Nevada Hospitals Lowered Nurses Pay Rates

**canoehead, BSN, RN** · Jan 4, 2003

I got an article about pt- nurse ratios.

-jt · Jan 4, 2003

I think hospitals got together in Nevada to stand their ground united, held a gun to the agencies heads by making it impossible to take their product & services to the next hospital for better rates & all together refused to pay AGENCIES what they demand - in an attempt to make agency work less attractive & force the RNs back on staff.

The agencies in turn, lowered the amount they pay the RNs, to make up the difference. The agencies still get the amount they want, or close to it. The nurse eats the cut.

The hospitals figured that if the RN isnt earning much more by working agency & has no benefits from the agency, she'll find its not worth working agency, will come back on staff for the same salary PLUS the benefits & the hospitals staffing problem will be solved by making sure the bedside RN doesnt have any other alternatives. So instead of fixing their own environment & making their own places more attractive to RNs, theyre saving their own money by just cutting the competition & trying to hold us over a barrel. More underhanded tactics against RNs.

A group of hospitals started it in Cleveland. A group of HCA facilities did it in Tennessee. The wave of the future. I heard that some of the affected agencies were considering an anti-trust lawsuit when it first happened. No updates.

Sooner or later, RNs who job-hop looking for better conditons & better pay, rather than figthing for it where they are, are going to run out of places to run to & will eventually have to take a stand together too -- or go work in Walmart.

Nurse Nevada, RN · Jan 4, 2003

This sounds exactly like management strategy to me.

Nurse Nevada

oramar · Jan 5, 2003

Did some other state try this same tactic? Seems to me it sounds familiar. Seems to be I heard it was an abysmal failure.

TYGGER · Jan 5, 2003

We recently tried to organize here at MMC in Oshkosh but the union was a bust. I fully support unionizing Nursing I just don't think there is an appropriate union out there right now to do it...all hospital staff I mean.

-jt · Jan 6, 2003

Why would there need to be one union for all hospital staff? The kitchen workers have different needs than the RNs do. In NYC, most of the non-RN workers in the hospital are unionized with SEIU/1199 healthcare trade union. The security guards are unionized with their own union, as are the engineers and other skilled tradesmen. And the RNs are unionized with the state nurses assoc. Each group of employee can then focus on their own needs & they are the ones who know best what those needs are.

flowerchild · Jan 7, 2003

The anti trust lawsuits in my state against HCA/Columbia failed. The state decided they really didn't do anything wrong. I disagree but the public doesn't care. Just as long as their hospital "looks" like a great place to be. The HCA/Col hospitals around here have chefs and the patients can order what ever they like, even lobster. They have all private rooms. Then the patients complain b/c they can't get the nurse into the room to help them when needed but they don't see that it is the care they are there for and not the lobster. Public is more interested in private rooms in a brand new hospital with surf and turf. Until...they almost die. But, then it's too late. Hey, they have to lower the RN pay to do the fluff and buff stuff that attracts the patients. It's a sorry state of affairs isn't it?

LasVegasRN · Jan 7, 2003

Nurse Nevada - sorry, but the thread title is misleading. The hospitals have not lowered the pay scales for staff nurses - they have lowered the pay rates for agency staff. They are INCREASING pay scales for staff in order to retain and not have to use agency nurses so much.

Big difference.

-jt · Jan 7, 2003

speaking of HCA..... the founder of HCA is the father of cardiac surgeon/US Senator Frist. Senator Frist (Republican) has just been elected to replace Senator Lott as Majority Leader in the Senate. If the likes of HCA & other profit-driven healthcare corporations didnt have friends in high places before, now the fun really begins.

Sally_ICURN · Jan 8, 2003

Originally posted by flowerchild
The anti trust lawsuits in my state against HCA/Columbia failed. The state decided they really didn't do anything wrong.

Sorry for my ignorance, but are these "anti trust" lawsuits different or separate from the medicare fraud and civil suits that were brought against HCA/Col? They are paying a couple of billion in fines for those suits.

http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/corporate/pr/pr002934.php3

Orginally posted by -jt
If the likes of HCA & other profit-driven healthcare corporations didnt have friends in high places before, now the fun really begins.

And I have read articles (can't find them now) where Frist denies his participation in any part of HCA/Columbia. He claims that the "business" was run solely by his father and brother and that he took a different direction in life that was seperate from the family business. YEA RIGHT! He's got 25 million in stock in HCA and his wife has got 1 million. How does that pig live with himself? This is an interesting article: http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/healthcare/pr/pr002935.php3

How can someone like this be in the position that he's in? Why does our government turn a blind eye? People don't realize or don't care or are ignorant to the fact that the politicians that represent them are crooks and are/have been ripping them off.

I feel ashamed that he's a cardiothoracic surgeon let alone that he holds the most powerful Republican seat in the Senate.

~Sally