6,500 Nurses to Go Out on Strike 09/20/19 in Four States

5 hours ago, adnrnstudent said:

These fill in nurses crossing the picket line for $840 a day in Chicago. Good money now, but don’t let those 2200 nurses see your face.  Don’t cross a picket line.

Who is going to care for patients, though?  People are still sick, and they need nurses. 

Strikes still have an impact because the hospital has to pay so much more for the temporary workers.  Also the hospital will be losing money from running below capacity, cancelling elective procedures, etc.  

I'm union and proud of it, but if my loved one were lying in a hospital bed, I would want someone to cross that line to care for him or her.

20 hours ago, Kooky Korky said:

Right on!  It's just too bad that nurses give notice of their intent to strike.

What really needs to happen is that Management gets caught with having to work the floors because of the nursing equivalent of "blue flu".

they need to feel the pain.

If they didn't give notice, who is going to suffer?  It's not admin.

It's the nurses who were on shift when the strike started, and can't leave without replacements because that actually WOULD be patient abandonment. 

It's the patients who are left without competent nurses.  As much as I like to daydream about management donning scrubs and working the floor, most of them have been away from the bedside too long to really be safe, even if they do still have RN after their names.

According to one CBS news source:

Quote

"To keep the hospital running during the strike, the University of Chicago Medical Center brought in hundreds of temporary nurses, and officials said they had to give them a five-day guarantee, so the striking nurses won't be back at work until Wednesday, when contract negotiations resume."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/university-of-chicago-nurse-strike-2200-nurses-walk-off-job-today-2019-09-20-live-updates/

Quote

 

The University of Chicago will be paying replacement nurses $4,200 each to fill in for the nurses who went on strike Friday, according to a recruiting notice obtained by CBS 2.

The hospital administration is working with U.S. Nursing Corp, a Colorado-based company that specializes in providing medical staff to hospitals during labor disputes. The nurses will be guaranteed 60 hours of work for at least five days at $70 an hour.

 

https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2019/09/20/university-of-chicago-nurses-strike-2/

I wonder if the hospital ever considered spending that money to pay for more staff to provide safer staffing ratios and patient care????

37 minutes ago, tnbutterfly said:

I wonder if the hospital ever considered spending that money to pay for more staff to provide safer staffing ratios and patient care????

I suppose it depends if the hospital sees that temporary bump in costs as the price they pay for chronic understaffing.  For a strike to work, the workers have to create an economic disruption big enough for the Powers That Be to consider safer staffing ratios a good return on investment.  The PTB are interested in the ROI - so do they invest in their permanent staff year round or their temporary staff during a strike?

I am an RN at one of the California hospitals that had the strike. The strike was for 24 hours, but Tenet hired strike nurses for 5 days (which is guess is the minimum) so our regular, permanent staff is being called off of their shifts. We work consistently understaffed. Even if we start our day with a full staff, our director delays the start of some of our nurses or sends nurses home early, at the expense of the patients and of our staff. We miss our breaks on a daily basis, and patients wait in the lobby up to hours because our nurses were sent home and we are unable to staff all of our rooms. I hear from coworkers right now that there are more than enough nurses on staff, everyone is getting breaks, everyone is within ratio. If tenet valued its employees enough to make sure we got the same, there wouldn’t have been a strike. They are spending millions on this, just to prove a point, but the ones suffering are the patients because they’re being cared for by nurses who don’t know our unit, don’t know our doctors, and don’t even know where to find supplies in emergent cases. I will be finishing my NP schooling soon, and when I move on, I will never again work for another tenet facility. 

4 hours ago, RNbel209 said:

I am an RN at one of the California hospitals that had the strike. The strike was for 24 hours, but Tenet hired strike nurses for 5 days (which is guess is the minimum) so our regular, permanent staff is being called off of their shifts. We work consistently understaffed. Even if we start our day with a full staff, our director delays the start of some of our nurses or sends nurses home early, at the expense of the patients and of our staff. We miss our breaks on a daily basis, and patients wait in the lobby up to hours because our nurses were sent home and we are unable to staff all of our rooms. I hear from coworkers right now that there are more than enough nurses on staff, everyone is getting breaks, everyone is within ratio. If tenet valued its employees enough to make sure we got the same, there wouldn’t have been a strike. They are spending millions on this, just to prove a point, but the ones suffering are the patients because they’re being cared for by nurses who don’t know our unit, don’t know our doctors, and don’t even know where to find supplies in emergent cases. I will be finishing my NP schooling soon, and when I move on, I will never again work for another tenet facility. 

Thank you for sharing.  More importantly, thank you for standing up for safer staffing.

On the other hand do you want your dad going an additional 15 miles for treatment for his AMI? All ERs and ICUs need to be staffed 24/7/365. The consequences to the community are just too high.

As a young medic stationed at Tripler Army Medical Center in Hawaii I witnessed a nursing strike by the local nurses. This was back in the mid 70s.  The local newspaper wasn't treating them kindly. I recall being in a hardware store and standing in the checkout line while the lady ahead of me chatted with the clerk about those horrible nurses holding their patients hostage for higher wages. I tapped her on the shoulder and said "Excuse me but did you know the people who pick up your garbage are getting paid more than the nurses in the ICUs?" She was appalled.

Those very lucrative wages being paid to the "scabs" are squeezing the management into getting the striking nurses what they are asking. 

 

 

 

Stay strong, stay safe, sisters and brothers.

 

I support you in your stand for realistic nurse patient ratios. I've retired after 40+ years of being expected to work short staffed and overtime.  All the mandatory on Call hours.  

HOLD FAST.  ITS WAY PAST DUE FOR AN UPDATE TO WHAT FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE STARTED.

SHAME ON THE STAND INS. 

Edited Sep 25 by SunCityInsPhysical

On 9/21/2019 at 3:04 PM, adnrnstudent said:

These fill in nurses crossing the picket line for $840 a day in Chicago. Good money now, but don’t let those 2200 nurses see your face.  Don’t cross a picket line.

This has been a big problem of nurses for as long as I can remember (and that's a looonnng time) - nurses not supporting nurses.  In big ways  (crossing picket lines) and in smaller ways (why are you leaving ____ for me to do? - not always spoken but the attitude).

Another thought.  Maybe and hopefully if this Chicago strike gets enough media attention, it just might influence other hospitals to get their acts together.  Wishful thinking?

On my old med surg unit it is ALWAYS 6-8:1. It was NEVER below 6:1 and it was insane! Especially considering the patients had post op vitals and many of them were getting units of blood. It was INSANE. I felt horrible that I could not give the best care. And I was only a tech at the time. They gave us 12-15:1. 

Hahahahahaha yes destroy the hospitals “ palpatine voice “