Should medication aides exist?

Nurses Safety

Published

  1. Should medication aides exist?

    • 116
      Yes
    • 347
      No
    • 39
      Not Sure

502 members have participated

Medication aides should not exist. Nurses must band together to fight against taking our skills and giving them to under-qualified persons. Sure we are overloaded with work, but they should hire more nurses to alleviate our burden. We should never accept an unsafe, undereducated "medication aide" to assist us. If they keep giving away our skills to uneducated people, soon we will be competing against them for jobs while they are willing to take half the pay. Then who do you think companies will hire?

Do you think medication aides should exist?

Specializes in IMCU.

I am still a student and think that there is room for medication aides, but only if the are well trained and well supervised. I may well change my opinion on this later...or not.

I note that in my state they permit CNAs, who are nursing students, who have completed their pharmacology course, to be medication aides. The other alternative is they must have completed something like 1000 hours as a CNA, be recommended by two RNs, then take a state approved course.

Specializes in Geriatrics.

I don't know if this is universal, but our med techs are required to take continuing education classes. They, along with my fellow CNAs and the nurses, have to have a minimum of I think 12 continuing education hours per year. Wait, 12 doesn't sound right--it may be 20. Our med techs and nurses are required to attend inservices and learn what the meds they are giving are for and when they shouldn't give them. The med techs work directly under the nurses and if they're unsure about something, they ask the nurse.

Most of our med techs are awesome and good at their jobs. There is, however, one who kept insisting that Metformin was for the thyroid. Then again, we also have a nurse who keeps insisting that Geodon is a benzo. Uh, no. I used to take Geodon and Metformin and I know what they're for and that ain't it. Metformin is for blood sugar and Geodon is an anti-psychotic. (I'm not schizophrenic, I have bipolar 1 and went into a mania.)

Yes, they help out alot.

Specializes in LTC.

I have been fortunate to work with some very knowledgeable QMA's. In our facility, they used to be able to administer g-tube meds and neb tx as well as prn narcotics. I argued this point as all of these require an assessment. Med Aides are not trained to assess. They are trained in pharmacology. I think highly of the girls QMA's that I work with, personally. I would even choose our QMA's over some of our nurses. I encourage our med aides to further their education to become a nurse. I guess I never thought about the "money" aspect of having them work along side of us. But how does that differ from medical assistants? In our area MA's take LPN jobs for less pay. The biggest hurdle with working with med aides for me is that they cannot assess or chart. So you still have to be responsible for the assessments and charting of 42 people on the unit. Let's pass legislation that limits the patient to nurse ratio in LTC facilities in Indiana and other states!

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