LNA Licensing at River Bend

The Health Science class at Riverbend Career and technical center helps students become a Licensed Nursing Assistant (LNA). When we started the class we would have three days that were LNA days, which was Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The other two days we practiced our Medical Terminology. For the LNA class we got two books. One book was a textbook where we had to read and highlight anything that was important to know. There was chapter review questions and we had to answer all of them after each chapter. There are 28 chapters in the LNA book. The other book we got was a LNA workbook and it had chapters as well but instead of reading and then answering questions after it’s a book full of question that will help us with the state test.

By the time we had finished our books, we had developed many different skills such as the proper way to wash hands, feeding a patient who can’t feed themselves, and providing assistance for daily tasks that residents would need help with. We practiced those on the days we originally had the LNA days. During all of this we would still have the medical terminology the other two days plus our regular school work. After we finished reading the books and practicing our skills, we started talking and planning for our clinicals, which we started in the beginning of April. Clinicals are when LNA students go to a nursing home and shadow an LNA and help take care of the residents that are there.

Over a total of five shifts, we have been going to Grafton County nursing home every Monday and Wednesday from 12pm-8pm. Doing this is a lot of work and you have to be able to handle taking care of others and coming out of your comfort zone. It can also be very stressful but when you finish everything you will be proud of yourself and doing something good by helping others.