Trying to avoid undesirable CNA duties

[girtenbt]

Does anybody know of any CNA jobs where you don't have to wash the patients or or wipe butts? Also I'm a sophomore BSN student with an associates in engineering and 6 months volunteer work at a hospital and worked in plant engineering at another hospital. Might any of this helps with job oppertunities where I don't have to wipe or wash people?

[Poi Dog]

I do not think anyone was trying to be "mean" to the OP but think about it, this is the CNA forum. We spend 99.1% of our CNA days performing personal care on residents.

[mariamsally]

Ummmm,

Maybe you should look for another line of work, please. The world does not need any nurses/cna's like you.

You are not above caring for a fellow human being, and I could-not-care-less what kind of program, or work you have done. You are NOT entitled to shirk some duties because you think you are better than everyone else who may not be in a BSN program, or was an engineer, or whatever. I couldn't care less if you were the Queen of England

I could imagine you will be the kind of nurse who will look down on your cna's. Please, do us a favor, find another line of work. Oh, and by the way, the nurses where I work help clean butts. All the time. You will be doing worse things than that as a nurse.

Nursing is about caring. I was just accepted to a prestigious BSN program, and have been working as a CNA. Just because I'm in a BSN program does not mean anything is beneath me. Guess what? I clean butts. I love caring for my residents. The care and concern you give for a fellow human being comes back to you ten fold and more.

I cannot begin to tell you how angry your post made me.

I also do oral care, fingernails, etc. etc. It is called care -

[ChicagoPeds]

Hi. I am going to have to agree with another RN who was saying to just do it - over exposure to that particular task may eventually give you "immunity" to it...hehehe. When I was a nurse extern, I had to take care of 3 kiddos who were all on contact, all CP, & all trached...for a couple of shifts in a row. I no longer had any problems with the really, really poopy diapers, trachs were a breeze (could do the care & suctioning in my sleep), and turning those Pt's heavier than me & dead weight became an artform.... Oh yeah, and wearing a mask & breathing through your mouth helps as well.

As others have also already said, everyone poops & it is actually part of what nurses do... assess all of our Pt's. Also, once you become a nurse & may have help taking care of Pts, you will also see that not every level of health care assistants worry about skin breakdown (read: Pt left in dirty/wet/soiled diaper for way too long...).

[DolceVita, ADN, BSN, RN]

I think mucus is MUCH worse than poop and pee. Try checking out a volcanic trach.

[westmar]

This is and always will be a sore spot with me. I completely agree with mariamsally

[CrazierThanYou]

Ummmm,

I could imagine you will be the kind of nurse who will look down on your cna's. Please, do us a favor, find another line of work.

I was thinking the exact same thing...

[Music in My Heart]

I haven't seen a response yet from the OP but here's my take on it...

Career changer going for a BSN and hoping to never wipe a butt. Let me guess, another person looking for the CRNA dollar signs.

I don't much like wiping butts either but I do what I need to... not out of a sense of altruism or even compassion, really, but simply because it's part-and-parcel of the job. I was down visiting in the ER the other day (hoping to get cross-trained) and lo-and-behold, somebody had a big BM. All the staff was already hopping so I just took care of it.

I figure that by doing what needs doing, whatever it is, I'm much more likely to be welcome back. People notice who's willing to do the dirty work and who's not.

[Hospice Nurse LPN, BSN, RN]

Ummmm,

Maybe you should look for another line of work, please. The world does not need any nurses/cna's like you.

You are not above caring for a fellow human being, and I could-not-care-less what kind of program, or work you have done. You are NOT entitled to shirk some duties because you think you are better than everyone else who may not be in a BSN program, or was an engineer, or whatever. I couldn't care less if you were the Queen of England

I could imagine you will be the kind of nurse who will look down on your cna's. Please, do us a favor, find another line of work. Oh, and by the way, the nurses where I work help clean butts. All the time. You will be doing worse things than that as a nurse.

Nursing is about caring. I was just accepted to a prestigious BSN program, and have been working as a CNA. Just because I'm in a BSN program does not mean anything is beneath me. Guess what? I clean butts. I love caring for my residents. The care and concern you give for a fellow human being comes back to you ten fold and more.

I cannot begin to tell you how angry your post made me.

I also do oral care, fingernails, etc. etc. It is called care -

mariamsally, I want to work with you!

[PhoenixTech, LPN]

i don't see how the op is lazy just because she's reluctant to the tasks she mentioned. it's not everyone's cup of tea, and calling her lazy just because of her preference is rude.

op, those things are a big part of a cna's duties. i really don't see how you get around it. i highly, highly recommend taking a cna course before you apply for nursing schools. that's what i did and i'm very thankful as it made me realize that i won't be furthering my education in nursing.

because once the op graduates and becomes an rn, she will be the type to sit behind the desk and wait for the cna/pct's to finish cleaning their third, massive, blowout code brown so that the cna/pct can go do 'their job', even though it's her patient also. no matter how long the cna/pct is taking assisting someone else and no matter how long her patient sits in it, she will not go near the room because......"does anybody know of any cna jobs where you don't have to wash the patients or or wipe butts? also i'm a sophomore bsn student with an associates in engineering and 6 months volunteer work at a hospital and worked in plant engineering at another hospital. might any of this helps with job oppertunities where i don't have to wipe or wash people?"

i've seen this repeatedly and it always puts an added stressor on me because now i'm seeing/hearing this patient sitting there talking about how lazy i am since i'm taking 'so long to come clean her/him'.

[WanderingSagehen]

There is nothing better than knowing a patient is freshly bathed. Your fears might be that you haven't learned the techniques to make it bearable or even enjoyable. The CNA's have all the practical know how for the gross stuff. Let's all hope to make friends with the CNA's and learn how to do our jobs well.

[Music in My Heart]

There is nothing better than knowing a patient is freshly bathed.

I can think of quite a few...

Noticing an error in the orders BEFORE it gets to the patient.

Noticing that the pt is crumping, calling the doc, and getting a pat on the back as the helo is flying 'em off to the specialist.

Having a patient say "thank you" after the 4th time in 20 minutes that I've gowned up to enter the iso room to troubleshoot a finicky IV... or after I stand there for 15 minutes holding traction on the catheter so that the infusion can finish before the patient has to get stuck again.

As I said, bathing and toileting are among my least favorite tasks... I'd be just as happy to go the rest of my life without seeing another person's poop again. It is, however, part of the job and an important one at that.

[ldybug84]

A nurse is not above "butt wiping" work. I worked at a hospital where a dr asked the nurse to help clean up a patient, the nurse responded " Let me get the PCT" the dr said " Uhh no, you and I can do it, we are not above patient care" I thought that was sooo awesome!!