CNA rant

[QuarterLife88, MSN, RN, NP]

I'll start off by saying, I do and have worked with some excellent aides that have saved my butt many times over, and made what would have a been a horrible night something I was able to get through. To the aides out there that do their jobs, you are invaluable and appreciated for your hard work.

However,

There is sadly, a larger subset, at least that I work with, who are lazy, rude, disrespectful, unprofessional, and I truly believe they think they are just there to sit and watch TV/their phones and think they will get paid for not doing anything. I have found aides duplicating vital signs and playing dumb with me that they have done so. When asked to assist patients to the bathroom so that we nurses can perform other tasks, or chart the eleven million things we have to chart, I get eye-rolls and attitude. I'm sorry your TV show was too important to pull you away from! In the same breath I hear from these same people how lazy the nurses are. *****! Look in the mirror please. Again, what do you think your job entails exactly? I'm tired of having to kiss butts and try to appease the aides just so they do what they came to work to do! It's insane.

I truly believe some are laboring under the delusion of vitals only, and then we're done, and asking an aide to toilet, bathe, walk, or do anything else for a patient is above their job. Half the time if I am able I will turn and clean my own patients because it's easier than getting so much attitude (and to clarify, we never have the aides cleaning or turning the patients alone, the nurses always help them with these tasks). But they love it if you're that kind of nurse who does all of her own vitals and brief changings, missing the obvious that the reason we now do it is because we think you're freaking lazy!

It's always the same people who do the bare minimum of their job who complain the fastest and the loudest about nurses not doing enough, and the hardest working who never complain, but then also have to absorb the incompetence of their co-workers.

/rant

[Dranger]

Yeah, I just call them out. Its more fun than being passive because they don't expect it.

This isn't a democracy, while I will do my best to help if I can, I have other fish to fry and worry about. Their only job revolve around patient hygiene, ADLs and vitals (which they have nothing to worry about if they are abnormal). When I ask something to be done, it will get done.

It's the same when I am charge nurse and working with the rest of the staff RNs.

[ponymom]

Buck up and start writing them up and sending the pigs home. And then call your DON, and anyone else of the higher-ups if you need.

[NuGuyNurse2b]

I briefly touched upon this very topic in another thread I posted in and someone jumped on me acting like I was acting superior, when I was just calling it like it is. These aides exist, they ruin your day, they don't add anything to patient care, and you just have to deal with them because your other option is having no aides at all. You're lucky if you find someone who'll be willing to work for the low page and provide the loving care that is required of the job. most of the others who apply for the position are just looking for a paycheck.

[ProgressiveActivist, BSN, RN]

Educate your patients and visitors on admission and at the start of your shift.

Tell your patients to ask for Sam the nursing assistant for food, drink refills, the bedpan, bathing brushing teeth or dentures and help getting to the bathroom. Yes nursing assistants that's your job and no I am not here to do YOUR job duties. It's also your job to answer call lights.

Say " Im libby and I am your nurse. If you dont feel good or need a medication ask for me. "

Teach them to ask for the nursing assistant by name

rather than just "nurse" for every little thing. If the service is poor well too bad for Sam.

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

It can be difficult to deal with that mentality / work ethic.

I have found that if they refuse my direction, the only thing that works is .. write them up.. each and every time.

Good luck, it can be done.

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

OP, if your profile didn't say you were from Michigan, I'd think you worked on my old floor. The only aides who were ANY good when I worked in the hospital were nursing students. The career CNAs were lazy and didn't want to do any work. On nights, I once opened the treatment room door at 2am to bring in a child for an IV placement and found one of the aides asleep on the stretcher. And, guess what? She'd done no midnight vitals. She was fired shortly thereafter when she was found asleep in a closet on another night. I did most duties that could have been delegated to the aides myself when I was a staff nurse because it was easier and faster to just do it myself correctly the first time than to argue with the aide about doing it.

[roser13, ASN, RN]

My first nursing job at the age of 40 was on a crazy busy step-down trauma floor. Not knowing any better, I set out to impress the CNA's with my "we're all in this together" attitude and my willingness to pitch in and help with the ADL's as often as possible, sometimes even to the detriment of my new nurse self, learning to prioritize and perform all of my own functions.

Well, I might as well have painted a big red target on my back. None of them would lift a finger to so much as toilet any of my patients as they knew they could get away with doing absolutely nothing and that I was so naive as to just suck it up and work overtime to do their jobs and mine. Boy, do I wish I could go back in time and have a re-do on those years, minus myself trying to win a popularity contest in order to get folks to do their own jobs.

[%D#2]

I used to be a CNA in a hospital, well, PCA, and I am now a nurse. I was the kind of pca who loved to help do I do not appreciate nor understand when CNAS get lazy. And I also HATED when nurses would be with s patient and be asked for a bed pan, and walk out and call me. I've seen laziness on both ends. Some people ARE just lazy people. Duplicating vitals Is horrible. If I was ever overwhelmed and didn't get to do a BP when I knew the nurse was gonna give bp meds Id call them and tell them what was going on. Sometimes the CNAs may need a little help if it's particular crazy and it's understandable.. But no one should be duplicating vitals.

I now work with a CNA who will call me in the middle of med pass (btw I am in charge of 48 patients) to take vitals if a patient doesn't look well. She won't do it. She also won't take urine specimens or feed pAtients who are in poor condition.. The other night I gave pain meds to a pt and she was very sleepy (hydronephrosis) but hadn't eaten all day. She told the other aide to call me to feed her and refused to do it. I stopped my busiest part of meds to give this lady a nutrition drink. Had the CNA help me sit her up then she just left. I'm gonna confront her again about this. I feel your frustration.

[%D#2]

That all being said I do believe in teamwork. I manage my time the best I can am never late with meds and if I'm giving meds and a patient asks for a bed pan or bathroom while I'm already there I do it. I coordinate which CNAs when I need to change dressings and we go room to room and they assist me while I assist them with pm care. I don't believe that im not responsible for toileting if the CNAs are truly busy when a pt asks. Things like that.. But I gotta work on my attitude and confidence as a new nurse. 99% of them are great and ask me if I need help all the time. It's just that one cna. She's great with bedside manner and very kind to the patients but thinks that if someone is ill then her duties become mine.