Agencies staffing potential Sparrow strike

[JoblessNewRN]

As a "new" RN, with 10 years experience as an LPN, including ICU experience, it is amazingly difficult to get a job in central Michigan. I currently staff with a VERY good agency who, due to JHACO regulations, cannot use me as an RN until I've had one year experience. This takes me out of the loop to work the potential upcoming strike at Sparrow Hospital for that company. I am wondering if anyone knows any of the other agencies that will be staffing Sparrow if they strike, and if they will take a new RN (graduated 8/10, current active RN license) to work them. Any information appreciated!

Thank you!!

Kim

[gjwandkids]

Just curious, why would you want to do that?

If the nurses are striking, chances are that staffing levels or pay or both are not good. Why on earth would you go in and undercut what they are trying to improve?

[JoblessNewRN]

First and foremost, I do not believe heath care is a place for walk off strikes. This is not an automobile assembly line you can switch off and go back to when your "needs" are met. Human lives are at stake here and, as a nurse, my oath was to DO NO HARM. Walking out on my patients does not fulfill that in my opinion. Sparrow is one of the highest paying hospitals in the state. That doesn't say much, I know, when the average RN salary in Michigan is 22% below the national average, but it says a great deal to me. I am struggling to get a job in a hospital as a new grad RN, I would jump at the opportunity to work at Sparrow.

Let's put PATIENT CARE first...PERSONALITIES..and petty bickering...second!

[gjwandkids]

Thank you for clarifying your position.

[LansingNurse]

I feel very sorry that you are having difficulties finding a permanent job, hopefully once your year is up, you will go on to have a good career as an RN in a setting you will like.

It is distressing, though, that you think that because Sparrow nurses have reasonably paying jobs and you don't that it is OK to undermine their struggle to get a fair contract out of Sparrow. How would you feel if you were on the other side of the fence? Sparrow is using this year's contract negotiations to drastically reduce the promised pensions of the nurses. These are people who have worked, ten, twenty or thirty years..... an often grueling job....12 hour shifts.....tons of responsibility....all the while believing that at the end of it all they would be able to retire with a sufficient pension. And then the rules are changed, and what was promised is taken away and the pension they were going to rely on is now much less. This is terribly unfair. And just because businesses everywhere have stopped providing pensions as a benefit to current workers, does not make it right to do this. It should be illegal. In addition, Sparrow has not adequately addressed patient/staff issues. This means that the nurses at Sparrow often work in harrowing conditions....where they do not feel that their patients are safe. So think about who you might want to support here. Sparrow Management - who are trying to break their promise to future retirees and are willing that their nurses work under horrendous pressure with unsafe staffing ratios, or the professional nurses that you would like to join one day..... who work their hearts out everyday for their patients, and deserve a secure rest at the end of it.

[JoblessNewRN]

I understand and appreciate your concerns. With ten years in the field as a professional nurse, albeit 'only' an LPN, I fully understand 12 and 16 hour shifts, short staffing and high patient to staff ratios. What I do not believe in is walking off the job we have dedicated our lives to, that being caring for those in need. As I have stated, patient care is not an automobile assembly line you can switch off and come back to when your negotiations are complete. These are human lives, not cars. My father dedicated 23 years of his life to serving this country through two wars and has watched his pension and health care benefits be trimmed, sliced and whittled away. Our current service men and women have less than half the benefits those in my father's generation have...thank G-d they do not feel the need to walk out on our country to make their point.

[lindy333]

In my humble opinion...

Sparrow Nurses and other staff do need to fight for those benefits..YES I am with you 100 percent

But you can not realistically just walk out and not have replacement staff to take care of

those patients. It is not a assembly line where they turn off the machine and stop making the product.

Only so many people can be diverted to other hospitals. So strike but thank those replacement nurses for helping

you out covering your patients so you can make your point!!!

[keepingit straight]

What company were you trying to go through for the strike? That said you couldn't go due to the less than one year experience?

[GM2RN]

First and foremost, I do not believe heath care is a place for walk off strikes. This is not an automobile assembly line you can switch off and go back to when your "needs" are met. Human lives are at stake here and, as a nurse, my oath was to DO NO HARM. Walking out on my patients does not fulfill that in my opinion. Sparrow is one of the highest paying hospitals in the state. That doesn't say much, I know, when the average RN salary in Michigan is 22% below the national average, but it says a great deal to me. I am struggling to get a job in a hospital as a new grad RN, I would jump at the opportunity to work at Sparrow.

Let's put PATIENT CARE first...PERSONALITIES..and petty bickering...second!

Oath? What Oath? I didn't take any oath...

[bbgnurse]

my aunt was just hired as an RN there in August. she just graduated this summer and feared losing her job due to this strike. but it is my understanding that they have come to an agreement and are also going to be hiring several nurses. so skip the agency and go straight to the source!