In December I took a CNA course offered through OrchardCNA in Orem. The class wasn't very informative but it is a state requirement to take a class somewhere. I completed the class but didn't receive my testing vouchers until after school had started at UVU. Due to my heavy course load I didn't feel I had time to worry about taking the certification exams at that time. Now that the semester is over I figured I would take advantage of my "free time" to finish taking the certification exams.
Yesterday I headed up to Salt Lake City to take my skills portion of the CNA exam. I was nervous heading into the exam not knowing how the exam was going to be administered and how picky the examiner would be. However, once we got started I realized that the exam wasn't going to be difficult and the examiner was very amiable. I went first (we test is pairs) and very quickly completed my list of skills except for the vital signs, which should have been the easiest part of the exam since that is the only real thing we worked on in my CNA class. However, while doing the blood pressure the examiner had to explain to me that I was incorrectly interpreting the results! Not exactly reassuring words to this examinee. She explained that when you're taking a blood pressure, the first sound you hear may not be the sound you record. You have to wait for the the first sound of the regular pulsing of the heart. The other sounds, she expained, were simply background noise and was to be disregarded.
She indicated that I should try one more time. This time I listened very carefully for the first sound of the regular heart beat. The examiner seemed pleased with this new assessment and I breathed a sign of relief. However, I must still wait 7-10 days to receive my results (whether I passed of failed this portion of the exam). Now I just need a quick review and I can take the written portion of the exam (which I'll probably do on Wednesday). I don't anticipate any problems with passing that portion of the exam so I should be a certified CNA by next weekend (officially).
