I am thinking about becoming an STNA so I can get some experience before I apply for a PA program or direct entry MSN. I have looked over some threads here but I cannot get a feel on exactly what dirty jobs the STNA does.
If there is poo-poo (for lack of a better term!), pee, blood, or puke on the floor, does the STNA clean it up or is there a janitor? I know this sounds really dumb but I just want to know ahead of time.
I am trying to get a feel if an STNA is more like a janitor of yucky messes or an actual assistant to a nurse (talking blood pressure, pulse etc.). Does an STNA often wield a mop?
I know STNA's change beds; what if the bed is covered in nasty stuff? Do you get to wear a bunch of protective clothing? Again, not trying to sound like a total moron here; just worried about disease prevention. Is this taken seriously on the job?
I don't mind helping people in the bathroom, bathing them, enemas, etc. (I have a strong stomach) but I have this fear that being an STNA is like being a janitor, rather than being a true medical professional.
I am thinking about becoming an STNA so I can get some experience before I apply for a PA program or direct entry MSN. I have looked over some threads here but I cannot get a feel on exactly what dirty jobs the STNA does.
If there is poo-poo (for lack of a better term!), pee, blood, or puke on the floor, does the STNA clean it up or is there a janitor? I know this sounds really dumb but I just want to know ahead of time.
I am trying to get a feel if an STNA is more like a janitor of yucky messes or an actual assistant to a nurse (talking blood pressure, pulse etc.). Does an STNA often wield a mop?
I know STNA's change beds; what if the bed is covered in nasty stuff? Do you get to wear a bunch of protective clothing? Again, not trying to sound like a total moron here; just worried about disease prevention. Is this taken seriously on the job?
I don't mind helping people in the bathroom, bathing them, enemas, etc. (I have a strong stomach) but I have this fear that being an STNA is like being a janitor, rather than being a true medical professional.
Can someone enlighten me? Thanks!
Based on your post, I'd say you are NOT meant for health care--RN or even MD. Sick people and body fluids kind of go together, you know.
Oh for crying out loud. You all are being way to harsh! This is an "outsider"..someone that has never been exposed to our daily enviornment.. ya know what we take for granted every day without a second thought. This poor person may only be able to base his/her thoughts based on what they show on TV.
There wasn't a single person in my family that had any faith at all that I would be able to deal with body fluids.. and my dirty little secret is that I still can't handle vomit after 25 years! I've known many a nurse who couldn't deal with BM, can't stand to suction someone, or one that couldn't clip a toenail without gagging..you get the drift.
You either learn to deal with it, or trade out with someone else's hangup.
Have to add my funny story regarding how people get the wrong idea related to medicine from TV shows. Back in the 80's I was a teenager working in a small Mom/Pop pharmacy. The pharmacist asked me to bring him the nitroglycerin pills so he could fill an Rx. I carefully got the bottle from the shelf and gingerly carried it with both hands towards the pharmacist. He looked at me very strangely and asked me what I was doing. In all innocence, I explained I was being careful not to drop the bottle. Again, he gave me a strange look like I was some weirdo or something.
I explained I didn't want to drop the bottle because every time the roadrunner (ya know with Bugs Bunny) got near nitroglycerin everything blew up! Took me a hell of a long time to live THAT one down.
And... who's crazy idea was it to call BM "stool"? I remember being a new nurse and hearing the term stool. My thoughts as a newbie... "I sit on a stool. Maybe I even Sh!! on the stool..but I'm going to keep calling it poop no matter what they say" With time and lots of experience, I have greatly matured as a nurse...but haven't we all?
Let's cut the OP some slack, ok? How would any of us know what BM was if we weren't introduced to the term? And if a person has never been in a health care facility for any length of time, he/she probably won't know who does what.
Here's an example (not all inclusive) of the work day of a STNA in a nursing home on the day shift. An STNA and nurse may be expected to:
Assist people out of bed
Toilet them
Help them shower/bed bath, brush teeth, comb hair
Pass out breakfast trays-monitor amounts consumed and chart
Feed people who need assistance
Ambulate people, reposition people who are chair and bed bound
may help with vital signs (depends on nurse and/or facility)
change linens, make sure rooms are neat and organized
pass water and ice
do rounds -check people who are in briefs and change if necessary, toilet those who can be toileted, you'll be looking at skin, too.
Report anything unusual to the nurse
May take resident to activities/assist with activities
pass lunch trays, assist with feeding
lay people down for naps
charting input and output (fluid taken in and urine out)
chart bowel movements (how many times, what size, firm, soft, loose)
Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
Or thrown up on your head as you were tying their shoes.
. . .or your 7 yr old son look down from the top bunk of a train cabin at 3am to tell you he's not feeling well and then proceed to hurl all over you, your bedding, hair. . eeeyup. (had to remind me, didn't ya? )
Nascar Nurse, that nitroglycerin story is hilarious, I can just imagine!!
OP, I don't think most of us feel like it's fair to judge whether or not healthcare is for them or they should work at Wal-Mart based on your questions. Lord knows we don't communicate with each other as if we were writing for publication in the New England Journal of Medicine. Best of luck!!
Or thrown up on your head as you were tying their shoes.
LOL - I roared when I read that. Never dreamed it had happened to anyone else! Only I wasn't tying his shoes, I was washing vomit off his little legs from the first round. Ah, they joys of motherhood :redbeathe
Well, here is a bit of advice to all student or want to be student CNA's, LPN.s and RN.s. Yes, "poo-poo" is part of the job. A very small part. If "poo-poo" is your main concern, then please, work at wal-mart. Do not, I mean, do not, think health care is for you. Professionals in healthcare- from CNA to RN and everything in between and beyond, do not care about "poo-poo". That is what makes us professional. I hope you never "poo-poo" yourself. Might not be pretty......
What's up with the super-critical post? I was only asking for clarification so I know what to expect. I have taken care of dying people in my family, so your post is barking up the wrong tree. The poo-poo joke at the end of your post was totally uncalled for, as well.
Let's start with the "for lack of a better term" issue....how about "stool," "BM," or "urine." I'm sorry if I'm being picky or whatever, but terms like "poo-poo" just make me cringe (to me, that's on par with calling briefs "diapers," I can't stand when people call them that!). Anyway.
If someone doesn't quite make it to the toilet fast enough, then yes, you'll have to clean it up (I would feel like a total orifice calling housekeeping to do that....I'm not *above* doing it!). Same goes for if they throw up on the floor. Absolutely your job if they mess up the bed. I find it disappointing that you'd ask, actually. Can you picture standing back watching someone else do it, or leaving a mess on the floor in a patient's room where it is, until someone can get there? The downside (at least where I am) is that I don't really have access to a mop, so I grab towels and a spray bottle of cleaner/disinfectant. If someone from housekeeping happens to be on the unit (they go throughout the hospital with their carts where they are needed and clean rooms after patients are discharged if it's past the time of doing their daily rounds), I may ask them to mop the area, but only AFTER I've done the spray/towel routine, just to have them just go over it.
The majority of excrement you'll be cleaning will be off of the patients themselves, and changing soiled linen, although over the years I've cleaned urine/stool off of just about everything....toilets (all parts...seat, bowl, handle), sinks, walls, floors, curtains, bed rails, call lights, clothing, shoes, ....dentures......
You're "disappointed I asked"? What's wrong with asking for the details of a job when you are unfamiliar with it? If someone asked me a bunch of questions about the job I have now, I would not insult them -- I would answer the questions as many have done here. Why so defensive?
I was using the term poo-poo to try to be light-hearted, not deadly serious. What's wrong with not being dead serious all the time? Geez.
Based on your post, I'd say you are NOT meant for health care--RN or even MD. Sick people and body fluids kind of go together, you know.
Btw, it's 'BM', not 'poo-poo'.
Eye am sew stoooooopid eye did not know that poo-poo is BM.
Ever heard of something called a "sense of humor"? Try looking it up. Oh, you know the sentence above? I was misspelling things on purpose. Just in case you didn't get it.
I was ASKING FOR CLARIFICATION of a field I know little about. I clean up FECES all the time -- I'm a mom. I can do a diaper with one hand and eat a sandwich with the other. Why don't you come over for dinner? I've got a sub with your name on it. That's called a joke, by the way.
The aides at the hospital I am doing clinicals at, do vitals, empty and measure the urine, turn the patients, assist with toileting, clean up a lot of vomit and stool. They do not do enemas, it's not allowed. They do the accu-checks and various other things, I can say the aides do clean up a lot of stool. Not housekeeping. The nurse does all these tasks as well, but I would say the aide does 98% of it from what I have seen. In the nursing home the aides pretty much did 100% of it where I was at.
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koi310
70 Posts
Based on your post, I'd say you are NOT meant for health care--RN or even MD. Sick people and body fluids kind of go together, you know.
Btw, it's 'BM', not 'poo-poo'.