CNA/Patient Ratios in ICUs

guest769224 · Sep 28, 2015

I work as an ICU tech and I am the only tech for 24 patients. RN's do most of the work. I help.

Creamsoda, ASN, RN · Oct 4, 2015

We have 2 CNA/PCT's in our unit which is 28 beds. They are responsible for stocking our rooms, and helping with turning and mobility and general tasks etc. They dont do anything nursing related, including vital signs or glucose checks. We do all that.

techlife72 · Oct 5, 2015

I am a tech in ICU and we have a 12 bed ICU plus a 4 bed step down unit. Typically we have a tech in the unit and a tech in step down. We are responsible for all baths, most if not all vitals, turning pts, most I&O's, stocking, assisting with dressing changes, compressions during codes, and any other thing that we are legally allowed to do. The only time we don't get vitals on patients are if they are nursing 1:1's. Nursing 1:1's are usually CRRT's, Hypothermia induced pts, pts with balloon pumps (sometimes), or just really really sick patients (like we had a pt code 8 times in one night, he became a nursing 1:1 after the 3rd code). There are other patients who are nursing 1:1's, but I am drawing a blank.

guest769224 · Oct 5, 2015

I am a tech in ICU and we have a 12 bed ICU plus a 4 bed step down unit. We are responsible for all baths, most if not all vitals, turning pts, most I&O's, stocking, assisting with dressing changes, compressions during codes, and any other thing that we are legally allowed to do. The only time we don't get vitals on patients are if they are nursing 1:1's.

I don't see how a tech can get Q2 hour vitals on all 12 patients and be the one responsible for that. That would take way too much time. I also don't see how you could bathe and turn patients on your own...nurse usually has to be at bedside for deep suction, skin assessments and to save your back.

MurseJJ · Oct 6, 2015

I'm a float NA at a major NYC hospital. Generally the ICUs will have one NA/tech per unit (I'd say each has about 15-18 patients). We help out with turns, cleaning/toileting patients, stocking, inventory, and techs also do EKGs and finger sticks. We have two MICUs and two CCUs (each right next to each other), and if we're short staffed, there can be one NA/tech between the two, and you can spend half your shift in each, or just go back and forth between the two. We also have two CTICUs but they always seem to be appropriately staffed, haha. It's really not that bad, much better than doing vitals on 20 patients on the med/surg floors and frantically trying to answer call bells.

techlife72 · Oct 7, 2015

All of our pts are on monitors that are in the rooms. I set my monitors up to take bps every hour or every two hours or sometimes more frequently in certain situations. The pts mostly all have rectal probes or temperature sensing catheters. And they are all of course hooked up to tele and an SPO2 finger sensor. I go into all of my rooms and look at the vitals, compare them to previous vitals, and make sure nothing is out of wack. As soon as our vitals take they transfer over to the Unit Clerks desk as well. It takes me about 10-20 minutes to take vitals on all of my patients. Between the UC, the Nurse, and the tech the pts vitals should be reviewed at least three times every two hours. Granted not every tech is trusted to handle all vitals on every patient. It is usually left up to the discretion of the nurse. If someone is on TPA it usually takes two of us working together to get all of the vitals we need. When doing baths I usually do as much as I can by myself and then have the nurse come in and help me roll the pt and change the sheets. As for the turning we have beds that turn our pts every 15 minutes.

Nurse Joy :-) · Oct 8, 2015

Texas - 20 bed MICU, 1-2 techs per shift, sometimes there aren't any techs. All our patients are on monitors and the vitals transfer to our charts automatically. We have our charge nurse, rapid response, and our co-nurses to use as resources/extra hands if we need help.

Trauma_drama14, BSN, MSN, RN, APRN, NP · Oct 9, 2015

Level 1 Trauma Center- 23 bed SICU. There is 1 PCT (sometimes) for the unit and 1 HUC that for MICU/SICU. PCTs mostly do like stocking and what not, we all do our own patient care. All of our patients are monitored and vitals can be automatically downloaded into our charting.

elkpark · Oct 9, 2015

In my limited experience (a few different ICUs in a few different hospitals), there haven't been any CNAs in the ICU, just RNs doing total care.

CamillusRN, BSN · Oct 22, 2015

My CVICU follows the model that elkpark has experienced - no techs, just total care by RN's.