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 Cardiac.

What is that all about????

Money.

Specializes in Med Surg, LTC, Home Health.
Millions of LTC residents are given medication by med aides. Millions of ALF residents are given meds by med aids-or untrained persons. True- it isn't a perfect situation....

It isnt a perfect situation to say the least. ALF residents are suppose to be A&Ox3, so for them to have a medication aide is acceptable, because this is the alternative to them still being at home. LTC residents, many of which are on more than 10 different meds, are victims of greed, period! The solution is the same one we use here in Tn. We have NURSES performing nursing skills, and not a 4 week trained individual. Maybe give them 2 more weeks of training and they can do the assessments too, and all of us nurses can just go on home! If you have read the med aide threads, then you have heard of the med aide giving digoxin to a pt with a pulse of 50, and when told by the nurse that she would start giving her own cardiac meds from then on, the med aide responded, "what does digoxin have to do with the heart?". You dont have to wait til med aides kill a bunch of people to be on the right side. As a nurse, you have a vested interest in protecting your skills. If they can prove that our job can be done with little training, then maybe they are paying us too much as well. The medication aide is a position created by those who have no regard for patients or nurses, not out of need, but out of greed!

True- it is all about greed. But that is what capitalism is all about, isn't it?

So, what is the answer?

If states outlawed all med techs tomorrow- there would be no medications passed in thousands of LTC, ALF, RCF, etc. Until the system has produced enough nurses, what to do? Totally untrained staff giving meds in group homes- including tube meds.

I have seen mistakes by CMTs, LPNs, RNs, NPs, Docs... It happens. But, I have performed the LTC med passes, and would not do it full time.

Any ideas as to what the future might hold? How we could improve conditions during this "nursing shortage"?

Specializes in telemetry, med-surg, home health, psych.

I don't think that there would be such a drastic shortage if our pay would equal or work.....if we were paid more money then many, many nurses that are not working as nurses would return....I forget how many, I read, an astronimical amount, of nurses that are either working in other fields (for more money) or not working at all.....what a pity....

Yes, I agree, it is all about the drug companies and all other major corp. making money and not giving a hoot about us worker bees....:cry:

In my area, LTC faclities do not use med techs. I believe they are only used in group home settings. We work short because our facility does not plan well and/or they want to save money. If you are going to spend 6 months to train a med tech, why not spend the extra months and turn out an LPN?

I have to say at this time and with the limited amount I know on this subject..I think it is a bad idea.

Specializes in Med Surg, LTC, Home Health.
any ideas as to what the future might hold? how we could improve conditions during this "nursing shortage"?

ltc facilities employ mostly lpn's. to become an lpn, i attended class from 8am-3pm for one year. that is so far beyond what a med aide must do that it is absurd. due to the high number of med errors made each year by lpn's, rn's and doctors, it seems astonishing that we would subject poor, defenseless elderly people to a risk that is obviously astronomically higher when these tasks are performed by exceedingly undereducated people. according to the institute of medicine of the national academies, medication errors are among the most common medical errors, harming at least 1.5 million people every year. studies indicate that 800,000 preventable drug-related injuries occur each year in long-term care settings. the committee noted that these are likely underestimates.---july 20, 2006

it will never be the time to buy into the lies perpetrated by greedy facilities. the nurses are out there for these jobs. they just want fewer patients and a little respect.

it is not a solution to the nursing shortage to let people come in off the streets and perform our skills. it should be a crime.

Specializes in Med Surg, LTC, Home Health.
If you are going to spend 6 months to train a med tech, why not spend the extra months and turn out an LPN?

I have to say at this time and with the limited amount I know on this subject..I think it is a bad idea.

Look at what the medication aide schmuffin says and youll think it's even worse of an idea.....

I am a med aide...we had a 5 day class, now its down to 4 days and about a half an hour of actual hands on training on the floor before they stick you out there yourself...terrible isnt it???

What an outrage!!!:down:

and I do not think they should exist even in LTC. An LPN would be more appropriate if not another RN. I ran around by myself, with only one CNA for get this- 40 residents! in an alzheimers facility. The only actual training about what the drug classes were, why coumadin was such a big deal, etc was when it was state inspection time. I had no idea what I was giving people. Looking back it was scary.

Specializes in telemetry, med-surg, home health, psych.

those that are grateful for the med aids due to the no. of pts. and the other dutes they must attend to...I can sympathyze with you because no matter how we all want skilled nurses in these facilities...we are not going to get them....GREED, people is what is running these facilities...

It does not matter WHAT we do...they will never provide us with adequate staffing (unless we all refused to work under those conditions !! ) At my facility, I have seen one RN to (up to) 45 pts. now, really, can anyone expect good pt. care with that ratio??? Administration does nothing but give you excuses....I have seen it time and time again...As long as these facilities are run by private, greedy corps, and/or ind. persons we are never going to see a change.

Specializes in Med Surg, LTC, Home Health.
they will never provide us with adequate staffing (unless we all refused to work under those conditions !! ) At my facility, I have seen one RN to (up to) 45 pts. now, really, can anyone expect good pt. care with that ratio??? Administration does nothing but give you excuses....I have seen it time and time again...As long as these facilities are run by private, greedy corps, and/or ind. persons we are never going to see a change.

Standing in unity and refusing as you stated can make the necessary changes, especially if you do it in front of the news cameras. The mystery to me is that these nurses know good and well that they are NOT going to be able to deliver adequate pt care, and yet they put their license, and the safety of their pts on the line everyday as they clock in and accept the assignment. I have been so lucky in my career that the ratios i was working didnt result in severe harm or death to my pts. I have seen it happen to other nurses, and i bet they carry around a guilt that should be on the shoulders of the administrators instead. It is a crying shame that we just cant come together and stop these atrocities.:down:

Specializes in Ante-Intra-Postpartum, Post Gyne.
You didn't need a med aide, you needed another nurse.

Just because you are busy doesn't mean the pts deserve less. We are their advocates and unlicensed people passing meds is not in their best interests.

When I was doing my rotation at a LTC they had an LVN that was assigned to medications (there were so many patients that it took him about 2 hours for each : am, noon, and pm).

Specializes in PeriOp, ICU, PICU, NICU.
I have never worked with a med-aide...but I don't think that it would be practical at all....I would not feel comfortable one bit....I have LPN's passing meds in my facility and it works out great !!!

Added tid-bit----how about CMT's??? I went to have an IVP done and two different "techs" at the hospital tried to put an IV in...no luck and I have great veins....Finally, I demanded that they find an RN or I would do it myself !!!! After waiting 20 min. for them to find one, she came and zipped it right in...I thought I was in a car garage getting repairs with all the

"certified medical technicians" around and NO NURSES !!!!

What is that all about????

It's all about money and greed.

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