Advanced Practice Nurse (Certified Nurse Anesthetist)

About the role

The Advanced Practice Nurse Certified Nurse Anesthetist (CNA) administers anesthesia in both inpatient and outpatient settings to patients of all health complexities. The aspects of practice include direct patient care, administration, education, and research activities.

Responsibilities

• Collaborating with a variety of health care professionals to achieve common goals for care, safety, and welfare of patients.
• Providing anesthetic services within five general categories to include: pre-anesthesia evaluation and preparation; anesthesia induction, maintenance, and emergence; post anesthesia care; peri-anesthetic and clinical support functions; and emergency response techniques.
• Developing and implementing a comprehensive anesthesia plan of care for patients requiring local, regional, general, and monitored anesthesia both inside and outside the Operating Room (OR) suite.
• Ensuring anesthetic services delivered throughout the facility are of the highest quality to promote patient safety, satisfaction, and improve outcomes and efficiencies.
• Functioning as a resource for staff education and being willing to be a preceptor and adjunct clinical faculty for health care trainees rotating through the facility.
• Prescribing appropriate preoperative, intra-operative and postoperative orders and medications.

Requirements

Work Schedule: Monday through Friday, 6:30AM to 3:00PM. Telework: Ad hoc telework may be available. Virtual: This is not a virtual position.

Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not authorized. Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Authorized.

Benefits

Competitive salary, regular salary increases, potential for performance awards
Paid Time Off: 50 days of paid time off per year (26 days of annual leave, 13 days of sick leave, 11 paid Federal holidays per year)
Retirement: Traditional federal pension (5 years vesting) and federal 401K with up to 5% in contributions by VA
Insurance: Federal health/vision/dental/term life/long-term care (many federal insurance programs can be carried into retirement)

Qualifications

Advanced Practice Nurse (Certified Nurse Anesthetist) Basic Requirements
Education: Masters or doctoral degree in nurse anesthesia.
Licensure and Certification: Full and unrestricted license to practice as a CNA or equivalent, in a State, Territory or Commonwealth of the United States or in the District of Columbia. Full and current certification by the National Board of Certification and Recertification for Nurse Anesthetists (NBCRNA) or an equivalent Nurse Anesthetist certification recognized by the COA.

Education and Experience Requirement: Meets basic education requirement for an APN (CNA). Nurse II is considered the entry grade level for APN (CNAs); no experience is required.

Demonstrated Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities: Present the minimum skill set expected of an Entry Level CNA. Entry level into practice may include but are not limited to the following:

• Ability to translate into anesthesia care the principles of professional nursing practice including the patients' rights to autonomy, dignity, privacy, and safety.
• Knowledge of current research and practice guidelines to frame anesthesia practice including up to date techniques, pharmacology, and equipment.
• Ability to obtain, document and verify informed anesthesia consent and perform a pre-anesthetic patient history and physical, which includes managing pre-operative consults and interpreting data.
• Ability to formulate a patient-specific anesthetic plan and describe salient anesthetic risks, benefits, and options to the patient.
• Ability to administer inhalational, regional, intravenous, local, and topical anesthetics.
• Skill in detecting and treating anesthesia or surgically related physiologic changes and ability to treat accordingly in order to maintain homeostasis.
• Skill in assessing patient status for appropriateness of transfer of care to another healthcare provider and communicating essential patient information to other providers effectively.
• Ability to participate in collaborative responsibility for proper patient positioning, physiologic monitoring, infection control and anesthesia documentation.
• Skill in responding to emergency situations by providing airway management, fluid and medication administration, invasive line insertion and management and the use of advanced cardiac life support techniques.
• Ability to provide patient care that is abreast of changing concepts and advancements in the profession, (e.g., ultrasound techniques.)
• Ability to practice anesthesia in an interdisciplinary environment utilizing a collaborative concept of anesthesia care.
• Knowledge of quality improvement processes to maintain ongoing review and evaluation of anesthesia care to improve outcomes.
• Ability to demonstrate a practice emphasis on safety, current established guidelines and protocols while recognizing the duty to report unsafe conditions or errors.

Education, Experience, and Knowledge, Skills and Abilities for Advanced Practice Nurse (Certified Nurse Anesthetist) III: Meets basic education requirement for an APN (CNA) AND One year of specialized APN (CNA) experience equivalent to the APN (CNA) II grade level.

• Ability to plan, administer and manage anesthesia for a broad range of complex surgical procedures skillfully employing continuous assessment and anesthetic adaptation based on patient response and comorbidities. Work assignments will vary by facility.
• Ability to participate in assignments that are technically challenging, encompass a variety of anesthetizing locations and utilize advanced equipment and procedures while adapting techniques to solve various complex anesthesia problems including the development of individualized programs of post-op anesthesia care.
• Skill in responsibility and accountability to perform to the extent of the CNA standards of practice as a licensed healthcare professional in any model of anesthesia practice.
• Ability to contribute to the educational mission as a mentor or preceptor providing didactic and clinical instruction in anesthesia to student nurse anesthetists, medical and dental residents, and other health care trainees.
• Knowledge to participate in the development, implementation and maintenance of auditing processes that ensure and improve the quality and consistency of anesthesia and associated documentation.
• Ability to contribute to departmental administrative processes through quality assurance, shared governance, or committee representation as applicable.
• Ability to serve as a representative on interdisciplinary teams to establish and maintain guidelines and communication.
• Skill demonstrated in the ability to embrace the safety culture emphasis by continuously assessing for safety risks, actively reporting safety concerns, and maintaining a just culture by identifying faults in systems rather than individuals.
• Experience administering anesthesia in both inpatient and outpatient settings to patients of all health complexities.
• Experience in the aspects of practice including direct patient care, administration, education, and research activities.