Nurses crossing picket lines

To Be A Scab Or Not

Just think-it's your mother in the hospital and instead of the experienced nurse taking care of her it's a nurse manager who hasn't seen the inside if the Pyxis in years and she's about to give Lovenox to your sweet, but very ill mother.
hhhmmmm...IS Lovenox given IM,SQ,IVP??? Well can't hurt to give it IVP right?

Nurses strike to improve patient care. As a nurse, bargaining team member and former union organizer I can tell you the folks who crossed the picket lines the last time the nurses are my hospital struck are 95% going to strike this time, have quit or don't care that their co-workers think they are lower than the belly of a worm.

If you are into nursing for the quick buck go abroad, get into another field. Why do you need money so badly? Is it??could it be?? that you aren't covered under a union contract now that guarantees you wage increases, benefits, employer paid health benefits, education reimbursement, etc???

Think carefully about crossing a picket line. Why would you call yourself a professional and yet not honor your peers and support them? Well I guess if you are travelling hobo RN with no community, no family, no ties to a peer group it may seem like no big deal. BUt it is.

The hospital can always settle to avoid a strike. Anyone who works a strike to "save the patients" needs to get their head checked and look up the definition of the following: codependency, narcissism, egotistical. I'm sure one of these will fit.

Hello

That is a rather hate filled post, I'm sorry you feel that way.

First off Nurses who cross picket lines are all nurses first, last, and foremost. Just because they do not agree with your political and financial agenda, does not mean they are less than qualified.

Second, we are all in nursing, to make a living. To make ourselves financially secure in life. None of us work for free. And the large majority of strikes deal with financial matters anyway. Better pay, more nurses, better benefits. So the strike itself is primarily about money.

Thirdly, traveling or strike working nurses should never be referred to as scabs, hobos, no family. Most are supporting themselves and their families. But it is wrong to insult them just because you disagree with them.

Codependency,narcissism, egotistical, this is all unnecessary name calling, and counter productive to any discussion

So- remind me again - what is my political and financial agenda? What post were you reading?
What ties to community do travellers have? remind me again. Nothing against travellers. It's a great option for nurses, but we all have to sleep at night. If nurses who cross picket lines can still call themselves professionals and members of the nursing community I would have to question their motives.
Most strikes are ULP strikes and most ULP's are non-economic. ULP strikes are closed ended. We are fighting to improve patient care and staffing. The boss has barely even talked about money with us so the $$$ isn't even the issue right now.
Remind me again where you work and what improvements have you and your co-workers been able to make? How were they achieved and what legally binding language do you have to hold mgmt to their word and committment?

Got nothing but love for ya!

Obviously I am referencing post #11

And here you go again insulting nurses who cross picket lines. And yes they are nurses, and yes they are professionals, and yes they are members of the nursing community at large.
Though you may feel differently strikes to "Improve patient care and staffing" is about money. It takes money to get more nurses. And money in this day and age is always the issue. No matter how you convince yourself otherwise.

OK so I have a couple honest questions (I'm not a nurse yet so I don't really have a stance on this issue)

Is the issue with nurses crossing the picket lines to take care of patients, or with them being paid higher wages to do so?

If no nurses cross the picket lines, who will take care of the patients? Why should they suffer because of a union dispute? (I'm pro-union, FTR)

And don't travel nurses get paid more and given living stipends anyways, not just for nurse strikes?

I don't like that nurses have to have unions, yet if we don't take care of ourselves, then who will? You can bet that it won't be the MDs, administrators, or the insurance companies. If professionals like teachers, accountants in the IRS, and other degreed people can and are union, then so can nurses. I also work with RN's who have crossed picket lines just to make large amounts of money, yet I have heard them say how tough we have it and how we need ratio limits, better work conditions, etc. These same nurses just don't understand that they are stabbing themselves in the back, then laughing about it. When the band played their last song on the Titanic, I wonder if they thought about how cold the water would be?

My community had an ugly strike a few years ago. There were nurses who had to cross the picket lines for personal reasons ( one had a dying husband) and another had a medical condition which was too costly for the nurse to pay for. Instead of the nursing union picking up the costs for these nurses to support their crisis, they sent dead rats to their homes and other horrible acts. The striking nurses did not portray themselves as caring professionals. In fact the nurse with a dying husband posted a letter in the paper asking for support from her fellow nurses and instead she got treated horribly. The travel nurses also did not represent the finest in nursing either making money off of other nurses issues ( the traveling nurses did not have the same patient assignments or conditions that the striking nurses had).

I also feel the right to work is a personal issue, like abortion and each person has the right to choose. It doesn't mean one person is right or wrong but both sides should be respected.

It is a horrible situation when nurses feel the only way they can make their situation better is by striking, shame on the hospital putting the nurses in this situation. But the striking nurses should respect other nurses who for personal reasons had to cross the picket line.

To Strike or not to Strike
To cross picket lines or not cross picket lines
These are the issues that serve
To cloud all of our minds


And render whatever we do as inefficient

to the poster adawg67: I know the orginal posting on this is almost 1 year old, but I have to agree with the posters' I am46yearsold and medsurg32RN.' At my stage in nursing I have run the gamit-union RN, nonunion RN. as a union RN for 18 YEARS all I ever heard for all those 18 YEARS is strike,strike,strike!!! If they didn't like the toilet paper we're going to strike and every 2 years when our contracts were up there would be a strike vote. THIS IS UNSTABLE and UNSETTLING when you have bills to pay-as medsurg32RN pointed out- think about what this RN most have been feeling with the sick family member and having to live and work in this strike,strike enviornment. All I saw during those 18YEARS was 'eating their yound, lateral violence, harrassment, name calling, falsewitness bearing,singeling out, sqirtingcondiments and other things in certain staff RN's lockers, my locker looked like someone took a hammer and screwdriver and beat the tar out of it. These were acts by those UNION RN's toward their fellow coworker staff UNION RN's. I did work a strike- would I do it again YES. My thought is- patient care- do I feel that a manager is competent enough to give lovenox- NO ( that's an example of why I would do it again) do I think a manager is competent to titrate vasoactive drips- NO (that's why I would do it again) when these nurses go out on strike- their patients DO NOT accompany them and walk the strike line with them- they are still stuck in the hospital bed. I saw no vents or IV poles on the picket line. What I did see was a bunch of nurses asking for more money- already making $50/hour( we nurses who worked this strike were making $40/hour just for the record and had to buy our own lunch and uniforms which were fadded and old), paid lunch, more of a uniform allowance- GREED and sticking their middle finger up at us and shouting names and slurrs at us. This behavior is so far from professional dignity , that it is beyond comprehension, To send dead rats to someone's house and call your-self a nurse and consider yourself professional standards, I think NOT. I do not care about thier POLITICS- the problems are on BOTH sides (another reason why I would work strike again) do we have a community- Yes- it's called state of residence/tax law- where we live, our residence, do we have families- yes- we are on the cellphone with them constantly (I did), do we have friends- yes- we cellphone them constantly too(I did- and they happen to be nurses- non union, in our hometown) Are we compentent- YES, more so than the staff that is out on strike- we have to be -to work different facilities, we have to be flexiable/floating( this is how we learn new skills I know union RN don't like this -they didn't like this when I was UNION for 18 YEARS and would offer to float to another unit- this threatened they lazy union mahoffahhs on my unit- I was learning other specialities- TELEMETRY It made them look bad- like the abusive spouse who will not let their partner socialize/work), we have to be up to date in our skills INCLUDING med calculations-just in case you staff nurses FORGOT to plug in your IV pumps before you left. Agency/Travelers/Strike nurse see ALOT of different settings/ experiences and their knowlege/skill base only broadens. Critical thinking becomes sharpens, they catch on to new things quicker. would I do a strike again YOU BET!!

Your story is like Swss chesse , full of holes..... have a nice life