union pro or con

i’d rather work without the pompons, hot dogs, cheerleaders, and even the $900.00. there are no nursing care or patient care criteria.

violations:

- the hospital failed to ensure that pharmacists responding to medical emergencies (code blue) were trained and competent before recommending doses of all medications used in a medical emergency. inadwequate dose of narcan recommended - http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/facilities/documents/hospitaladministrativepenalties-2567forms-lnc/2567scrippsmemorial-lajolla-event-1dck11-20080418.pdf

- [color=#4c4c4c]the hospital failed to develop and implement policies a procedures to protect patient safety related to the use of controlled substances. a fentanyl patch was applied following surgery for acute post operative pain which is a contraindication according to the black box warning statement… - http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/facilities/documents/hospitaladministrativepenalties-2567forms-lnc/2567scrippsmemoria-lajolla-event-1dck11-20080307.pdf

- [color=#4c4c4c]the hospital failed to protect a patient's right to considerate and respectful care. the patient had undergone an invasive cardiac procedure, and was lying on a gurney awaiting transfer to an intensive care unit, when the physician who had performed the invasive procedure proceeded to verbally and physically abuse the patient. - http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/facilities/documents/hospitaladministrativepenalties-2567forms-lnc/2567scrippsmemorialhospital-lajolla-event-bm3p11.pdf

- [color=#4c4c4c]the hospital failed to implement policies and procedures to provide for effective surgical service infection control. - http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/facilities/documents/hospitaladministrativepenalties-2567forms-lnc/2567scrippsgreenhospital-lajolla-event-zskg11.pdf

- [color=#4c4c4c]the hospital failed to ensure the patient safety in the surgical department when a patient fell off an operating table during surgery

http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/facilities/documents/hospitaladministrativepenalties-2567forms-lnc/2567scrippsgreen-lajolla-event-hjze11.pdf

- [color=#4c4c4c]the hospital failed to have a safe, effective and timely system for dispensing and administering medications. - http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/facilities/documents/hospitaladministrativepenalties-2567forms-lnc/2567scrippsmercy-sandiego-event-n64l11.pdf

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and ironically, this was still the best in california.

one can only shudder to think what is happening in the rest of the state if this is the best-foot-forward for employees.

is the implication here that the hospital does worse in treating their patients than unionized hospitals that didn't make the list?

are you thinking that i couldn't go to the cdph website and find reams of violations in facilities that are unionized?

We are the only tertiary facility of it's kind to make the Fortune's "100 Best Companies to Work For." Can you explain why the only Cali Hospital to make that list is a non-union hospital?

Too easily...marketing and advertising. Pay to play. Fortune's 100 Best, that's the advertising vehicle they chose. Solucient 100..., Top 100 Hospitals..., 100 Top Hospitals...and the list goes on. Pick one, pay, and use it on your ads. It comes complete with proprietary tools, surveys and press release templates, professional "coaches" and other techniques to manipulate staff and public perception. Hot dogs and cheerleaders, anyone? Scripting and teaching to the test...critical thinkers need not apply!

How are these companies chosen?

The FORTUNE 100 Best Companies to Work For® Companies are selected primarily on the basis of their employees' responses to the Great Place to Work® Trust Index©, a proprietary employee survey developed by the Great Place to Work® Institute. Every company that applied for the FORTUNE "100 Best" list received a confidential complimentary report allowing them to compare their employee survey responses to the "100 Best Companies", allowing them to see where they did well, and where they can further improve their workplaces. In addition, the Institute evaluates materials submitted by the company, including the company's response to the Great Place to Work® Culture Audit©, any accompanying materials submitted by the company for consideration, as well as information gathered from other reputable sources such as media stories about the company.

Yeah, great source...media stories about the company = press release derrivatives from the hospital's corporate partners. The newspaper editors and the hospital board members meet up regularly at the C of C and award each other community service ribbons too. If your hospital board has gobs of extra-money lying around, buying into the big-boy's club by using "proprietary" push-pull surveys and serving the nurses hot dogs on nurses' day...wow, that's showing respect for the profession and a commitment to the patients! Top 100? Stop the presses and hold the buns...the ONLY tertiary care facility of it's kind? Yeah, right!

That being said, you're obviously proud of where you work. I work in a 'Top 100' hospital too. They said it was "the best of the best" at the time, and it's become an even better place to work since we voted to organize and we passed the ratio law in California. I didn't say perfect, but much safer, especially for the patients.

Figures. If the ranking does not fit your ideology, just criticize the methodology.

Show some evidence. Proof of the claim that a union hospital is safer.

I take it back...one other similar tertiary facility was ranked. It was non-union as well.

And I didn't share it as an issue of pride, I was pointing out in line with the theme of the thread that non-union hospitals know how to treat their employees well, even while you trivialize the very things they do that make their employees happy.

I'm just pleased we didn't need a ratio law here; our facilities obviously don't need someone else to tell them how to implement safe staffing.

There is one study from years ago

Could YOU please summarize the conclusion so I won't be accused of bias?

It seems to me that they are acknowledging that they might be able to show correlation, but not causation.

Already done

https://allnurses.com/nursing-activism-healthcare/jona-says-nurses-15369.html

Thanks.

Speculative correlation, but not necessarily causation.

Kind of what I was thinking...just wanted to clarify.

Would it be fair to say that it's not sufficient to actually promote unions for clinical reasons? Possibly a Class III modality? (ACLS-speak).

Thanks.

Speculative correlation, but not necessarily causation.

Kind of what I was thinking...just wanted to clarify.

Would it be fair to say that it's not sufficient to actually promote unions for clinical reasons? Possibly a Class III modality? (ACLS-speak).

In terms of the ACLS-speak analogy, union pro or con, I believe organizing and affiliating with California Nurses Association/NNOC is definitely a Class I treatment modality. Therapeutic and effective as demonstrated by the powerful action agenda of collective patient and professional advocacy. Passage, implementation, and ongoing facility-based enforcement of the RN to patient Ratio Law in California is evidence of their effectiveness.

There's a critical problem with our health care system. I would say that we have a duty to act, once we've recognized that there is a problem. Nursing is an action profession; we have to go back in the room. And sometimes, as social advocates, we have to take our advocacy from the bedside to the halls of justice and the legislature. The so-called nursing shortage has been described as a self-inflicted wound brought on by the industry--as hospitals introduced a "lean and mean" industrial model of restructuring care. Nurses were laid off, their work was fragmented and intensified and many left the profession because of the onerous working conditions that made hospitalization for patients more hazardous and less safe.

What's been described as burnout, is better described by the term "moral distress." Individual RNs, although well-intentioned and most sincere, have been targeted and "picked off" by industry, when they've tried to control their practice and the ability to exercise independent judgement in the planning, implementation, and evaluation of nursing care that's in the best interests of patients against the corporate agenda of bottom line self interest. Moral distress has been described as the physical or emotional suffering that is experienced when constraints (internal or external) prevent one from following the course of action that one believes is right. With more responsibility than authority, nurses often lack the autonomy to do what they feel should be done.

Time and time again, throughout history, the cure for overcoming these constraints, (which are most often abusive and collusive employer practices), is self organization by workers; in other words, they form unions. I think the time for sitting around and just talking about what to do is over.

I like the analogy of the disabled plane; for the purposes of this forum the plane represents the bedside practice of nursing and our health care system; it's going down, dropping like a dead bird from the sky, and you're going with it. Do you put on a parachute, jump, and pull the cord and hope that the chute will deploy? One group of passengers says, "yeah we need to do that, put on the parachutes and take action or we're all going to die".

Another passenger looks up from reading Sky Mall, and says, "Where's the evidence that parachutes save lives? There haven't been any double-blind controlled clinical trials to show that parachutes save lives. If you have some evidence, summarize it for me so I won't be accused of bias. What we need to do is form a parachute safety committee...and, by the way, parachutes are expensive; maybe there's another way to make crashing planes safer so we don't need parachutes." What will be the cause of death of the passengers? Care to speculate? Are parachutes, possibly, only a class III modality, in ACLS speak?

As a direct care RN and as a patient advocate, I feel it's imperative that RNs belong to a union, like CNA/NNOC, that supports the RN's duty and right to advocate in the exclusive interests of patients. I've seen how hospitals may try to cut corners by pushing for early discharge or transfer of patients who still need nursing care based on medical need. Having competent RNs present and available in sufficient numbers to care for patients is a Class 1 modality for sure. A matter of life and death. No speculation, just facts.

http://www.calnurses.org/assets/pdf/ratios/ratios_patient_safety.pdf

http://www.calnurses.org/assets/pdf/ratios/rations_solve_rn_shortage.pdf