CNA ACUTE CARE PROGRAM
Precision in Acute Care: Shaping CNAs for Specialized Patient Support.
The focus is on the care of the patient in the acute care hospital setting. This course consists of theory and supervised clinical experience in an acute care facility. This is 80 hours acute care training which consist of 40 hours classroom instruction and 40 hours clinical hospital experience. The program is designed to prepare students who are Certified Nurse Assistants for employment in an acute care facility as Acute Care Nurse Assistants. The competency-based curriculum provides a review of nursing assistant skills with emphasis placed on specialized acute care areas such as medical, surgical, orthopedic, pediatric, and obstetrical units. The training incorporates the concepts of safety and preventing complications, communicating patient responses to the nurse, and documenting/recording outcomes of patient care.
This course includes both classroom instruction and clinical practice. At the completion of the course, students will demonstrate knowledge of skills required to assist the nurse in providing nursing care and service to the patient in an acute care setting. Basic academic, communication, interpersonal, and problem-solving skills are reinforced throughout the course. This course uses the nursing process to understand the care of adults and their families during health and illness. Principles of nursing care for adults experiencing and adapting to health deviations in the following areas are covered: cardiovascular, respiratory, urinary, endocrine, and hematologic.
By the end of the course, the CNA will be able to: identify from the scenarios and lists, normal and abnormal patterns and changes in findings related to patient. Patient descriptors include: mental status (orientation, psychosocial responses, and level of consciousness), vital signs, mobility, skin, pain level, bowel and bladder function, appetite, and activities of daily living; and articulate rationale(s) for action given in various clinical scenarios and situation.
By the end of the course the CNA will be able to identify findings, patterns, habits, and behaviors that deviate from normal in acute care patients; report and record abnormal findings, patterns, habits, and behaviors of acute care patients; and notify the RN regarding all abnormal findings in a timely manner.
