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Injuries, Illnesses, and Fatalities
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Occupation Snapshot | Nursing assistants, 2015-2019 | January 2021


Background

Nursing assistants provide or assist with basic care or support under the direction of onsite licensed nursing staff. They perform duties such as monitoring of health status, feeding, bathing, dressing, grooming, toileting, or ambulation of patients in a health or nursing facility. Nursing assistants’ duties may include medication administration and other health-related tasks.

As of May 2019, there were 1,419,920 people employed in this occupation. The average hourly wage was $14.77 and the average annual wage was $30,720.

Nonfatal occupational injuries and illnesses

In private industry for this occupation, there were 27,590 nonfatal injury and illness cases requiring days away from work during 2019. The incidence rate per 10,000 full-time equivalent (FTE) workers was 283.5.

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Table 1. Number of nonfatal occupational injuries and illnesses involving days away from work by selected case characteristics, nursing assistants, private industry, 2019
Case characteristic[1]Number of cases

Nature of injury or illness

Sprains, strains, tears

13,390

Soreness, pain

7,180

Bruises, contusions

2,780

All other natures

2,280

Fractures

770

Part of body affected

Back

8,070

Multiple body parts

3,720

Shoulder

2,700

Knee

2,140

Hand

1,490

Source of injury or illness

Patient

15,050

Floors, walkways, ground surfaces

4,710

All other sources

2,820

Worker motion or position

1,990

Furniture, fixtures

1,260

Event or exposure leading to injury or illness

Fall on same level

4,980

Overexertion in lifting or lowering

3,190

Intentional injury by other person

2,910

Struck by object or equipment

1,440

Injury by person-unintentional or intent unknown

1,130

[1] Data shown correspond to Nature, Part, Source, and Event codes based on the Occupational Injury and Illness Classification System 2.01 developed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses

Fatal occupational injuries

Fatal work injuries totaled 7 for nursing assistants during 2019, compared to 12 during 2018.

Table 2. Fatal occupational injuries, nursing assistants, all United States, 2015-2019
YearFatalities

2015

--

2016

8

2017

8

2018

12

2019

7

Notes: Dashes indicate data do not meet BLS publication guidelines. CFOI data by event are only provided if there are fatal case counts in three or more of the six event categories. For more information visit: https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshfat1.htm.

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries

Sources

Wage and employment estimates come from the Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) program. Injury and illness information come from the Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses (SOII) and Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI). For more information on SOII and CFOI program concepts and definitions see the SOII Handbook of Methods and the CFOI Handbook of Methods.

 

Last Modified Date: February 4, 2021