An automated nursing system for handling waste material from a patient includes a mattress including an opening; a workhead for accepting the waste material, the opening of the mattress sized to accept the workhead; a main unit in water flow and pneumatic pressure communication with the workhead; and a main processor carried by the main unit, the main processor programmed to at least partially (i) cause negative pneumatic pressure to be applied to the workhead to remove the waste material from the workhead, and (ii) cause water to be delivered to the workhead to rinse the patient.