Abusive Cna!

Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN · Mar 9, 2004

You call the state ombudsman. NOW.

allnurses Guide · Mar 9, 2004

You call the state ombudsman. NOW.

Yes, and get physically between this CNA and the patient.

steph

Dixen81 · Mar 9, 2004

How horrible! Good advice, LPN2Be2004. This cannot be allowed to continue.

jkaee · Mar 9, 2004

Like LPN2Be2004 stated, call the ombudsman or Dept. of Health right away. My advice would be not to tell anyone that you are doing it, at least not right away. You don't want to get too many people involved in this. Call them, report what you saw, and leave it at that.

I might also consider going to your instructor and informing her what you witnessed. She/He might be in a position to speak with adminstration at the NH you are at, not that that will do anything..we all know how efficient administration can be..... :imbar

I'm so sorry that your first experience with nursing and it's staff was negative. Remember that there are nurses out there that truly care for the elderly, and treat them with dignity and the respect that they deserve.

Good luck in all that you do!

Jennifer :)

heart queen · Mar 9, 2004

I have the "luxury" of being an Rn and being able to say.."you are handling my patient roughly, you need to step out of the room NOW". Then write up an incident report to the manager, after speaking in private to the CNA, alerting her to my continued actions.

being a "learning guest", you were in such a difficult situation. I'm thinking here.... :imbar , it's tough!!! the best I could come up with is "I know so and so needs you more, and I'd like to care for her myself".

This is to remove (her) from the situation, protect the patient, save face. Then finish, and report to the charge nurse, as well as instructor.

There are so many people in nursing, that not only misunderstand, but simply don't care. You've already hit the morale dilema facing us with what to do with those that shouldn't be there.

The answer is simple... keep up the paperwork, relentlessly, until they are removed. It sucks, it's tough, it's the only way to sleep at night.

Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN · Mar 9, 2004

Yeah, but until the paperwork comes through....

heart queen · Mar 9, 2004

you are so right, in that simple statement!!!! Which is why you need to find some way to get that person the hell out the room. Maybe you could suggest a better way.

But If you don't arm management with the documentation, and yes wait it out I don't know how it can be handled differently "on the floor". Sure, two people can "have it out", but only the manager is in the position to encourage change.... either behavioral... or positional :rotfl:

the waiting with blind faith is the roughest part :angryfire

Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN · Mar 9, 2004

Policy everywhere i went was suspension pending further investigation.

If that wasn't possible, then the one in quesiton was was paired up with a nurse (the on-call one) to be watched like a hawk until the paperwork was completed.

heart queen · Mar 9, 2004

It seems, as a future Lpn, that you've unfortunately been exposed to more of these situations than I have. The "2be", makes this even worse since it's usually only 18 months for an lpn program! :uhoh3: I can't even imagine what you've faced so far.

Now, I've not been in the trenches like you in nursing home type facilities, and yep, here's the But..

How many members here can say that they have turned in their GREAT FRIEND of four years to management due to unsafe practice and possibe drug use?

This took over two months of documentation on my part, to remove her from bedside... two LONG months of watching over hers plus mine until management finally had enough documentation to remove her.

This hurt us both tremendously, not to mention questionable patient care... a whole new thread in itself.. point is.. it took that long, that much for management to have an iron clad case to ensure she could not only sue us, but have no options for returning to bedside care... If the person is that bad, you need to get it right the first time.

It's tough for bedside nurses to wait out the process, not realizing that those that got through, were not exonerated, but management lacked the paperwork.

I differ in your opinion, feeling that it needs to come from the bedside to mangagement before we go all the way up.

Again, I think that you have different experiences that may show that management is a worthless venue..... which unfortunately IS in many cases. I'm lucky that mine worked, with a LOT of time and documentation... which you're right... put patients at risk meanwhile..

Not an easy answer.

Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN · Mar 9, 2004

Thing is, in the past 11 years (started working when i was 16 as a PCA, this was before most laws required the age to be 18, and all that was required was parental consent) the majority of what i've seen was pretty unbelieveable.

A lot of what happened was that a CNA (for example) was witnessed being rough and verbally abusive to a resident. So that CNA was pulled aside and informed that, yes, we saw what you did.

Then the paperwork was underway. It usually took a good week for some sort of investigation to be completed. Meanwhile, that person has had a whole week on the job as usual, possibly WITH THE SAME PT., and who's to say that they didn't just continue on abusing? Or wait till the smoke dies down? A lot can happen in a week while waiting for the paper to get shuffled.

Personally i'd have a HUGE problem with someone being accused of abusing my father going RIGHT back to my father as his "caregiver". And most people would.

It not that i didn't have any faith in management handling things, just that justice has a molassas-in-January consistancy when it came to speed. A week is way too long for paperwork when we're talking abuse.

Just frustrating. Worked with so many people who rightfully accused, wrongfully accused, go to work in a new facility and recognize 3 people working that that were fired from another job for abuse.

tmiller027 · Mar 9, 2004

Thing is, in the past 11 years (started working when i was 16 as a PCA, this was before most laws required the age to be 18, and all that was required was parental consent) the majority of what i've seen was pretty unbelieveable.
A lot of what happened was that a CNA (for example) was witnessed being rough and verbally abusive to a resident. So that CNA was pulled aside and informed that, yes, we saw what you did.
Then the paperwork was underway. It usually took a good week for some sort of investigation to be completed. Meanwhile, that person has had a whole week on the job as usual, possibly WITH THE SAME PT., and who's to say that they didn't just continue on abusing? Or wait till the smoke dies down? A lot can happen in a week while waiting for the paper to get shuffled.
Personally i'd have a HUGE problem with someone being accused of abusing my father going RIGHT back to my father as his "caregiver". And most people would.
It not that i didn't have any faith in management handling things, just that justice has a molassas-in-January consistancy when it came to speed. A week is way too long for paperwork when we're talking abuse.
Just frustrating. Worked with so many people who rightfully accused, wrongfully accused, go to work in a new facility and recognize 3 people working that that were fired from another job for abuse.

At our facility, if anyone is accused of abuse, they are immediately removed from the building and placed on suspension until the investigation is complete. The facility has 3 days to complete their investigation. If the employee is cleared, then they go back to work with full back pay. If they are found at fault, they are immediately fired and reported to the state. I've yet to see any abuse here, and so far, everyone seems to be pretty nice and caring. HOpefully it'll stay that way. I really don't want to be put in that kind of situation.