Career CNA's

[futureLVN40]

Hi, I am just curious if there is any CNA's out there that absolutely love their job and are completely content with being a CNA and don't plan on becoming a Nurse. I believe that I could be an excellent CNA because I want to work directly with the patients one on one and have that close relationship with them taking care of them on a daily basis. So I was just wondering if there's any CNA's that could share their daily duties and how they feel about being a CNA? I was thinking of becoming a CNA and staying a CNA, as I'm a Medical Assistant in Externship right now and am soooo worn out with school. I know the money is not good and CNA's really deserve to be paid more, but I just like the job itself caring for the elderly. I think it is such a rewarding career.

P.S. You're probably wondering why I want to do CNA if I'm completing my MA program. I decided I wanted to do the CNA job duties more than the MA duties, but I am glad I have the skills and experience. It also gives me an opportunity to fall back on it if I need to.

[medicaljohnny]

MA's have to go through a year of training in Houston, Texas and CNA's only 6 weeks. MA's make more and have more opportunities.

Here is my experience as a CNA:

Be prepared to be a nurse's play thing. I'll put it like that and I won't glorify it more than it should. I work in a spine, leg, and hip surgery hospital. We take catheters out a day after the surgery so people who are in agony need to walk to the restroom. You need to help them walk and not fall. A lot of times you need to hold them up. Your back hurts, you arms hurt, your legs hurt from supporting people. But mainly the back goes out on you. You bend over to apply socks or stockings because people cant raise their legs. People need to urinate once every hour or so, but some people (mainly mid to late age ladies) need to pee everything 20 minutes no joke. That really is the only hard part of the CNA job type that I have. Where everybody needs to urinate at once and they look at you with disdain for the rest of the day if you aren't there in time because you have 8 other patients you also need to attend to. Patients can be VERY needy to an unnecessary degree. Partly because of loneliness because they are in a room for 24 hours a day alone, partly because they can't get up and do things themselves. It's a mix. The good, the bad, the ugly.

If my job dictated that all of my patients had foley catheters, my job would be great. The only thing is that and the odd patient who likes to abuse you by making you do silly things they could do but just want to feel empowered, or the odd patient that signed to have the surgery but is resistant to any participating in the therapy, letting us do their vitals, etc.

If you can look past that (if you are working at a surgery hospital) then you'll do great. But keep these things in mind:

- Due to the fact you do need to go help 8 patients to the bathroom every hour, and you STILL have to do things like vitals, charting, putting equipment on, emptying various vacs, etc. you start to understand that there's only 60 minutes in an hour

- Be ready for nurses to look down on you. They make mistakes but if you do they will get you like a pack of hyenas

- Impress people. I've been at my work for 6 months and got a raise already for "outstanding work in my field"

- Always smile. Patients will say the harshest words to you. Harsher than doctors. Just the other day a lady thought she knew how to use medical equipment better than I do. Asked me how long I'd been working there. 7 months. Too low for her. The nurse came in and put the machine on exactly like I did and it was okay for her.

- Patients are there for them, not you. If you leave a room and suddenly a patient doesnt want to wear his ted hoes (blood clot prevention stockings) anymore, he will take them off. Nurse comes in, sees this, who is in trouble?

- Patients can distort the truth. The last thing I said to a patient was "Here's your call light. Call me if you need anything." The nurse went in there a few minutes later and came out with a horrid look on her face. The patient had said, "John told me I'm bothering him too much so I'll leave you guys alone." Also, I had a patient who was telling me his life story and said he had been to vietnam. A few minutes later he started having fits. When we calmed him down he had said I kept bringing up war stories that gave him PTSD and anxiety.

Just PLEASE, for goodness sake, know that videos online are not all sunshine and roses. Yes, I COULD do CNA forever. It is a VERY heartwarming feeling when a patient hugs you and thanks you for everything you've done, and surpervisors come to you and praise you for what patients have said behind your back, but there are bad apples in every apple pie. I've mainly said bad things here, but there are good aspects to this job too. Helping people who are actually grateful. If that's a feeling you'd like to have, at least give it a shot for 6 months. If it's not you, at least you found out on your own terms.

[fuzzywuzzy, CNA]

I like being a CNA. Obviously there are bad things about it (dealing with annoying people, condescending superiors, etc), but most of them are things that you'll encounter in pretty much all jobs.

I don't plan on staying a CNA for life though. I don't have family money or a husband with a good job, so the pay is pretty bad for me. My husband makes the same wage that I do. We rent an apartment, drive modest cars (no public transportation out here), have crappy phones, no designer stuff, etc. No kids either. But we live paycheck to paycheck, basically. I would like to be more financially secure. I also worry about how this job is going to affect my health long term. I like that it's more active than sitting at a desk all day, but if I'm going home with stiff muscles in my 20s, how will I feel in my 60s? A lot of lifers that I work with eventually get put on the rehab units where it's easier, but I don't want to work rehab. My favorite population to work with are the really helpless advanced dementia people that can't do anything for themselves. I get satisfaction out of doting on them and would much rather to that than deal with rehab patients and their mind games.