Happy Holidays to Sutter Hospital

Nurses Union

Published

Ho Ho Ho... DEC 24, close to 5000 RNs will strike for one day... http://www.nationalnursesunited.org/state/california

kcmylorn

991 Posts

May the CEO or CEO's choke on their Christmas dinners!

Specializes in ICU.

Is Sutter profit or non-profit? I'm a little shocked at the concessions they're asking from nurses, i.e. no sick leave. You want sick staff taking care of sick patients?? In the Los Angeles area, wages for new grad RNs are already down to $29/hour. Everywhere else in the state is $33 (up to $42/hour for newbies in certain places). I'm not even a nurse yet but I'm already shaking my head at the concessions being asked. I mean, the job is not easy and you do have to be smart ... you would think job difficulty and intelligence would be rewarded and not punished.

kcmylorn

991 Posts

Pretty soon, these facilities will have nurses working for minimum wage and wanting bedside doctorates. I am shocked at California's wages. They have always been the highest in the country. We needed to stop this dropping the payscale about 4 years ago. New grads taking jobs for free interships and residencies did not help the situation in the long run. I believe way back when, I posted it was going to bite them in the backside- well.... here it is 4 years later and now look.

There should have been a push, a really hard push to get these CEO salries cut down to current ceonomic standards that are in tune with the current economic climate- down around the $500,000 range. But that was like anarchy back then. Well we are continuing to pay for it. and will continue to pay for it until it's too late and nursing will have to fight it's way back un the payscale.

I remember nursing wages being at $29.00/hr back in 2004!!!

No way in gods green earth am I getting a doctorate or any masters to do beside nursing, and wipping butt!! let the CEO's and their spouses do it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Testa Rosa, RN

333 Posts

Specializes in Tele Step Down, Oncology, ICU, Med/Surg.

I will be on the picket line. I am sick of the lies and the way Sutter treats their nurses. The lies to media about our salaries (I make 2/3 what they tell the local newspapers I make), the lies to their staff--management just sent a mass email saying they are "appalled" we were striking again since our "union was not willing to negotiate." OMG! Do they think their nurses are this stupid??? Its was management that presented the "Last, Best, Final" offer of drastic take aways last year, and from day one refused to negotiate with US. Flat out refused to come to the negotiating table and discuss the take aways and provide rationals as to why.

We as nurses are held to high ethical and moral standards, yet at Sutter we are being managed by such immoral and greedy management. I. AM. APPALLED!!! Note, I was never a strong union person--but I would never work for a Sutter facility without the union having my back. Our bargaining team are my HERO's for the lies and crap they put up with. Recently another email came out from management stating that our bargaining team never showed up to a meeting when the management was playing immature tricks like changing rooms and showing up at the meetings two hours late. This is the unprofessional behavior of our management and how they negotiate with their front line workers. We definitely feel the hate--at least this one does.

I am dedicated to my patients to to providing the very best of care and will continue to do so despite how badly I am being treated. I would gladly make less money to be treated like the professional I am. Bedside feels like a war zone with everyone pushed to the max with little support. I understand that the conflict between management and nursing is endemic to all of nursing and that the push and pull between nursing and management can create healthy synergy; However, at Sutter it is just ugly. It involves bullies as managers, pressure to clock out and continue to work, situations that place the nurse in impossible situations (like having a policy stating you must enter an airborne precautions room with a new N95 mask yet never being able to find enough supply so you end up reusing the same disposable N95 mask--just one small example of many).

Sutter management has spent the last year refusing to negotiate with their nurses. They say they need to squeeze these take aways from their nurses due to economic hardships they do not justify--that they can't justify as they enjoy record profits. They are a non-profit hospital group machine built to feed the upper management salaries. They threaten RN lay-offs while units are short staffed and we are filled with travelers--layoffs that never transpired-- all as a scare tactic to deflect negotiating with us. Yet they settle with other nurses at other smaller hospitals making it clear they just want to run our union to the ground. And they are "appalled" when we call another strike? They treat the scabs better than the dedicated employees. They are sucking staff dry at bedside in order to feed the boardroom. And they have a record of behaving beyond the pale if you look at what happened with Marin. I am fighting mad and I am compelled to write an article or paper on this. I am no writer, but I have been refining my voice on Allnurses and other nursing boards. I am so stinking mad at what I am seeing at the bedside and how nurses are being treated at Sutter run facilities. I will be on the picket line--we will stand strong. Whew, thanks for the vent.

Yours in nursing, TR

Is discussing how much those CEOs make. Mine makes 600000 and we gripe it's too much

coughdrop.2.go, BSN, RN

1 Article; 709 Posts

Specializes in School Nursing, Public Health Nurse.

I'm a SMU grad, Sutter owns us since we are on the Alta Bates campus, and I find it interesting how often the Sutter Nurses strike. I did my clinicals at Kaiser and Alta Bates and I don't remember how many times during the two years we had to miss clincial days due to the strikes and that when the Sutter nurses went on strike for a day they get locked out for a minimum of five due to contract obligations for the replacements RNs. That actually lead to a patient being killed because a traveler (NEW GRAD RN TRAVELER) hooked up a patient's feeding tube to the IV. It scared me as a future nurse seeing the nurses fight hard for basic working rights. It also hurt me seeing so many traveling nurses on the floor during "peace-time" and see the hospital discuss nursing shortages on the news especially when you have a university hooked up to your hospital spitting out BSN nurses being trained at your facilities and we aren't wanted and when we are you want to pay us as little as possible. With all that said, I am not shocked another strike is being planned. If I could I would pass out Christmas dinner to all the nurses on strike!

Testa Rosa, RN

333 Posts

Specializes in Tele Step Down, Oncology, ICU, Med/Surg.

We love our SMU Little Sibs! Best SN's Ever! So sorry to mess up your clinicals due to Sutter waging war on it's nurses. I guess you've seen the ugliness at the bedside first hand and that saddens me to think this is your perception of what nursing is as a new nurse. It's appalling, isn't it? I never imagined educated professionals responsible for something as precious as human lives could be treated like such second class citizens by the company that manages them. That this company would so brazenly lie and squeeze their frontline worker to feed their pockets and their bottom line. It too saddens me how many expensive travelers work on our floors when we should be hiring directly from the nursing school next door.

I love our regular travelers--many who come to us after years of experience and do much to add to our work life. And every Hospital needs a good core group of travelers to call on to fill staffing shortages. However, they are over used at our facility, and it would be better to build nurses from within our community. Travelers are expensive--I can't imagine hiring a new grad would be more expensive? And don't even get me started on all the $$$ wasted on scabs--that whole locking out the regular RN's due to the five day contract thing is a fallacy. We aren't getting locked out with the Decermber 24th strike so what's changed? More Sutter Lies--not surprised.

Also, mentoring new grads brings so much growth. It's part of the life cycle of a normal healthy nursing unit. It forces RN's to see things from new perspectives and everyone learns. I would be happy to negotiate salary if that meant we could hire new grads (even if it meant my new grad had to come in at $20 an hour at least she would be IN with me her preceptor instead of traveling to a different state). Unfortunately, Sutter refuses to negotiate with us at all--never once did they sit across from us and agree to negotiate their "Last, Best, Final" crappy offer. So these series of strikes are all basically one big strike because Sutter refuses to negotiate with their nurses.

Dear New Nurse--You are better off going elsewhere. I made the mistake growing my career in a Sutter facility. Learn from my mistake. Start somewhere where they treat their nurses as the professionals they are. Where the nurses don't need unions to have their backs because the management and staff can negotiate together for the betterment of patient care and hospital profits. Many blessings on your journey. So sad to see you go else where tho. Come join us on the strike line on the 24th if you can.

kcmylorn

991 Posts

Is discussing how much those CEOs make. Mine makes 600000 and we gripe it's too much

It is too much. It's way too much. Every other industry took a big hit in pay scale, doctors took a big hit in payscale, nurses have taking a big hit in payscale, Engineers took a big hit in payscale, Some lawyers took a big hit in payscale. What's this group's problem. It's time to do to the CEO community what has been done in all these other professions- Offer them to lower their salary, if they don't take it, then out they go and find someone who will take the lower salary and do the same job for less money.!!

With CMS only allowing reimbursement for a certain level ofacuity for certain conditions and the insurance companies following suit, I don't see why the CEO is kept around just because they think they can bring more profits into the system. It's not like people come to the hospital because they are planning a Hospital themed vacation. There are certain criteria for a hospital admission- if they don't meet the criteria, they don't get admitted. So maybe alot of these hospitals are cheating the system. Bringing patients into the hopsital for bogus, phoney reasons, documenting it on paper, just to collect money from the insurance companies, after all- they can't mess around with CMS that way, it's called fraud and if found out and convicted, they will never get another drop of CMS money!!

The hospital's funding is limited, very limited. So it doesn't make sense to pay a huge chunk of the revenue to 1 person when that job position is no longer the driving force of inbound money( the CMS and insurance companies are). These CEO's are no longer bringing in any more than a certain amount of money.So why are they paid a King's ransome in salary??

Testa Rosa, RN

333 Posts

Specializes in Tele Step Down, Oncology, ICU, Med/Surg.

Because they sit around board rooms and strategize ways to squeeze resources to the bare minimum to the point it feels like you may lose your license practicing nursing in their facilities. And for this they get paid 6million a year. It's ridiculous.

coughdrop.2.go, BSN, RN

1 Article; 709 Posts

Specializes in School Nursing, Public Health Nurse.

I've met some of the most amazing nurses at Alta Bates and here at Sutter Sacramento and in addition to doing my clinicals there I also have 340 hours of volunteer hours at ABSMC so I know how hard you guys work! When I see there's a new position at a Sutter facility I feel conflicted because in school I said I don't want to work at a hospital where the nurses are striking with the seasons but at the same time I'm desperate for a job after 8 months out of school. At this point I'll take it and I'll take the picket signs too. I'll take the $20 a hour and I'll argue until I'm blue in the face for sick leave. Also, considering how much we spent in tuition, we should get a little more consideration. I know during school were told STAY AWAY FROM THE PICKET LINES and even though I'm still jobless when I see nurses striking, no matter the hospital, I feel like those are my brothers and sisters and their decisions shape my future as a nurse. I think I might just make my way toward Sutter Sac and pass out some of my famous snickerdoodle cookies on Dec. 24th.

lindarn

1,982 Posts

ALL of the Sutter Nurses, need to go public BIG TIME, and take a page from teachers. Get the public involved, make big signs to picket with with the names, positions, and salaries on them. Get out in the open, with a lot of bystander traffic to show the public what is going on. Get in the public' s face, do BPs for free, have candy for the kids. You get the picture.

Make them look as bad as possible in public. I would also try to get air time on the local TV news.The sueaky wheel gets the grease. That is why teachers get what they want. Invite the press, I would call CNN as well. You have to get out the truth to the public, and counter what they are saying.

JMHO and my NY $0.02.

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN

Somewhere in the PACNW

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