Tag: Medical Professionals

Explore other Medical Fields as a Nursing Assistant

Employment as a Nursing Assistant offers you a unique opportunity to explore many avenues of the medical field. You will primarily be working with the patients, their families, and the Nursing staff. However, it is not uncommon that you will have interactions with many other areas including physicians, X-Ray, surgery, specialists, and emergency staff.

Since you will be working with so many types of individuals, having quality communication skills is a vital quality to have for being an effective Nursing Assistant. You will be responsible for meeting the basic needs of your patients including feedings, bathing, and dressing. They level of care with vary depending on the individual needs of the patient. In addition, you will be providing them and their family with emotional support.

Your position will involve working closely with the Nursing staff on a daily basis. This will be the medical professionals you deal with the most. From providing vitals for all patients to offering assistance with whatever comes up, the nursing staff needs to know they can rely on you. This means showing up as scheduled, completing your tasks to the best of your ability, paying attention to detail, and being willing to work as part of a time.

Depending on the type of medical facility you work in, physicians of the patients may be stopping in to check on them. They often as questions of the Nursing Assistant. For some, this is intimidating. If a physician is asking you for information on a patient, take it as a compliment. Physicians often recognize Nursing Assistants as having more one on one interactions with the patients. Therefore, things that you observe can help them with treating the patient.

For example, a doctor may prescribe a new medication. You will be able to let the physician know if the appetite of the patient has changed as well as if the patients level of being coherent has changed.

Working in the medical profession, you will be exposed to a variety of other staff from different medical fields. This is because of the changes in the needs of your patients. You may be asked to take patients to X-Rays or to help get them prepared to be moved to the surgery unit. There will be an array of specialists checking on patients, again based on the individual needs of those you are serving.

Working with emergency staff is very important. Their interactions can make all the different in some situations. It is vital that you are trained on when emergency staff should be called. You need to have detailed information of where to call, who to call, and what information to give them. This should all be secured prior to any event actually happening.

In this type of situation, you will need to work with emergency staff to provide information. Anything you can tell them about the events that occurred as well as the events before the incident took place can be of importance.

The role of a Nursing Assistant is one of many hats. You will have the opportunity to provide quality care for patients as well as be exposed to many other arenas of the medical field. The more you are able to effectively communicate with these other professionals, the better service you will be providing to those in your care.

Duties of a Nursing Assistant

Most of us are familiar with Nursing Assistants, but we dont really know all that is required for them to complete their work efficiently and of the best quality. Time restraints can often make it difficult to decide to do a job better or to get more done. Thus, having an outstanding work ethic is of the utmost importance.

Nursing Assistants must also have excellent communication skills. They are required to have interactions with patients, family members, Nurses, and a variety of other medical professionals. It is imperative that they are able to effectively reply and communication that needs to take place with these various types of individuals.

It is widely known that Nursing Assistants provide basic are for patients including feeding, bathing, and dressing. However, this is just the tip of the iceberg when you take a look at all the various duties involved in being an effective Nurse Assistant. While the specific duties will vary according to the medical facility you work for, there are some that are found in most every one.

Bathing is generally either a shower or a bed bath depending on the level of care the patient requires. Personal hygiene including combing hair, brushing teeth, applying makeup, cleaning dentures all needs to be done for each individual patient. Shaving is also to be taken into consideration, and completed as needed.

Taking patients vital signs are a daily requirement of Nursing Assistants. Taking vital signs includes temperature, pulse, respiration, and blood pressure. This information that is recorded on the patients chart, and reviewed by the Nursing staff and other medical professionals.

For patients requiring assistance with eating, the routine can take 20-60 minutes depending on the abilities of the patient and how much food they consume. The Nursing Assistant needs to document the type of food and drink consumed and the quantities of each on the patients chart. Some patients will need to take vitamins and other nutritional supplements, also the duty of the Nursing Assistant to administer.

It is also the duty of the Nursing Assistant in many medical facilities to be responsible for getting those who can feed themselves ready to be taken to the dining area. This may just be having their grooming done or helping to lift them into a wheelchair and take them to the dining area.

Nursing assistants will need to change any bedding or other soiled materials if found on the patient. This is a case by case basis and will vary each day. While interacting with the patient, you will need to document their behaviors. It is important that you notify the Nurse on duty if you see any changes that are unexpected or not generally seen. You will be trained in what to look for.

Keeping a sharp eye for details will assist any Nursing Assistant with successfully performing all duties. Caring for people changes because their needs change as well as those you are caring for changes. How quickly you are caring for new patients depends on the type of medical facility you work for.

In addition to performing all of these essential duties, Nursing Assistants are responsible for providing emotional support to patients and their families. This can be helping patients feel comfortable with their surroundings, hanging a photo on the wall for them, or helping them compose a letter. Family members may want you to certain things for a patient such as braid their hair daily or keep their fingernails short.

Disadvantages of Being a Nursing Assistant

Being a Nursing Assistant can be a very rewarding career for those who are compassionate, hardworking, and who enjoy helping others. They are a necessary part of the medical field. Often, their work goes unappreciated by others in the medical profession. There are disadvantages to being a Nursing Assistant that can lead to someone no longer enjoying their job. The Nursing Assistant profession has one of the highest turn over rates in the medical field.

Most people who become certified as a Nursing Assistant dont do it for the pay. They are interested as a way of helping others and working with other medical professionals. The low cost of the program as well as the short amount of time it takes to complete it are also big motivators to enroll in such a program.

We all like to feel appreciated, both professionally and personally. Nursing Assistants who dont feel respected and appreciated by the other medical staff quickly come to dislike their job. It can lead to feelings of inadequacy and resentment. In some cases, it can result in not performing duties to the best of your ability. In others, it can result in simply not performing the duties you dont enjoy doing.

While Nursing Assistants help keep things running smooth for everyone including patients, families, and other medical staff, they are often not paid very well. This type of position is considered entry level. The starting pay is generally a few dollars above minimum wage, but when compared to the earnings of Nursing staff, the pay is still considered to be very low.

Being a Nursing Assistant exposes you to a wide variety of patients. Meeting their needs including feeding, bathing, and dressing can often be difficult. Nursing Assistants are also required to be able to assist the Nursing staff with anything that arises during their shift. Nursing Assistants often find themselves running short on time to complete everything on the agenda for a given day.

One of the most difficult things for Nursing Assistants to deal with is the behaviors of patients. While most appreciate the help being offered, others become very angry and mean towards the Nursing Assistant. The risk of both physical and emotional abuse is very high in this profession. This can definitely take a toll of anyone.

As with any area of the medical field, Nursing Assistants are exposed to death and dying. There are times when feelings of hopelessness are felt by the Nursing Assistant as they see patients that they arent able to help as much as they would like to. While they understand that is part of the medical profession, it can still be very difficult to take.

Even the most dedicated and responsible Nursing Assistants can start to feel burnout in association with their job. This is when your job becomes so overwhelming that you lose interest in it, as well as other activities. It can be the result of working too many hours, working short staff, or a combination of other factors. Watch for the warning signs.

The decision to pursue employment as a Nursing Assistant lead to a wonderful career for you. However, it is important that you are fully aware of the disadvantages of the career choice as well. This way you can make an informed decision. You will need to ask yourself if the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. It will also help you prepare for signs of such disadvantages that you can overcome.

Sleep Disorder Affecting Shift Workers

This is a fairly common form of sleeping disorder among medical professionals, police officers, and fireman. This is attributed mostly to people who change their work schedules and sleeping times around frequently. You’ll find this often in college students when they’re changing semesters and quarters when they get new schedules and can sometimes throw sleep patterns off.

Meaning if you were used to getting up early one semester and then you get to sleep late on another it can throw your sleeping patterns off, which can make you feel disoriented and confused which is the main cause for why people get up and retire late, and are late for their jobs and classes because they’re not giving themselves enough time to adjust between schedule changes.

This is why when a job or school schedules changes it’s ideal to give yourself adequate time to make the adjustment so that it doesn’t throw you off physically, so you’re able to wake up and retire at a reasonable time so you can make it to work and school on time.

This is why it’s not always wise to constantly change your schedule whenever possible because if you do it too much you’re going to confuse yourself on whether you’re coming or going. There are some people who’s jobs switch their schedules around so much that it can throw someone completely out of synch because the hours start to get rather conflicted when they’re coming and going and not making time for other things like having a life or maintaining their priorities outside of their job and school.

This also can happen if you’re running between more than one job and school because if you’re going to a job during the day and then running to another job at night it can throw you off as well. People are advised to give themselves so much time between things in order to make the full transition into the new schedule or time frame so they’re not feeling overwhelmed and stressed out since stress can play a huge thing in work related insomnia. The stress comes from having to make so many drastic changes too fast and at one time.

This is why people get burned out quickly and dealing with the physical things like indigestion and other things because they’re pushing themselves too hard and sometimes forcing themselves to do things that isn’t even normal and is considered unhealthy.

College students who are like this tending to gain or lose weight because of the stress they’re under to switch from one thing to another and not giving themselves a chance to really adjust fully to a schedule or lifestyle change. Even people who work as nurses and doctors occasionally go through this. Because hours are rather strange, and that can throw off the pattern your body has become custom to when to rise and sleep.

If you interfere with that, it can make you feel weird which can also affect appetite and mental focus and concentration which most people deal with the disorientation of switching things around too fast.