CNA Night Shift...housekeepers?

Nursing Students CNA/MA

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I would like to hear opinions from CNA /Med Aide like myself regarding night shift workload/tasks.I am completely baffled weather to stay or resign. I am a doer by nature , I don't like to complain, i give things a try and do my best. But lately, I have been very down and a feeling degraded in one aspect of NOC shift job. I work in an assisted living facility/not Memory care. There are about 25-30 residents give or take.Most of them , atleast at the moment sleep at night and only a few to take to the bathroom or turn. I do med pass, positioning and basically monitoring people and assisting as needed. That's all easy for me and I love it on top of MED room task,MAR Audits, Med Cart check and refilling, receivables,incident management (911) that's all fine. done ,done , done , no problem.

I work with a caregiver, so there are 2 staffs total . I love all the people i work with at NOC shift. that aspect makes me not want to leave and also the residents that I have learn to love .They are a pleasure to help and serve.

However,the housekeeping tasks is messing with my self esteem.I am talking about the whole kitchen, dining room ,laundry,main living room, reception area, activity room , 2 offices including RN's office and Community relation managers,( I have to vacuum their offices and empty their trash???) 3 bathrooms and break room, including breaking down boxes for recycling.Basically the whole building including sanitizing all the doorknobs in 4 hallways. Yes, I am hardworking and I can get that done with the help of another caregiver (HCA) but is that acceptable workload for CNA and Med Aide?

Since it is "not busy" all the deep cleaning is assigned to the NOC shift, sanitizing, vacuuming, some laundry,sweeping, mopping scrubbing toilets,washing rubber mats,ironing all linens for the dining tables, setting tables for breakfast.I bet you, there is more , I am just tired of typing so ill stop there.

WoW, I just got exhausted typing and reading it...how much more doing every night I work for the last 12 months.

Do you have the same work load/ housekeeping task s in general ? What is acceptable and whats not? Inputs anyone.

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Specializes in ICU Stepdown.

That's ridiculous.

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I'm not sure what's customary for that setting, but it seems like you're doing more housekeeping than actual CNA work. I don't think I would be happy, but I don't see things changing as long as they're able to find staff willing to do it.

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Your for profit facility is working you to the bone, so they do not have to hire housekeeping.

You have let them do so. Nothing will change now.

Brush up the resume, start applying where you KNOW you will not expected to be housekeeping as well.

Best of luck, let us know how it's going.

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Specializes in Education, FP, LNC, Forensics, ED, OB.

Welcome to allnurses.com

Thread moved to CNA forum.

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This does seem pretty excessive.

At my LTC facility help flows like this:

- Morning/Day shift: Aids get residents up and ready for breakfast, housekeeping and aids split breakfast duty about 50/50, housekeeping cleans up, while aides begin the days task.

- Lunch/Day shift: The same.

- Dinner/Evening shift: All housekeeping has left for the day, it is up to the aids to prepare for the meal, get tickets, serve, and clean up afterwards, then of course get residents ready for bed/comfortable in their rooms.

- Night shift: No housekeeping staff till 6am when the day shift returns. So check and changes, turns, washing, drying, and folding table cloths and napkins, possible vacuuming the living and dinning areas. And I think that's about it? Light cleaning and tidying but nothing excessive.

Offices should be done by housekeeping during their shift, not the night aids or nurses.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Med-Surg, Psych, Geri, LTC, Tele,.

I understand completely how these duties are considered housekeeping, and not nursing duties.

However, I think, based on my experience that having 2 CNAs plus a nurse for 25-35 pts is much more staff and much fewer pts compared with my (short) stint in an ALF.

We had 45 memory care and over 100 ALF clients. 1 nurse and 1 CNA for nocs. Because your facility is small (I mean a small number of clients) this is why they want the nursing staff to perform housekeeping duties.

I'm not excusing them. They are probably trying to save the money they should be spending on janitorial staff.

When I was a CNA in a SNF, we had 100 pts. 2 or 3 nurses. And we did have to empty the trash cans overnight. It was part of our CNA duties. I wish I could recall the number of pts per CNA. I think it was 15-20.

At another SNF, we had 1 nurse and maybe 2 aides for about 50 pts. No housekeeping duties for CNAs or RNs.

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That is absolutely ridiculous and it pains me to see other CNAs or individuals sayin things like "That's just how it is, it's not gonna change." Why not? Because we as CNAs refuse to do anythin about it?? We are LICENSED professionals. Your scope of care and practice is with your residents, not the offices of your team leaders. Most LPNs and RNs would be offended (and would most likely refuse) if administrators assigned those kinds of tasks for the sake of saving a buck but you're expected to just do it because you're a CNA and not viewed as they same professional as your RNs and administrators. I'd bring this issue up at a staff meeting, explain why it's not your responsibility to clean up after an entire facility, that it's beneath your scope of practice and I'd start a petition.

We had a program here called the star program. It required a CNA to remain on the floor for an additional 4 hours if someone on the on-coming shift called off. Once the program was implemented there was a serious rise in call offs and CNAs were having to stay an extra 4 hours constantly. Eventually we got sick of it and threatened to start a petition. The admins got wind of it and sat us down to ask us what was wrong with the program. We explained, they tried to convince us it was for the best and we told them we will start a petition and send it to their bosses, we would go over there heads. They cancelled the program the following month.

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That seems like wayyyyyyyyy too much. Cleaning your manager's offices?? They can empty their own trash if they don't want to hire a janitorial!

Admittedly I work in a hospital, so our staffing is much more full. But both shifts empty trash bags, tidy up, break down boxes, etc. The only real difference I can think of is that night shift really, really stocks the floor- because the person from the warehouse who restocks the utility room only comes in the morning, so you want to "use it up" so that they'll refill you faster.

I agree with "Been there, done that": brush up that resume! Your prior experience will go a long way. Ask around with aides in your area to see what facilities share those sentiments.

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I would quit if I were you. Your place of employment is taking advantage of cheap labor. You are paid far too little to be doing all of that housekeeping.

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That is absolutely ridiculous and it pains me to see other CNAs or individuals sayin things like "That's just how it is, it's not gonna change." Why not? Because we as CNAs refuse to do anythin about it?? We are LICENSED professionals. Your scope of care and practice is with your residents, not the offices of your team leaders. Most LPNs and RNs would be offended (and would most likely refuse) if administrators assigned those kinds of tasks for the sake of saving a buck but you're expected to just do it because you're a CNA and not viewed as they same professional as your RNs and administrators. I'd bring this issue up at a staff meeting, explain why it's not your responsibility to clean up after an entire facility, that it's beneath your scope of practice and I'd start a petition.

We had a program here called the star program. It required a CNA to remain on the floor for an additional 4 hours if someone on the on-coming shift called off. Once the program was implemented there was a serious rise in call offs and CNAs were having to stay an extra 4 hours constantly. Eventually we got sick of it and threatened to start a petition. The admins got wind of it and sat us down to ask us what was wrong with the program. We explained, they tried to convince us it was for the best and we told them we will start a petition and send it to their bosses, we would go over there heads. They cancelled the program the following month.

Whereas, I do not feel OP should not be cleaning offices, CNA's are NOT licensed professionals.

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I agree with the fact that cnas are not licensed. I never understood why they aren't considered professionals.

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