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Catheter Care CNA Skill

It’s quite likely that you will deal with patients with mobility issues when working as a nursing assistant. Knowing this, catheter care is a CNA skill of extreme importance, as many patients will need to use a catheter and require assistance. As a CNA, you’ll need to clean the catheter tube as well as the drainage bag each day. One of the most important elements of this task is making sure that the patient is comfortable with the procedure. 

To learn all of the necessary steps for the CNA skill for catheter care, please watch this video demonstration. 

The process for catheter care for a female patient during the CNA skills exam is as follows:

  1. Perform the standard CNA beginning tasks. Knock before entering the patient’s room, greet the patient by name, introduce yourself, explain the task you are about to perform, close the privacy curtain, and wash your hands.
  2. Fill a water basin and let the patient touch the water and ask them if the temperature is suitable.
  3. Adjust the bed to make your patient comfortable.
  4. At this point you’ll want to don gloves.
  5. Place a protector sheet below the patient’s perineal region to prevent anything from spilling off of the bed.
  6. Roll the patient to a side of the bed to provide yourself space to spread the sheet before rolling her back and making her comfortable. 
  7. Uncover the patient near the catheter, exposing as little of her as possible and apply soap to a wet wash cloth and then clean the four inches of the tube nearest to the perineal region. Start from the meatus region and extend outward, cleaning in one direction and using a new, clean wash cloth for each stroke. 
  8. If the bed linen gets dirty during this process, you must stop what you are doing and clean it immediately.
  9. Remove the linen protector sheet and dispose of it.
  10. Put the patient’s clothes back in their original place, and cover the patient with their sheet and blanket.
  11. Empty, rinse and dry the wash basin and dispose of equipment used during cleaning.
  12. Remove and dispose of your gloves and wash your hands.
  13. Perform your standard completion tasks – ensure the patient has a clean environment, ask if they are comfortable, and give the patient their call light.

* Please be sure to consult the testing materials provided by the skills test provider in your state to ensure that these steps for CNA catheter care are in compliance. The procedure in different states and from different test providers can vary slightly and greatly affect your score.