Are There Specific Personality Traits That Make a Good Certified Nursing Assistant?
A CNA is someone that needs to care for patients, and because of this, a person with a calm, compassionate nature is typically someone who makes a good CNA. This isn’t to say that someone who is a bit more anxious or who has trouble being compassionate couldn’t possibly be a good CNA, it’s just that the profession tends to lend itself more to people who have the presence of mind to deal with difficult patients in a calm, relaxed manner that puts the patient at ease.
Think about it this way: if you are sick and in need of care, do you want someone to be helping you who has trouble empathizing with you and who is crabby and non-attentive to your needs? Of course you wouldn’t want that! What you’d probably want is a person who is calm and puts you at ease, even if you are stressed out because you’re sick and not feeling well. It’s hard for people to face this reality sometimes, but the truth is that not everyone is cut out to work in the health care industry, just like not everyone is cut out to do other jobs that require different personality traits. CNAs sometimes have to work with patients who have hygiene issues, so a good CNA should typically be someone that is able to deal with those things and help a patient remain comfortable during any type of procedure.
In addition to being an empathetic person when it comes to procedures, it’s also important for a CNA to be a good listener, and someone who can relate to patients. There may be times when a CNA may be able to help a patient by talking to them when they are upset or having a bad day, and not everyone is good at handling these types of situations, so it goes without saying that not everyone may be a good fit to become a CNA. At the end of the day, it’s important to take some time and reflect on things that you are good at in order to figure out whether or not your personality traits lend themselves well to being a CNA, and if they don’t that’s OK—it’s better to find this out early on then to choose a career that isn’t right for you, only to end up disliking it and realizing that you would’ve like doing something else better.
CNA Classes and Training: What Do They Prepare a Person For?
The entire point of a CNA classes is to prepare a student for working with patients, and also to prepare them to take the state CNA exam. This means that typically a student taking a CNA course will learn various skills and medical information that can help them with this. Each state typically has their own rules and regulations when it comes to CNA training and what is required to be taught, as well as what a student needs to know for the CNA exam. So, a person living in one state and taking classes at a specific school may learn something entirely different from a student in another state taking classes at a different school, although there may be some commonalities in the training.
For example, CNAs typically learn basic procedures like how to help patients with their hygiene needs, how to take medical measurements such as blood pressure, pulse, weight, height, body temperature, and other medical metrics or data. In addition to learning about recording medical data, a person taking a CNA class may learn medical theory such as basic anatomy and physiology, medical biology, and other related topics. They may also learn about how to handle difficult patients, and how to counsel patients when they are having a difficult day with their illness. Being a CNA isn’t just about performing meaningless tasks or repeating the same care activities with patients, it’s about making a difference in the lives of patients, and helping them to feel better while providing the care that they need, and this is one topic that may be addressed in your cna classes, depending upon where you take them of course, and the specific programs available.
As mentioned earlier, various schools may approach CNA training differently, and this may be related to the state regulations regarding CNA certifications where you live. There may be some states that may have different tiers of certification, and a CNA with a more advanced certification may be able to perform different tasks that a CNA with a lower tier certification may not be able to. This is important to understand because if you live in a state where there are different tiers of certification, you may want to spend some time considering which one you want to pursue, if any. There are many states though that only have one CNA certification and in this situation the choice of which tier to pursue isn’t there, so in that situation a person only needs to decide if becoming a CNA is something that is a good choice for them.
Online CNA Classes – Are They an Option for People?
Online classes, distance learning, internet education…whatever you want to call it, the internet has become an exceedingly popular way to learn in the past few years, in fact—some might say that it has revolutionized the education industry. Because online learning has become so popular, people interested in becoming a CNA or may have wondered if online CNA classes are available, and if so, under what circumstances.
The answer to this question is somewhat complex, and requires a bit of explanation, so let’s take a closer look at this. First of all, it’s important to understand right away that there’s no such thing as being able to take all of your CNA classes over the internet. Things just don’t work that way, because there are skills that need to be learned in person and just can’t be understood by learning over the internet. For example, learning how to help a patient with their hygiene or taking some medical measurements like blood pressure can’t be learned over the internet. There’s no state or school that allows a person to take all of their CNA classes online, and there are some states that may not allow a person to take any of their classes online. When a state does allow a person to take CNA training online, it’s only a portion of the class (sometimes part of the lecture portion) but a person will always be required to attend some in-person classes, as well as labs. Again, there’s no way for a person to take 100% of their training through online CNA classes. It’s just not possible no matter where a person lives, so it’s important to understand that.
Some people might say that this is unfair and that the internet has come a long way, so there’s no need for people to take classes in person anymore, but this would be wrong—especially when it comes to preparing and training for medical careers where there are a lot of hands-on skills that need to be learned, and another person’s health is at stake. CNA training does not typically last as long as training to be an RN or some other medical careers, so even if a person had to take all of their training in person and couldn’t do any of it online it wouldn’t be bad at all. If you’re interested in attending CNA classes online, a good thing to do would be to check with the Department of Health in your state to find out what the rules are in your area for online training, and then check with some local schools as well to find out if they are able to and do offer any online classes.
Does a Person Need to Have Good Grades to Get Into a CNA Training Program?
When the thought of a new school or training program enters a person’s mind, it may be followed by other questions like whether or not good grades are necessary when it comes to getting into a CNA training program. Well, this answer is fairly subjective because there are so many schools out there where a person can take their training, and every school has different criteria when it comes to accepting students.
Generally speaking, it’s a good idea for prospective students to have had good grades both in high school and in any other college courses that they’ve taken, but because CNA programs are usually taught at community colleges, tech schools, and sometimes even private training companies, it’s possible that they may be more lenient when it comes to grades than a 4-year university or another type of school that has more stringent requirements with respect to their admission criteria. Again, there isn’t a way to know this for sure without talking to the specific schools and finding out what their requirements are, but it may be someone safe to assume that there may be some schools that teach CNA classes that have more flexibility with their admissions standards.
With that said, there are some requirements that may related to non-academic standards (at least not to academic performance) that some schools may have that may be required by the state in which they operate. For example, many states and schools may require that a person looking to take a CNA class have a high school diploma or GED. This may be to ensure a minimum level of education among the student. There may be other requirements too that some schools might have such as students needing to have current immunizations, or passing a background check. Some of these requirements may be mandated by the state such as a background check or current immunizations. Again, this depends upon where a person lives and also the requirements set by their state.
If you’re interested in taking a CNA class, it may be a good idea to check with the Department of Health in your state and find out more about what types of requirements there are and what may need to be done to meet them. It may also be a good idea to check with some of the schools in your area to find out what their own requirements are and how they may differ from one another.