About CNA Nursing Home Duties

A certified nursing assistant (CNA) who works in a nursing home reports directly to the registered nurse. The CNA is responsible for a patient's personal needs care and guides the patient through activities of daily living. The CNA is an integral part of the patient care team and must be a compassionate and caring individual who makes life for an elderly patient as pleasant and livable as can be expected.

Nursing Home Duties of a CNA

• Provides personal care including bathing, feeding and assisting the patient in moving from bed to wheelchair or helps with walking and other activities of daily living.


• Empties bed pans, changes bed linen and tidies patient's room.


• Records and measures vital signs.


• Measures height and weight, fluid intake and output.


• Dispenses water, injections and medications as directed by the facility's physician or nurse.


• Gives patient condition feedback to the registered nurse or physician.


• Aids and supervises patient exercise program.


• Cleans and bandages wounds.


• Offers therapeutic therapies and massages as required.


• Awareness of infection control practices in the nursing home.


• Utilizes infection control method practices at all times.

Other Personal Needs Duties

• May be called upon to read or write data for the geriatric patients.


• Provide emotional support for patient and family members when they visit.


• Maintain the confidentiality of the patient's status.


• Bond with the patient and help to ease the assigned patient's mental and emotional experience.


• Always respect the patient's rights.


• Recognize a patient's religious and cultural leanings.


• Be compassionate at all times.


• Remember that the client is a vulnerable elderly patient.


• Transport a wheelchair patient onto the grounds outside, if permitted to do so, if that is what the patient enjoys most.


• Have conversations with the elderly patient if there is downtime and the patient would like to discuss events of the day or what is going on in the world. That helps the brain cells and thinking process of an elderly person, even if it does not make sense to you the CNA.