a rant to my fellow aides

fuzzywuzzy, CNA · Mar 15, 2010

I don't think 3rd shift should have to get anyone up. Washed and dressed, definitely, but not up. Honestly I do get annoyed when 3rd doesn't do a single person. I don't expect them to drag anyone out of bed but dressing a few people and leaving them in bed is a huge help. Our breakfast trays come up between 7:10 and 7:15, which leaves my partner and I 15 minutes at the most to get up 16 people and nearly all of them are 2-assists (and believe me the supervisors start riding your butt to pass the trays as SOON as they appear). If no one is dressed, then by the time breakfast is done that leaves us very little time to get our AM care, our snacks passed, and our next toilet round done.

If you are truly required to get 6 people up in their chairs then why not do the care early on and then pop them up at the last minute? That's totally ridiculous to force people out of bed at 2 in the morning and leave them sitting there for such a long time. No wonder the residents all want to go to bed so early.

One Flew Over · Mar 15, 2010

2am?! Either that's an exaggeration or it sounds like the state or management or someone! needs to be notified.. If somebody was dragging my grandmother out of bed at that hour, I would be raising heck like you'd never believe! That's absolutely ridiculous

NM nurse to be · Mar 15, 2010

Unfortunately, it's not at all an exaggeration Management knows, it's only an issue if they are forced to pay attention to it. Don't ask, don't tell, ya know? If someone complains, they get all puffed up, why are you night people getting them up, everyone's suspended... blah blah blah. And the next minute, here's six different ones who don't have family, can't complain. Get these up instead. I am not long lived at this place for a number of reasons, poor admin is high among them.

I do my am cares, dresses and last round, then pop everyone in their chairs. It is doable. But it is NOT doable to get up 15 people before 6a without starting at 2 or earlier. Six gets ups is what's required. Running scared of being fired and doing everying unsafely and half a$$ is what I just won't do. I do what I know is right and if that doesn't fit with what management actually expects, then this isn't the place for me.

I do hope there are better out there though, it's more than a little depressing to be in nursing school and only hear how horrible everything is everywhere. I can't believe that everything is as bad as this place gets though.

CalledtoCare · Mar 15, 2010

We start at 5 getting up about 12+ up between 2 of us. It's hard, but doable. One thing I have found is that I try to get the ones that can do some oral/grooming care independently first and park them in front of the sink while I move on to their room mate/the next room. It takes a few extra minutes, but I always get some of the first ones up a cup of coffee or juice so that they don't have to sit for 2 hours just waiting. I don't really care if the morning crew gets mad at me. I will do complete care as quickly as I can, but I will not compromise a resident's safety or rights to do it. It is illegal and it violates a resident's rights to force them to get out of bed without a doctor's order. Tell the morning crew you refuse to get your certification taken away/get in legal trouble because they don't want to deal with it. Tell your nurse about the resident's refusal to get up. Document it and the nurse should also chart it and tell the morning nurse about it. Just cover your butt the best you can and do not ever compromise your resident's care for the sake of saving another shift some time.

NM_CNA · Apr 3, 2010

It IS possible to get them all up without having to start at 2 am. Our night shift is required to get 14-18 people up. They leave the hardest ones down for us. Night shift gets paid more, they just do bed checks at night. We come in, have to get people up, feed right away, then have two hours to toilet 20 people, do 5-6 showers, get most of them stripped, laid down, then have to get them up for lunch, do peri, redress them. I don't see why night shift shouldn't get people up.

TampaTech · Apr 3, 2010

NIght shift doesnt just do bed checks atleast in the hospital. This is another example of someone who is ignorant about things and opens their mouths and spews garbage everywhere before truley getting their facts.

Selphie · Apr 3, 2010

Nightshift is required to do a lot of tasks where I work in addition to bed checks. They clean out the shower rooms (I'm not talking a simple spray down and wiping...I mean wiping down the walls and all), straighten up closets and clean out bedside tables for hoarded food and other "surprises", wash down the wheelchairs and geri-chairs, clean the lifts and vital machines, charge the vital machines and the batteries in the fb and sit-to-stand lifts, mop the floors in the residents' rooms and clean the slip guards, clean out the refrigerator in the breakroom and also the one in the fine-dining hall, clean fine-dining's microwave, and clean out the breakroom ...basically housekeeping. They do this in addition to bed checks, dressing residents, and getting over 20 up. There are 76 residents and 3 CNAs. After being mandated from second to third all these years, I appreciate what 3rd shift does.

NM_CNA · Apr 3, 2010

Where I work, they just do bed checks (some of them do, at least) and get some people up. I wish our facility would have them do other tasks. The ones you mentioned, such as cleaning the shower rooms, microwaves, and wheel chairs, scrubbing lifts and organizing rooms and closets- fall to day and evening shifts. Actually, mostly day shift has to do it all. We frequently come in and see that night shift has been doing crossword puzzles, playing cards, and listening to music all night. I thought most facilities had similar set-ups. Apparently ours is just crappier.

CoffeemateCNA · Apr 3, 2010

I'm not saying that all night shift people are good, and not all are bad. It's just like any other shift. Some people choose to do their work, some don't. I have worked places where night shift brought a stack of DVDs to watch every night while leaving residents soaked so bad that urine was dripping off the beds until puddles. BUT I have also worked at places where the night shift people are AMAZING and bust their behinds to make sure everything is done and done properly. I deeply admire those people.

Sometimes night shift is slow. It is a fact. But there are other times when you can hardly keep up. More than once I've had confused ladies wake up at 0100a and start singing songs like "Mary Had a Little Lamb" so loudly that they wake up every other resident on the unit. Everyone is then on their call lights every 5 minutes needing anything and everything.

NM_CNA · Apr 3, 2010

What do you guys do when you see that other aides aren't doing their jobs? There are four aides that work our night shift here that NEVER bed check residents. As a result most of them are experiencing break down. These particular aides have also removed certain resident's call lights out of the wall enough for them not to work, but they are kept in far enough to where the alarm doesn't go off. Several of us report this (almost daily) to the nurses, but nothing is ever done. A very sweet resident of ours has been exhausted a lot during the day, so I questioned him about it. He told me that the night shift aides have been sitting in his room during the night and watching his roommate's TV. They have also been getting him up and dressed around 2-3 AM. I told him that all he should have to do is request to be left in bed longer, but the resident told me that he'd rather get up than be left with wet pads all night.

I went straight to my supervisor and detailed all of this to him. Nothing happened. It's been a month of reporting all of these things to different people and I have no idea what to do. These aides are friends with a lot of the nurses. The DON won't follow up on any of it either, the administrator just tells me to tell my nurse. We've had a lot of people quit this month because of it. Who do I contact that will do something about it?

Poi Dog · Apr 3, 2010

What do you guys do when you see that other aides aren't doing their jobs? There are four aides that work our night shift here that NEVER bed check residents. As a result most of them are experiencing break down. These particular aides have also removed certain resident's call lights out of the wall enough for them not to work, but they are kept in far enough to where the alarm doesn't go off. Several of us report this (almost daily) to the nurses, but nothing is ever done. A very sweet resident of ours has been exhausted a lot during the day, so I questioned him about it. He told me that the night shift aides have been sitting in his room during the night and watching his roommate's TV. They have also been getting him up and dressed around 2-3 AM. I told him that all he should have to do is request to be left in bed longer, but the resident told me that he'd rather get up than be left with wet pads all night.
I went straight to my supervisor and detailed all of this to him. Nothing happened. It's been a month of reporting all of these things to different people and I have no idea what to do. These aides are friends with a lot of the nurses. The DON won't follow up on any of it either, the administrator just tells me to tell my nurse. We've had a lot of people quit this month because of it. Who do I contact that will do something about it?

Reading that just fried me :mad: :mad: That is so wrong!

I think that you would contact your local ombudsman but I am not sure if that's the way to go.