A Louisville-based health care training platform is gearing up for more growth as it reaches a big revenue milestone this year.
CNAOnline.com, a branch of Academic Platforms, is an online education platform for training certified nursing assistants, or CNAs. CNAs work with patients and nurses in places like skilled nursing facilities, long-term care and rehab centers.
Its long-term goal is to help the shortage of certified nurse aides in the health care sector, something exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic.
John Reinhart is the partner and principal of CNAOnline.com, which launched in 2016.
The service is hosted through a contract with learning management platform, Canvas Instructure, and the company built other programs required for the training, including feedback analytics portal and an administrative portal. It also handles onboarding work that can be personalized for the company or the state.
CNAOnline.com has a partnership with the American Health Care Association to deliver its training courses nationwide. It is a hybrid model, because in addition to being online, CNAOnline also works with senior living providers to co-host courses with in-person clinical training.
Some of its Louisville customers include Nazareth Home, Masonic Homes and Christian Care Communities.
“The telling sign here was Covid,” Reinhart said. “[It] transformed everybody’s thinking about online and embracing online … We got a silver lining.”
Gwynette Winstead, director of sales and development for CNAOnline, said during the early days of the pandemic, the platform provided free training for more than 300,000 people that immediately began work in nursing homes and rehab centers. She said this allowed people to start a career path they may not have considered before.
The hybrid model also allows the program to reach students it may have not been able to reach before, said Julie Gdowski, nurse educator for CNAOnline. She said this includes working parents, and it helps people complete online courses on their schedule.
In 2022, it trained a total of 1,453 students. It currently employs 14 people in various roles including tech operations, instructors, clinical operations and sales and business development.
CNAOnline is available in 24 states, including Kentucky, and it anticipates adding seven more states in the near future. Its goal is to be in every state.
The company generates revenue by charging a $700 tuition for each student, and employers pay to sponsor those students. Courses run during different time periods based on the employer’s needs and what the state requires, but its typically between three and four weeks.
Reinhart said the company will reach $1 million revenue this year and educate 1,500 students.
Also this year, Reinhart said they are adding another training course for medication aides. He said the company has the potential to double in size, based on the offering of another course, new states and new customers in states its already licensed in.
