TheCellist

As a CNA, I would not be comfortable dishing out meds on my own. I worked at a nursing home very briefly where they would only use medication assistants if the nurses were short staffed or something came up where they were swamped with other work. They allowed some of the CNAs with their MA cert to jump in impromptu in those instances. Now that I've been on a geriatric psych unit, the meds are only accessible with a nurse's badge and we do not employ MAs. Nurses are the only ones who give out meds, except in rare instances where confused patients are not responding well to the nurse/think the nurse is someone they knew and didn't like, etc. In that case, the nurse let's one of us try (oral meds only) while the nurse is standing right there. I'll venture a guess to say this has a lot to do with individual state legislation more than individual facility policies. If anyone knows specifics on that please correct me.