Any CNA's use Accunurse at their facility?

stefspets · Nov 5, 2010

I hate accunurse. We just got it at our facility.

It takes a lot longer to document everything, so instead of giving care, I am documenting. I would rather document everything at the end of my shift than be constantly talking into my headset all day. I feel like I can't communicate with the residents or give them the care they need because I am always documenting. If I don't document, then I get nicked by the staff for not being 100%.

AccunurseSupport · Nov 6, 2010

I think getting used to anything new requires some time. When I first got my smart phone, I didn't like it and now I can't live without it. We hear from CNAs that AccuNurse gives them back 30 minutes per day that they can redirect back to resident care. And they can get home faster because they don't have to document after their shifts end. We certainly can help you get productive with it.

Ashmeg87 · May 19, 2011

I just received my certification and started my job in a LTC facility a few weeks ago. I'm having trouble because management is on my case about not having the charting done 100% by the end of the shift. They basically said we understand it's impossible, but do it anyway. On a typical night I have 11 residents to care and document for. Each resident has at least 8-10 different items to chart for. This is all on top of answering call bells, doing our chores, and of course caring for our residents. So basically, if we are to get everything done, we're forced to chart while giving care. I think this is wrong and the residents deserve better. I also think this level of multi-tasking is ridiculous.

Does anybody who has dealt with Accunurse charting have any tips or advice? I've actually contemplated looking for another place of employment, just because of this.

nurse cartman · Sep 23, 2011

My advice: get rid of it. We've had it for 3 years and I must agree, it's a waste of technology. (Not to mention all the incident reports in regard to skin irritation related to battery leakage , batteries going dead mid-shift, and the high cost of training new CNA's because they get so frustrated with AccuNurse not recognizing voice commands (and the subsequent butt chewing) that they jump ship to another facility without AccuNurse.)

Anybody from AccuNurse care to address this?

HADASSA · Feb 22, 2012

i despise and hate accunurse, and i would like to write a petition against this company, due to the fact that it is impeding to the work of a cna and have the potential to increase a patient neglect due to the fact that in my facility we have to electronically chart 4 times minimum on 20 patients every shift...and that is what i call transforming a brain into a slave for this

absolute disgusting accunurse garbage. many of our nurses and nurses assistant at 99 % have left their job at our facilitie because of accunurse..it is horrifying and an absolute nightmare...if i was to be the owner of a facility, never i would put my staff through this brain slavery..there is no words good enough to describe how disgusting is accunurse...i hope someone put them in court...

they just try to get more money from inssurances and don t give a flying care about the staff..while looking at us like we are not even worth breathing but yet good enough to be their slave to they can get more money ...living large and sleeping comfortable in their nice bed at night those evil CEOS...they don t even know how to conduct a business to make their business profitable,, that is why so many are closing down and get busted by the health department ,, trying to save money and yet make as much as they can...our facilities have cut down on wipes to clean patients already and someone told me that one of the CEO said they wanted to cut down the briefs use to only 4 per day..they are insane....

certifiedbuttwiper · May 30, 2013

I agree with the vast majority of posters on this subject, we have been using AccuNurse for about a month or two, although it seems like much longer. We were previously using CareTracker to chart on residents, AccuNurse easily takes 4 times as long to chart, and that is if you only chart each occurrence once per shift, they want us to chart multiple times for each occurrence on each resident, even the ones who are independent (they say "chart everything as it happens", which is impossible if you actually do any care). It is slow, cumbersome, and even if you tuck the cord away it will still get caught on things, and residents will grab it if you have it on (especially dementia patients, it's a good way to get choked if you leave it on while caring for them). Of course our facility requires that it be kept on at all times, except for in the showers. For myself, it is impossible to concentrate on it and providing quality care to residents, especially the ones who are talking to you and asking questions, and it confused the HOH and dementia residents when you're trying to talk to the headset and care for them at the same time. Of course MDS loves it, they say they've increased "reimbursement" significantly already, what they haven't said is how much reimbursement will be required to pay for the system and break even. At the end of the shift when everyone is rushing to get done with the charting it gets more contrary than normal, sometimes repeating the same thing over and over no matter what you say to it, or just "going to sleep" in the middle of charting. It does get faster as you get used to it, you don't have to wait for all the prompts, but it will only go so fast, if you get too far ahead it will just ignore whatever you said. And background noise sometimes causes it to chart something you never intended, it is designed to ignore background noise, but as anyone who has worked in a LTC facility knows, background noise is constantly changing, and I've had door slams cause it to try to chart an independent person as total care more than once. They also have the care plan for each resident programmed into the system, but I work nights, and they tend to play musical halls with us, we are often on a hall that we are not familiar with, and I may have anywhere from 16 to 34 residents assigned to me depending on which hall I'm assigned to for that shift, it would take over an hour to listen to all the care plans for everyone, I'd much rather just have a paper with all the relevant information written down that I can check as I go. Plus the information is often incorrect, many of the residents with mobility monitors are not listed as such in the system, while I'm told to check them on people who are mostly independent and not a fall risk. Toileting plans are the same, I'm told to toilet some residents who are totally continent and independent while others who I know need to be taken to the toilet have no toileting plan at all in the system. Many of the occurrences are redundant and not relevant to the shift, such as meals on night shift, yet they come up as an occurrence that has to be charted. Each resident has between 8 and 27 occurrences that must be charted at night, more during the daytime shifts, and most occurrences have several prompts that must be answered, and then each occurrence must be "saved" (for example: ambulation; if a resident walks in the room, in the hall, and on and off the unit and uses a walker or cane, there are 19 questions that must be answered, and then you have to "save" the documentation). And most occurrences have several prompts or questions, some you can answer before the prompt, some you have to wait for the prompt. In my opinion, it takes away from patient care, and in my experience the workload for CNA's has quadrupled since we started using it. It also has greatly added to stress since we're told we have to get 100% no matter what, if not, the nurse and the CNA are not allowed to go home until it is completed. I would much rather have a kiosk or computer myself, or I have heard there are systems that use I-Pad type devices to chart on, but anything that would allow us to look at something and know what still needs to be done rather than having to listen and try to remember everything for up to 34 residents.

I've also noticed that since we started using the system we've been running short on some of the basic items we need to take care of the residents, I can't help but wonder if it's because of the money the company had to spend for this sorry system.

Oh, and another thing I don't remember seeing mentioned before, the headset that is assigned to you is trained to recognize your voice and supposedly only respond to your voice, it's not always true, but I have noticed after talking all night when you start to get a little hoorifice it sometimes won't recognize my voice as well, I can imagine when colds and laryngitis are going around in the wintertime charting on this thing is going to be even more fun, if not impossible, and I'm sure they're not going to take that as a good excuse to use sick time.

ketchasketch_RN, ASN · Dec 20, 2016

I am a former Vocollect/AccuNurse clinical specialist. I was one who help train and set-up AccuNurse in facilities in Texas. After I was trained, we moved to Texas to take over accounts in Texas and then Vocollect was bought by a larger company and they layed off multiple new employees including me... despite all the money they invested in training me... caught me by surprise... worked for about a month after my training was complete and I loved the company and my fellow clinicians. I believe the model works well with people/clinicians that are inclined to take their job/career seriously. I don't think it works well with people/clinicians that are inherently lazy and lackluster. After I left AccuNurse I became DON for a rehabilitation facility in Texas that used AccuNurse and with my background and training was able to get documentation and useage up pretty well. Where we failed was in keeping track of the devices... nurses and CNA alike failed to take it as seriously as they should and people moving from one hall to another without returning their device to the hall they checked it out on made it very hard to track the devices... I left this company a few years back and it has probably gotten better since then. Overall it is a great company that should be the standard in the industry if they can get the clinicians to take it seriously.

kimmienut · Mar 5, 2017

We have Accunurse at our facility. Everyone hates it. Its a waste of time and so stressful. Our jobs are already stressful enough without adding accunurse into the mix. Paper was so much better. Half the time it charts by its self and then it will loses some what you have charted and then you have to redo it. And the batteries always need charging. Some nights I go thru 3 or 4. When the batteries die the whole blame system has to reboot from the very beginning and that takes forever.