CNAS behind Nurses Station more than nurse

tmiller027 · Jan 1, 2005

And the nurse has access to this info, and if a CNA needs to know something, either the nurses should tell them, or the CNAs should ask.

Unfortunately, some of our nurses view themselves as the sacred keyholders of information. You ask th em something and you get a "why do you want to know? What does that have to do with anything?" and so on. We've had patients with MRSA and all kinds of other stuff that no one knew about until AFTER a CNA ended up cleaning up a big mess of urine or feces...then one of the nurses might say "Oh, you might want to wash that off, she has MRSA...oh, you mean you didn't know?"

Not all of them do this, most are decetn abuot getting us info, but a few act like we are lucky to even know the patients names :rolleyes:

tmiller027 · Jan 1, 2005

I should also add that at my facility, we are not allowed behind the nurses station at all. For our charting, I ussually sit in one of the recliners on the unit...much more comfy :)

foxfire65 · Jan 2, 2005

I work in a LTC facility. The CNA's are sitting behind the nurse's station more than the nurses. We don't even have enough room to sit down and chart! I have had to ask them to move on several occasions (more than I care to count). :angryfire
Are there regulations about who is allowed behind a nurse's station? If so, would someone please show me where to find it????

I was a Nurse assistant for many years in a hospital. I think the Nurse assistants are getting a bad rap in this forum. There alot of darn great aides in the medical field. With any job there are bad people in every job classification, including nurses. You can tell a good nurse from a bad nurse as a nurse assistant. We all work together as a team. That is what makes patient care run smoothly. You have to work as a team in order to provide good, quality care to the patients. They are the reason we are all there anyhow. I am a nursing student now, making high grades and hope to complete my education in December 2007. I am glad I have many years experience as a nurse assistant, it will help me to become a better nurse. As for being behind the nurse's station, in the hospitals there is just a station where many medical personnel share. It was in our job catagory to go there and get supplies such as glucose monitor's and so forth. We were never allowed to hang out there, we were much too busy for that. Take care and happy new year.

foxfire65 · Jan 2, 2005

I work in a ER...Busy ER usually. I am a 'er technician II' ...paramedic...Most of the staff I work with are wonderfull...I love them and get along with them all great...but I find that there are a couple RNs that work on my shifts that are just plain LAZY. It is very sad to see it. The one does not have to get out of her chair unless a medication is being given--if its something i can push in the field, them the doc will let me do so... I do the IV, lab work, EKG, get the urine spec., everything...Now its one thing if we are super busy..but this would be her only patient and she still does it...I have 17 rooms to deal with on my own as a tech...mind u , we have no transport..thats me...so my job is pretty much non stop from the time i clock in. Most of the time the patients think I am the nurse. (nope, your nurse is at the desk "charting" and eating dinner ) I feel over worked and pulled in about 20 different directions at work when i work with this lazy shift. Its awful. I have went twice to managment. Nothing is done. I love my job. don't get me wrong, but things would be so much easier if everyone did their job equally. It is a sad situation. What makes me the most mad is when she will come outside and hunt me down while i am on a smoke break.

Amen to that! I hear you on the nurses hanging out in the nurse's station. I have worked at 3 hospitals and each one had it's fair share of lazy nurses. They barely spent any time with their patients, because they were too busy in the nurses station talking amongst themselves. I have noticed in the last few years more and more of those kind of nurses. If you tell them a patient is in pain, or needs something from their nurse, whoa watch out if you interupt their down time. Some of those nurses cannot be bothered with a request from a patient. It's incredible. I am a student nurse, and vow never to become one of those kind. There are some really awesome nurses out there, most of them are awesome, but then there are the lazy ones too. A former Nurse assistant I know exactly what you speak about, when you say they are in the nurses station eating dinner and charting.

germain · Jan 2, 2005

Well, I have to say its very discouraging reading rant after rant about CNA's. I understand that there are lazy aides, but there are good ones too, only they don't work in your facility because they get paid SO POORLY or teh politics are so thick. Only the worst of the worst stick around, at least thats the way it was in the two homes I've worked at years ago.

I've been an aide for 11 years now first in SNF's then homecare and now in a great hospital. Lazy aides aside, being an aide is hard work that gets 0 respect and pays very poorly, for most anyway. There is no way to advance, little praise, and it can be very repedative. McNursing homes staff with an absolute minimum number of aides, good work is almost impossible to do. I busted *** every day I worked at the SNF I worked at, and went home every night knowing I had cut every corner of the cloth to make it.

I have to say that until I decided to go to nursing school and got a job in a hospital, I was bored with my job. It was a Nurse at a SNF that helped me decide, because she shared with me information about patients and their care beyond "clean this ****** diaper" Good aides are experienced aides and experience comes from information. Knowing a patients history and diagnosis helps me so much when I go into room to anticipate needs and organize my day. Also, as patient have become so much sicker than they were even 10 years ago, aides are being asked to do more and more just like nurses are.

Anyway, its true that not all of your aides are that interested, and some of them are just awful,but if there is one you can take under your wing do so. We need aides, just like we need nurses.

Finally I think you should all try praise to get your aides to work. I dont' mean to be pollyanna, but its worth testing out "you did a good job today" as positive reinforcement- that is if they occasionally do a good job.

Strength to all you LTC nurses!

Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN · Jan 2, 2005

Almost every post i've seen in regards to NAs or CNAs say something along the lines of "there are good ones and there are bad ones" and then the same things are said about nurses as well. It's a fact of life, not a bad rap.

The "rant after rant about CNAs" that someone else is refering to, are rants about bad ones, if you notice, and is not including ALL under a bad label.

lovingtheunloved, ASN, RN · Jan 2, 2005

Actually, there's a lot of posts in various places singing the praises of good CNAs. There are also posts about horrible nurses. I haven't seen any CNA bashing. Most nurses are smart enough to know (especially in LTC) that they couldn't do their jobs without good CNAs. And that bad ones jeapordize their licences. I don't know. Maybe I just work with awesome people.

matty23 · Jan 2, 2005

Hello everyone :) Just a few more things to add...one of the two nurses I referred to in my earlier post about just being plain lazy, was even in triage one night painting her toenails! I am so not kidding around when I say this. I don't understand this at all. I am not knocking her skills as a nurse, but we had a AMI and were landing a bird to fly out a bleed and she is sitting on her *** painting her toes! Any pther RN would come back and help out doing whatever if we are that busy.... The other nurse, is the sweetest person in the world and would give her shirt off her back to you if you needed it, but she is nothing but a traffic director...(her nickname) She has her special corner she sits at the desk, even when she is in triage on her nights, she will come back to the ER and still try to order everyone around. I just want to throw my arms in the air and go nuts sometimes when i work with these two. My job is hectic enough, then put me with them and I want to pull out my hair. My fellow co-workers feel the same way, as do the ERPs. I know it doesn't make sense "how can a ER RN not be busy in a ER ?" But when you get an ambulance backing in one after another, somehow, they find time to dissapear and take a very long bathroom break...I am looking into the paramedic bridge program to RN , and I have sworn to myself to NEVER ever be like this...it is truely pathetic...( sorry, had to vent...just got home from work...lol...)

vanurse1968 · Jan 3, 2005

CNA's are not expected to stand and chart. Several CNAs that work on different halls chart in the dayroom. Whatever information they need to know will be provided to them by licensed personnel. If the resident has a contagious dz, we will let them know. If a new resident has been known to become violent, we will let them know. But information such as family contact, lab results, nurses notes, physician's notes, MAR, pt. history, etc. should be of no concern of a CNA. Why should it be? It is not their responsiblity to contact family, give meds or transcribe orders. As far as responsibilities go, the hall I work on is my responsibility because I am the CHARGE nurse. If anything happens...management discusses it with me (or chews on my butt), not the CNAs. I have some excellent CNAs and then I have not so great CNA's. After doing a little filtering, I have what I need to run an efficient hall with happy residents.

Well, I disagree that HIPAA is a reason for them not sitting at the nurses' station. What information do they NOT Have a right to know about the resident? Anything that affects the resident potentially affects their care and how it is delivered, so it seems to me that everyone on the healthcare team needs to know. CNAs generally have more contact with the residents than anyone else.
I firmly believe that as long as the work is being done and residents are well cared for, the CNAs have a right to sit down...don't they have ADL flowsheets or some sort of charting to do themselves? I do think that everyone should be respectful of the fact that the nurses need a place to do their charting, make phone calls, etc so that if a nurse needs the space at the nurses' station, it should be made available to her. One of the best LTCs I ever wored in had "mini-stations" all over the building...they were flip down tables where the CNAs (or anyone else) could take their ADL books or charts and sit down and do whatever they needed to do...they were positioned throughout the buiding between rooms, near the nurses' station, etc.
I've found that if you treat the CNAs you work with respect, most of them will do anything you ask them to do. There are always a few bad apples that are going to slack off and buck the system, but I've never found them to be the norm.