Nurses' strike is about preserving San Bernardino County patient care

[herring_RN, ASN, BSN]

We are registered nurses. Many nurses grew up in San Bernardino County, attended local nursing schools, and raised families here. We are your neighbors. We made the decision to dedicate our professional lives to providing quality care to our community in a public health setting. We wanted to work where they took in everyone who needed care — the county.

Eroding conditions jeopardize the county’s mission statement of “providing quality health care — to the residents of San Bernardino County” at its safety net hospital and outpatient clinics.

The essential element in the ability to provide quality health care is the expertise of the registered nurses. Sadly, the county is not investing in its loyal, experienced registered nurses — from its hospital, Arrowhead Regional Medical Center, to its many outpatient clinics, the county detention centers, juvenile halls, and public-health programs.

Several hundred San Bernardino County registered nurses voted to strike...

... That decision did not come easily. Strikes are a last resort for nurses. When we’re out on a strike line, we’re worried about our patients inside.

To ensure the well-being of our patients we have a Patient Protection Task Force to make a professional nursing assessment if emergency assistance is requested after the strike begins and will assign a nurse to stabilize the patient if necessary.

Ironically, that’s why we have to go outside. RNs have a legal and ethical obligation to advocate for their patients and ensure they receive the care they need and deserve 365 days a year. That’s just not happening.

Recent years have been difficult for county nurses and patients. We are providing care for increasingly sicker patients while losing more of our most experienced RNs to area hospitals every year. Especially troubling is that the majority of these RNs worked in specialized units where safe care depends on having highly experienced staff....

... With an operating surplus of $166 million for the fiscal year ending in June and an expectation of increased revenue, the county does not need to shortchange its dedicated, experienced RNs, and the public’s health.

Rather than invest in retention of experienced nurses, the county is being financially irresponsible. The county spends $50,000 to train a new hire and budgeted $15 million dollars for temporary registered nursing staff between 2013 and 2015.

Nurses have endured a six-year salary freeze. To recruit and retain seasoned nurses we must close the massive 30 percent gap — up to 52 percent for the most experienced nurses — in compensation between nearby hospitals and the county. ..

Recently graduated nurses, who find a first job with the county, and now make up 20 percent of the workforce, repeatedly move on to better standards at other hospitals. As a result, the county has essentially become a training center for the area’s private hospitals. Taxpayers are subsidizing the private sector hospitals by training the RNs for them.

The loss of experienced nurses leads to a number of patient safety problems.

For example, the county wants to require nurses to work in units far outside their area of clinical expertise, such as having maternity care RNs care for very different extremely ill cancer or intensive care patients. The county restricted this unsafe practice in our prior contract, but is now demanding this protection be eliminated to make up for inadequate staffing and high turnover...

http://www.sbsun.com/opinion/20141207/nurses-strike-is-about-preserving-san-bernardino-county-patient-care-guest-commentary

[toomuchbaloney]

Thank you for this article, it was a good read.

Many of us worry for the future of nursing and health care in our country if we don't begin to change our focus.

[xoemmylouox, ASN, RN]

If we allow these poor standards to continue things will only get worse. I applaud those who strike to protect their patients and themselves. I hope this brings about change for them. Best of luck with this. Know at least this nurse stands with you.

[cdgoldilocks]

I am a San Luis Obispo County Public Health Nurse. We are in a similar situation, but we are in a bargaining unit with other people besides nurses.....

It costs soooo much $$ to live here. We are a vacation destination, much like people go to lake Arrowhead to vacation, people come to our community to retire, vacation. My position was once a "coveted" position. It was once a position new nurses had to "work up to". Now, new grads take these jobs because no one else wants this low pay. Once they get a little bit of experience, or another opportunity comes along.... they leave. Our benefits are so expensive, they pay is low, and our pension is now terrible for new hires. "We" (the nurses) want to hold our for more of a cost of living increase. The others in our bargaining unit, which are like clerical, etc, I am told are afraid and want resolution. I am hoping to get enough people fired up to keep fighting, or to bring a nurses union in to unionize JUST nurses and pull us OUT of the union we are in.

I wish you success in your endeavor. Nurses and the people in your community DESERVE wellness.

[BR157]

These problems with inexperience have already been addressed in San Bernardino and San Obispo which is why the Fire Departments are stepping up to care for patients recently discharged by the hospitals and establishing clinical services. So, rest assured while nurses strike, the Paramedics will still be there to care for the community needs of the patients. Community Paramedics will be the future.

[lindarn]

Contact the NNOC. They have been a very positive force in No Cal. I know that So Cal. tends to be anti union, but that will not get you anyplace, with the nursing glut that was purposefully engineered. Mainly to dis-empower the nursing profession of the little power and strength that we have accomplished.

You are going to have to fight tooth and nail, but it will be worth it. Look that it has done in No Cal.

JMHO and my NY $0.02

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN (ret)

Somewhere in the PACNW