Degree Programs

Job Titles
Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA)

Occupation Description
A CNA provides personal and direct care services to patients in assisted living facilities, nursing homes, and hospitals. They perform duties that utilize specific knowledge in personal care skills, nutrition, safety, infection control, and emergency care to provide as positive an experience for the patient as possible.

Specific Work Activities

• Administer medications and treatments, such as catheterizations, suppositories, irrigations, enemas, massages, and douches, as directed by a physician or nurse.
• Answer patients' call signals.
• Bathe, groom, shave, dress, and/or drape patients to prepare them for surgery, treatment, or examination.
• Clean rooms and change linens.
• Feed patients who are unable to feed themselves.
• Prepare, serve, and collect food trays.
• Provide patient care by supplying and emptying bed pans, applying dressings and supervising exercise routines.
• Provide patients with help walking, exercising, and moving in and out of bed.
• Transport patients to treatment units, using a wheelchair or stretcher.
• Turn and re-position bedridden patients, alone or with assistance, to prevent bedsores.
• Work as part of a medical team that examines and treats clinic outpatients.
• Answer phones and direct visitors.
• Collect specimens such as urine, feces, or sputum.
• Deliver messages, documents and specimens.
• Explain medical instructions to patients and family members.
• Maintain inventory by storing, preparing, sterilizing, and issuing supplies such as dressing packs and treatment trays.
• Observe patients' conditions, measuring and recording food and liquid intake and output and vital signs, and report changes to professional staff.
• Perform clerical duties such as processing documents and scheduling appointments.
• Restrain patients if necessary.
• Set up equipment such as oxygen tents, portable x-ray machines, and overhead irrigation bottles.

• Have a high level of social contact with other medical personnel and patients.
• Sometimes deal with unpleasant, discourteous, or angry people.
• Deal directly with patients.
• On occasion are placed in conflict situations.
• Are directly responsible for patient well-being.

• Are sometimes exposed to disease or infections when interacting with patients.
• Occasionally are exposed to distracting noises from medical equipment.
• Always work indoors.
• Some lifting of patients out of beds and wheelchairs is necessary.

• Must be sure that all details of the job are done and their work is exact.
• Repeat some physical activities routinely

• May work part or full time

Major Employers
Hospitals
Assisted Living Facilities
Nursing Home