Tech_2_RN

When I worked on the floor as a CNA, I would never have done these things to an RN. I read these stories all the time and I just cannot understand HOW lazy CNA's get away with this stuff. One thing I did notice when I was a floor CNA is that there is a different mentality for CNAs who are in nursing school versus those who are not. If a CNA is in nursing school, he or she will be more than willing to work hard for you because they are thinking of their future career. However, if the CNA is not in nursing school, they are only thinking of themselves and their JOB, not career. I saw this over and over on the floor. If you have any good CNAs who work hard for you, don't forget to thank them. This means alot to us after a hard day of work and should mean alot to you because a good CNA will definitely make your life easier. Just my two cents.

I too was in this same situation. It is working out for me and I have no regrets. I do want to tell you though that CNA's don't make a ton of money so spend wisely until you can get your degree and are making more money. Best wishes.

I am an ER tech and a nursing student. On this past Saturday, we had a peds patient in our department who was dx'd with rectal bleeding. The doctor collected a stool sample from the patient and handed me the Hemoccult card to test. The first thing I noticed is that there was only one smear and not the usual two smears on the front of the card. While this is surely not mandatory and the results will be the same irregardless of the number of smears, I just found it odd and thought I would mention it for this post. I tested the stool sample and it came back negative. I charted this and told the charge nurse, who had absolutely no reaction whatsoever. The CN was also the patient's nurse during his visit. When the doctor asked me about the results, I told him it was negative too. He said he found that odd because he could see visible blood in two different areas, one in the patient's pamper as well as around his orifice area. The doctor told the nurse to specifically collect samples from these two areas and test them. She did and when they came back positive, she blew a gasket....making a really big announcement in front of any and all patients and other RN's who were within earshot. She loudly yelled, "did you run the stool sample on bed xyz..to which I responded yes (even though she knew I had because I had told her the results earlier and I peeked her looking at the chart...then she makes the announcement that she had just re-run it and it was incredible high positive...to which I said well based on the stool I was given on the slide, my test results were negative..... She then talked about it all day today (and I mean ALLl day folks) and even said "yesterday, we had a misdiagnosis on a stool culture". For background, this is a VERY negative person and very seldom has anything good to say (to me anyway). She does however, seem to like the attractive fire fighters who bring in patients to our ER but unfortunately, I don't fit that mold. She has given me reason to believe that she is only a nurse there for the $$ (after 17 years) based on several of my experiences with her. Definitely, a drama queen! Now, this is where I need help. (1) Anyone familiar with Hemoccult testing knows that blood may not be evenly distributed in feces and you can get a false negative as a result of this. Can I be written up on the negative results in light of the patient was in fact positive? Also, she used blood that had obvious blood for her testing..that was not the case with my testing. (2) You have earn the respect of the more experienced nurses and I have worked hard to do so. I do the best I can for any RN I work with. By making this into such a big deal, this nurse basically was telling the other nurses and techs, that I was incompetent to a certain degree without actually saying it directly. I am fearful the more experienced nurses will not want to rely on me as much when there is no reason for this. (3) I am very bent out of shape over her behavior and how she responded to my test results. I do not want to be emotional however I found her reaction to be very embarrassing, humiliating, and unnecessary. She could have just called me to the side and discussed it with me instead of making a big deal over it. She didnt even have a reaction until the doctor said something to her. Is her behavior something that I would/shoud talk to my floor manager about or I am just being a big baby? I really dont have a problem with the message, just the delivery. Shouldn't she have just asked me to redo the test without all of this drama? Any advice and input is appreciated. Thanks.