C.N.A. in Home Health Nursing - I am supervising but kept in the dark

caliotter3 · Jul 3, 2009

I can see why the insurance company wouldn't pay for extra visits to supervise CNAs. CNAs are supposed to be competent before they are sent to people's homes. Their skills should have been learned while in CNA school. If they are that deficient, you should speak to your boss at the agency and suggest mandatory inservices at the office where these CNAs can get their act together in the presence of their employer instead of the patient/family. This could be unnerving for the patient. The agency can pay everyone involved out of their own budget, instead of relying on the insurance company to pick up the tab. Suggest a two to four hour "skills day" to have X number of CNAs checked off in the office. If time is needed for extra training or practice, that could be taken care of. When you do supervisor visits in the home, you should just have to write up the supervision as it occurs. If the CNA is acting like a do do bird, maybe removal from the field would be warranted until they decide they want to be up to par with their job. Good luck with this. I don't really think your agency is concerned with the problem.

LuLu2008 · Jul 3, 2009

I can see why the insurance company wouldn't pay for extra visits to supervise CNAs. CNAs are supposed to be competent before they are sent to people's homes. Their skills should have been learned while in CNA school. If they are that deficient, you should speak to your boss at the agency and suggest mandatory inservices at the office where these CNAs can get their act together in the presence of their employer instead of the patient/family. This could be unnerving for the patient. The agency can pay everyone involved out of their own budget, instead of relying on the insurance company to pick up the tab. Suggest a two to four hour "skills day" to have X number of CNAs checked off in the office. If time is needed for extra training or practice, that could be taken care of. When you do supervisor visits in the home, you should just have to write up the supervision as it occurs. If the CNA is acting like a do do bird, maybe removal from the field would be warranted until they decide they want to be up to par with their job. Good luck with this. I don't really think your agency is concerned with the problem.

I hear you 100% and agree! The agency is not really concerned, and I KNOW if I suggest the skills day idea I will be told to dream on.......

Ginger's Person · Jul 8, 2009

I'm a CNA, and applied for a bunch of jobs last month. One home health agency called to interview me after I submitted the shortest job app I submitted in my life... no references, no resume, no nothing. The interview consisted of the following questions:

Have you done personal cares before? (They were totally uninterested in when or where or what)

Are you willing to work for $10/hr?

Do you have access to a car and full insurance?

Do you mind doing light cleaning and cooking?

Are you sure you're really willing to work for 10$/hr??

I didn't feel remotely safe about working for that company (or very excited about working for $10/hr), so I don't. But, I was shocked to realize that's the kind of screening some CNA's go through before they're hired.

I don't know what you could do to fix the situation to keep your license and your patients safer, but if they are forced to improve their hiring process by nurses who are unwilling to supervise dangerously bad CNA's, perhaps they could find a more serious bunch of CNA's?

It sounds like a crappy situation, I hope you're able to make some change in that company.