According to Sokolove Law thousands of elderly Americans are abused each year in nursing homes responsible for their care. A recent study found violations at 94% of nursing homes in the U.S. (1)
I feel it is much higher than that because I’m a C.N.A. (certified nurse’s assistant), and have been in the nursing field for almost 8 years now. Although abuse is illegal it still manages to happen more frequently and needs to be stopped.
“According to the Nursing Abuse Center Website,” there are many reasons that elderly residents in facilities suffer nursing home abuse and neglect. Nursing home workers are too often low-paid, overworked, and poorly trained. (2)
The problem still persists after many years of trying to stop the abuse of the elderly. There is so much to be done with training and overworked and underpaid employees. I think even though you might be underpaid for the amount of work you are doing is no excuse to abuse them at all. I have a no tolerance policy at my work for abuse and if you are found guilty your license is permanently taken away and you will never work in the nursing field again.
Mike Taylor is our DNS (Director of Nursing Services) at my work and he explained to me that “Under no circumstances will abuse be taken lightly. For every one person that comes to me there is about four that won’t to report suspicious allegations. So that tells me that I need to be more assertive in getting people to come to me and report what they see I can’t be everywhere at once and this facility has more eyes in the rooms and on the floor than I do. After all there is an open door policy here.” (3)
Then that means we have to tattle on each other if we see abuse going on and I should run to my supervisor and tell instead of trying to explain to that person that what they did was wrong and implement some on the job training.
I work in a nursing home and because I do I have an insight on what goes on in one at