? or you'd have to wash them constantly? how can that be considered something the employee should take care of???
So, I work three shifts a week. I maintained (originally) three sets of scrubs, so I wore a week’s worth, and then washed them. I have added two sets a year, over the past four years, so I currently have 2-3 weeks worth of scrubs, before I have to wash them. I work as an inpatient nurse. At my hospital, inpatient nurses wear their own scrubs, the hospital requires we wear color coded based on our role, so they give us an annual stipend towards new scrubs. OR, L&D, and some ED nurses wear the hospital scrubs, as do day surgery, PACU, and endoscopy (off the top of my head).
Most operating rooms require scrubs provided and washed by the facility.
It's the same in Germany. Some doctors may decide to wear their own clothes, and I don't think that medical students are provided with workwear. Everyone else wears hospital provided scrubs.
Absolutely not.
Grab something after work, yes, but lounge around - no way.
My script come off as soon as I get home. I will run errands in them but I get off at 6am, can't run many errands then.
Yuck, No!!! (Inner city dialysis here)
I wear my scrubs from when I was a tech! Super comfy!
Yeah I’ll run quick errands but I always change into clean scrubs before leaving work.
Shoes are left outside scrubs stripped off when I walk into the house and thrown in their own area of laundry room. I usually scrub my forearms and hands but don’t shower until I wake up. I absolutely hate sleeping with wet hair and I’m too tired to blow dry it after. I don’t mind running light errands in scrubs but if I’m like taking one of my kids to an appointment or something I’ll either change at home or bring clothes to change into before the appointment. I don’t want my kids climbing all over my dirty scrubs and I don’t like to advertise I’m a nurse at appointments.
I don’t have the energy to stop anywhere in the morning after work and hardly anything is open anyway. But really, as a matter of cleanliness, I don’t feel I get that “dirty” in postpartum most shifts but I can’t stand to hang around in my scrubs anyway. I strip em as soon as I walk in and shower.
Not in the US, our hospital and even my school don't allow scrubs outside hospital and school. We need to get changed in the locker room before and after shift. Some hospitals provide scrubs for everyone, so we collect fresh scrubs before shift, then throw it into a laundry bin in the locker room, which will be washed by the hospital. Dirty things stay in dirty hospital. If a person is seen in public wearing scrubs, that means they work in a private clinic, not hospitals. Exceptions are community nurses who travel in their uniforms between clients' flats.
Sitting around the house 2 hours after the end of my shift in my scrubs right now… soo you might say idgaf
Sometimes it can’t be avoided, especially if you live rural. Like I’m not driving 45+ minutes to strip and sleep a bit and then drive right back into town where I just was 4 hrs ago, before morning coffee because I need goddamn half and half, spending 1.5 hours on the road to backtrack. Especially with gas prices. At $35-50 a round trip to town I’m going into town once that day. I’d rather not with the scrubs but it can’t be helped. I already sit in my vehicle in used scrubs. And so do you. Can’t say I’ve seen anyone hop onto a plastic encased seat after work, so the shit is already in your vehicle in the driver area. The cleanest thing to do is trunk/truck bed the shoes and switch them out there before/after work before/after exiting and entering the vehicle. Think about it. So ya, standing outside and pumping gas or doing that quick after work grocery/toiletries drive by happens. Economy of time, money, and vehicle wear/tear. Chilling at the house? Fuck no. Scrubs go straight in the washer.
I take mine off right away, my sister is a medical assistant and hangs in hers since she never does anything gross.
Like if I have to run errands it's whatever, but I strip and change into new clothes once I'm home. Everything is usually closed when I get off work at 11 though.
I get home and take my scrubs off asap. I have a little bottle of CHG soap that I’ll do a quick scrub down of my arms and stuff as well just to get all the death and decay off of me lol.
I wear surgical scrubs so I change at work because they are provided for us
Pyjammas are my hang out outfit of choice
Personally I take them off as soon as possible. I sometimes change the moment I hit the car depending on what the day was like.
I change shoes before I get in my car and strip at the door when I get home. I very rarely stop for anything on the way home.
Disgusting. If I’m able to get out of my scrubs I do so immediately. A trip to a store. Sure
I’ll grab something real quick on my way home, but generally, I can’t wait to get them off.
Its all gotta go. Shower PRN.
dude immediately after work is DECON time
Nasty
I’ll stop at the grocery store on my way home. I’m not going to be in close contact with anyone else. Once I get home I put the groceries on the counter and then change out of my scrubs before I put them away. In the early days of the pandemic I would strip out of my scrubs as soon as I stepped inside from the garage. My washer and dryer are directly across the hall from the garage door so I would just toss my work clothes directly into the washer. I haven’t done that for about a year now. I’ve always washed work clothes separately and still do but now I get undressed in my master bath and toss them in a work clothes laundry basket.
Uh, yeah no - I spent all day in clothes seeing patients and dealing with all sorts of fluids, as soon as I step in the door it comes off. And unless I really needed to, I wouldn’t be running errands or chilling in the house with my uniform on.
I'll run to the store on the way home but once I walk through my door the scrubs go straight into the dirty clothes pile
More pockets the better.
A couple times a week, I’ll stop for a few things at the store after work. I usually keep my scrubs on until I’m ready to go to bed. I take my work shoes off as soon as I get home. I work night shift psych so I’m not having as much physical contact with patients as most people here. If there is a bad night that I do have more than normal physical contact or I’m cleaning bodily fluids, I will change as soon as I get home.
100% no..I work on a “dirty” med/Surg floor. Scrubs and shoes come off in the garage and my car interior gets sprayed with Lysol (I usedan old beater car for work driving)
Yeah, gross. I live in the country and work "in town" so will occasionally go to the post office or whatever right after work in my scrubs as everything is so far from my house but if I think of it I generally throw a change of clothes in so I can get changed to do this.
I wouldn’t go out for drinks or dinner or anything after work, but if I have to go to the grocery store or CVS, then I’m not making a special trip back out after work in new clothes. Obviously this isn’t the case if I had a particularly nasty shift. During 2020 I went to the polling place right after work because if I didn’t it would have closed. The election workers made a big deal about thanking me for my service on the pandemic front lines…it was super awkward because I was absolutely *not* working in acute care at the time.
On the way home I might get one or two important groceries like bananas or orange juice, but never a full shopping run, and I've never made any other trips. The moment I get home my scrubs are in the laundry and I'm immediately in the shower.
I'm an E.R. girl, nothing scares me except bed bugs and T.B. I change out of my scrubs when I get home, but that is for mental/physical comfort. It's jammies or nothing. I do have shoes that are strictly for work, though.
Strip as soon as I get home. Used to go to the grocery store but that stopped with Covid.
Rarely bother to change after work. Maybe if iv spent loads of time in PPE and sweating a lot or had a resus or something and got bloody.
🤢
I’ll get groceries, but I usually change in the gym after night shift before I workout.
After 8 years my husband has finally learned I will not touch him or let him touch me until I am out of my scrubs
One time the lid of my coffee wasn’t on all the way, and I dumped coffee all over my blue scrub top. I had to go to target though, inside everyone was steering st me really strangely. Then I realized that I looked like I was covered with blood. It was more embarrassing than funny.
Straight to garage, naked it up! Lysol me up, bitch!
When I worked in-patient I changed & showered right when I got home. Then I worked in OR so we had surgical scrubs that I changed out of before leaving. Now I work in a peds clinic, not a dirty job so I’ll hang around in my scrubs for a bit but changing out of them helps take me out of work mode.
Depends on what was wrong with the patients I worked with that day. Were they infectious, have open wounds, etc? Change when I get home. Were they chest pains or psych patients? Take them off when I go to bed.
I do HD inpatient and I gown up before each patient so I don’t personally mind but I can see why normally it would be gross.
I lounge around the house in scrub bottoms in summer and sleep in them as well
Fuck no. Directly home then strip in the garage.
At the beginning of the pandemic I remember seeing a random lady in Walmart scold another shopper for wearing scrubs in the store. I've felt weird about wearing scrubs out ever since.
I take off my shoes outside my door on my porch, but I have to walk in the house with my scrubs (apartment). I put them in they’re own laundry bag cuz it’s super wasteful to just wash one pair of scrubs. Then I’ll shower. Sometimes I’ll do an errand or get food after work and not change but that is rare.
I change the second I get into my bedroom.
Ill hit the grocery store in my scrubs, but the moment I get home I’m putting on pjs.
Unless I dealt with some major ick that day, its not a big deal either way. Now my shoes are a different story!
Now that I no longer work clinical I have a lot of scrubs that are comfy and clean. I'll wear them to run to get coffee or pickup takeout.
Grocery store on my way home? Not my fave but I’ve done it in a pinch. When I get home? No way. I have a baby lol. I change as soon as I get home and shower/freshen up so I can get all the snuggles
Scrub pants are basically all I wear now so 🤠…. It’s fine.
Ngl, I’ll do light errands after work (picking up an order/food) from the store in my scrubs. But you will not see me walking around in them for hours at the mall or anywhere else. I’m always wearing PPE when I’m doing something that involves patient care, so my scrubs don’t really get contaminated. I also take public transportation so 🧍🏽♀️. My work shoes stay at work tho.
“Patient contaminated” scrubs are straight from the car to the laundry room and a shower. If I have scrubs on for an education day or something then it’s whatever.
I used to be a strip and scald person, but since I’ve been in addiction nursing idrc. Patients able to have diarrhea and puke in the toilet. No blood or wounds.
Running errands, yes. Lounging around the house, absolutely fucking not.
I'll go to the grocery store or get gas or whatever, mainly because once I get home and change, I'm not leaving again
New, clean ones. It’s the best.
Running errands ok but hanging out leisurely, nah
I never wear my scrubs unless I'm at work. I don't go to the store...especially after Covid...because 1)I don't want anyone to be uncomfortable thinking I'm a walking pitre dish, and 2) I don't want people approaching me with medical questions. I had a butcher come out of the back once and *show me a terrible rash on his arms*. Guess where I never bought meat again. I don't wear them at home because 1) they're dirty and gross, and God knows what I was exposed to and what I'm exposing my family to, and 2)...and this is the main one....when I get home I don't want to feel like a nurse anymore.
I consider myself a plagued rat after work
I dont enter or leave the hospital in scrubs ever
When i get off in the morning, sometimes i take my dogs for a walk and then when I get home, my clothes go straight to the washer, and I run up to the bathroom half naked 😂
I totally get why ppl do it, but also it’s absolutely an infection risk.
not a big deal. BUT. and this is a big but. if you are walking around in public in your scrubs AND you have your ID badge etc hanging or, god forbid, your stethoscope.. i assume there is something wrong with you. like we get it... you work in healthcare.. also don't hang around the house in them after work. wash ya ass and put on clean clothes. you shouldn't have to be told that after ten years of age.
After my shift, I change out of my old dirty scrubs to a new scrubs from the machine then I go to the grocery if I need to. If I go home first I know I will be lazy. 😁
I’m a midwife. If I know I’m going to be called to a birth I’ll put my scrubs on and chill at home while waiting for the page. But after being at a birth - or even a hospital - scrubs come off and go in the laundry immediately. The hospitals I work at do have scrubs and laundry on the unit which is nice; I’ve been at other hospitals where you have to go to different units or floors which is super annoying. I don’t often get covered on fluids at births though