Role of a CNA - Certified Nursing Assistant

A Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) is very crucial to the survival of people who are in need. There are very many Certified Nursing Assistants all over the country and they are very helpful and skilled people. Being a nursing assistant is not an easy task. To work in this profession you need to be emotionally, physically, and mentally very strong. If you lack these characteristics you might find being a CNA is not right for you. Certified Nursing Assistant jobs, unlike many other jobs, are still needed today during this rough economy because they are very important in the lives of the people who need to be cared for that can’t do it on their own and these will remain important no matter how good or bad the economy becomes because there will always be a need for assisted living. (Marrow, State)

If there were no Certified Nursing Assistant jobs, it would make things very difficult for Registered Nurses. CNA’s do the jobs that Registered Nurses are not able to take care of. Certified Nursing Assistants have more time to take care of the residents than the Registered Nurses do and the residents get the basic care that they need for their everyday life under the CNA’s. Residents in nursing homes (note: the residents are the people who live in the facilities) are very well cared for in the facilities that they reside in. There is much debate on whether people who need assisted living are better taken care of in their own homes or if they are better taken care of in facilities where they have people everyday to help them with their basic needs everyday. In personal opinion, I think that people who need assisted living are better taken care of in a facility were they have people who are there to care for them at all hours and times of the day. If these people lived at home they might not receive all the care, attention, and technology that they needed to survive. (“CNA Jobs, Certified”)

When being a Certified Nursing Assistant, you need to know how to work the equipment that they have for taking vital signs on the residents. Taking the residents vital signs is a very important part of the day for a Certified Nursing Assistant. There are four main vital signs that you have to take on the residents daily, which include body temperature, pulse or heart rate, blood pressure, and respiratory rate. When taking the temperature, its main purpose is to show any signs of systemic infection or inflammation in the presence of a fever or way over the individual’s normal temperature. Blood pressure is important to take on the residents because blood pressure problems usually occur in elderly people and can become very serious. Taking a pulse can either be measured at the wrist, which is the most common place, and if it cannot be taken at the wrist, it can be taken at the neck, behind the knee, or in the foot. A pulse will tell you how fast and regularly the heart is beating and the heart rate is different in all ages of people. A respiratory rate varies with age but it is an indicator of potential respiratory dysfunction. (Certified, “A, By Maintaining”)

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There are many good things that come out of being a Certified Nursing Assistant and you get to experience many new things. When you work with elderly people you get to know them very well and it’s almost like you have 20 sets of grandparents. The residents that you work with usually start to really trust you and look at you as if you were part of there family. Sometimes the CNA’s also become the resident’s best friends. For many people who don’t like working outdoors, a Certified Nursing Assistant job might be just right. As a CNA, you don’t do many things outdoors except maybe go outside for a few minutes with the residents. Therefore, you wont have to deal with being outdoors much if that’s not something that you want to do everyday. Most people that I have talked to that have experience as a CNA, say that the best part of there job, by far, is knowing at the end of the day that you have made a difference in someone’s life. (What, “What Do”)

Along with the good things, there are also many bad things about being a Certified Nursing Assistant. Getting residents up in the morning is one of the more difficult things that the CNA’s have to go through because the residents are usually pretty angry when they get woken up. Changing the linens and struggling to get the residents out of their beds to change them is something that is also very difficult. It’s hard to lift the residents out of the bed when they weigh almost as much as you do but the CNA’s do it so that the residents can be comfortable and sleep in clean beds every night. Although CNA’s already have a big enough job taking care of the residents, they also do “side work” which includes doing laundry and cleaning the dinning rooms. Charting is also another task that the Certified Nursing Assistants take over. This task takes a while and you have to chart down every detail of every person that you work with and all of there special needs. You also record exactly what you have helped them with that day and all of there basic needs that you have taken care of. The smell of working in a nursing home is also a very unpleasant one that a Certified Nursing Assistant must get used to because they will be smelling that smell all during there shifts and even after they leave. Then another bad thing is to get beat up for doing your job and trying to help the residents with the basic things that they are not able to do on there own. The residents just don’t understand that you are trying to help them so they are grumpy and then in return hit you and yell at you. The absolute worst thing about being a CNA is not getting attached the residents that you take care of. Even though it is encouraged to befriend them and provide support for them, it is almost forbidden to become emotionally attached to them. This is almost impossible though because when you take care of someone everyday and help them survive, it’s like you form a bond with your residents. (“NOC”)

If you think that becoming a CNA is something that you want to do, keep in mind that no previous experience is needed but you have to go to some schooling first. You can get a Certified Nursing Assistant credential by going to a few classes and then pass an examination. There are CNA programs that you can take at healthcare facilities or at community colleges which makes it convenient for anyone who is interested in being a Certified Nursing Assistant as a career. While doing your schooling, you also need to keep in mind that you have to register a certain number of hours you have worked. Along with the test that you have to take after your program, you must also turn in a written theory exam and will be tested on the practical duties of a CNA. The programs that you take to become a CNA is usually about 50 hours of training which shows how to help people with there basic everyday needs. Although it takes a little schooling, it can be a very rewarding career. A Certified Nursing Assistant usually can earn between $9.50 and $12.00 an hour. A shift of a CNA is usually 7.5 hours with a one hour break. To earn additional income, CNA’s may work double shifts and some can even have a second job somewhere else and can work 6 or 7 days a week. If you find that you like being a Certified Nursing Assistant in the medical field, you might want to continue your education and become a Registered Nurse (RN). “The best RN’s started out as CNA’s” says a Registered Nurse name Mira Dixon with 13 years of experience. (“CNA Jobs, Certified”, Certified)

As you can probably tell, there are many aspects to the daily life of a CNA. Did you think that the list couldn’t get any longer of the duties and responsibilities that a CNA has throughout the day? Well, it can because not only do they do there basic duties and take the vital signs of the residents, they have to provide the residents and patients with emotional and social support. As I mentioned before, you are not allowed to get attached to these residents but are still told to be there for them, be there friend, listen to them talk, and get to know them on a personal basis. The CNA’s support the patients emotionally by talking to them and reassuring them that things will be alright when helping getting them prepared for surgery and transporting them o there treatment units. (What)

Once you get a job as a Certified Nursing Assistant, one of the first things that you will do is have an orientation. The managers and the supervisors of where you are working will usually have this meeting. During this meeting the managers and supervisors will normally assign an experienced CNA to work with you and inform you as to how to handle and take care of the residents. While in this meeting it is common for the CNA in training to take notes and become familiar with the care plan, family preferences and more. During this meeting they will make it clear to you that taking care of 8-10 residents is not an easy job. Therefore you will need to understand that each resident has their own unique individual needs. (Alohagems)

After you have went through your orientation and have worked with an experienced CNA until you got the hang of things, you will get assigned a group of residents to work with. You will receive a sheet with residents listed and these residents will be on a certain floor or area. They will mainly be grouped with corresponding diagnosis (which means they will have similar needs), activities (the things that enjoy doing during the day that makes them happy), and meal preferences (these are the times and things that they like to eat to make things easier on the CNA’s and to make the residents feel like they are more at home). Once you get this list, it is wise that you get to know the residents and learn there names and be able to talk to them in a friendly manner. Once you have done all of this, a smart thing to do is to prioritize your residents that you are set to take care of. You should prioritize them from highest to lowest priority of what you need to take care of first in your day. Start of by prioritizing them by the residents that need to be up for daily activity, residents that have appointments, such as doctors, Physical therapy, x-ray, and family home visits. These residents should be at the top of your list to start on there daily basic needs. (Alohagems)

To start your daily work daily, you should prepare your cart. This is something that you must take to all of the rooms that you go to. You need to make sure that before you start, you fill the cart with all the materials needed for that shift so you won’t have to keep going back and refilling it during your shift. In your cart you need blankets, batch blankets, fitted sheets, hospital gowns, thermal blankets, top sheets, and daily living materials such as shampoo and toilet paper. Then you should go to the residents with the highest priority rating and start giving them the care they need such as shower, dressing, toileting, and transfers and make them ready for activities and appointments and keep moving down the list of your residents until you are done. Certified Nursing Assistants should not start there care for the residents if they are eating breakfast. Some of the things that they can do during this time is help distribute meal trays, feeding, collecting, and recording food and fluids. (Alohagems)

There is a high demand for Certified Nursing Assistants now because an increased number of people need assistance for their daily lives. CNA jobs are one of the few jobs that still have a high demand for people during the downed economy. CNAs have really good job security and less job cuts and pay drops in a time we need a job the most. This career is also exciting and has many different possibilities in many different locations. At most times there are normally 2,000 positions that are not filled. One of great aspects of this job is that as long as there are people, they are going to require getting cared for on one level or another and that is what makes Certified Nursing Assisting is such a smart job choice for your future. Once you become CNA certified, you will have the choice to participate in home care assignments and assist a visiting RN which is also something that is very popular now with going to people’s homes and assisting them. (“CNA Job Description, CNA Jobs and salary”)

When getting a job for a CNA, you will want to make sure that you are going to be motivated and determined. Certified Nursing Assistants are also very professional people and you will want to make sure that when you go to get a job as a CNA that you show that you are responsible and very professional. When you’re a CNA you need to be emotionally strong because you need to be able to deal with death and people getting really sick and loosing people that you have really come to know and take care of. Also, you will need to be somewhat physically strong because a lot of the work that you do with residents is physical because you need to lift them to do a lot of the basic daily procedures. (Marrow)

In conclusion to my research I have found that there are a lot of many different tasks that a Certified Nursing Assistant must complete on his/her day to day basis. CNAs are very strong emotionally, physically, and mentally and they are some of the people that I look up to because they make a huge difference in people who need assistants every day life. People who need help in there everyday life need someone who they can count on to help them out, luckily they have Certified Nursing Assistants that they can count on and consider them there friends. They also have very good job security if this is a profession that you might enjoy. The daily life and duties of a CNA is very interesting to me and they make a huge difference in people’s lives.