Nurses at Scripps Encinitas voted this week to keep the California Nurses Association as their union representative. The opponents had tried to launch a decertification effort to eliminate CNA but, according to the hospital's anti-union website, CNA won the vote.
So much for all of the predictions that union decertifications will be sweeping the state of California.
While the vote was close, it's not surprizing that a majority of RN's ultimately felt they'd still do better with the union, despite all the controversy with no contract, strikes, etc.
IMHO, I think the hospital made a mistake by enlisting doctors, non-nurses and anti-union nurses from other hospitals to campaign against the union. You risk offending RN's when people who don't do the job, or people who don't even work there, to try to tell you how to vote on your particular job situation. In my opinion, it probably cost the hospital the election.
Anyway ... just thought everybody would like to know the latest news since decertification has been a hot topic in this forum.
I'm not here to fight with anyone. I have a different view of unions than some of you. I have friends at Scripps and depending on the source, we hear or read different things. Very few people are truly objective. I have a personal history with CNA that leaves me a bit biased as well. I admit that. I know a lot of nurses that think CNA is all good, but they are not all good. I encourage people to get all the facts good and bad, positive and negative before they make a decision to affiliate or not. I do not try to tell people what to do, but to investigate fully!
That is it. I will give my opinion, but it is just that my opinion. CNA is all about money and political power, NOT patient advocacy!!!
I do consider the source...of your information, as well.
It would be interesting to see if you ever have an opinion on any other topic on this BB.
I have posted on other topics. And I belong to other BBs where I share about lots of things.
I happen to be passionate about this subject because Nursing is one field that cannot be "out sourced" and we are taking a hit all over the country by union organizers who have lost steelworkers etc... We have a giant target on our profession and I am passionate about protecting our profession and our patients, I don't need a union to do either, all they will eventually do is cripple the hospitals as they've crippled the steel industry.
I am truly grateful that you consider the source of my comments as well! I welcome anyone to investigate this subject on their own. I do not fear the truth. I only fear blind ignorance!
I have posted on other topics. And I belong to other BBs where I share about lots of things.
I happen to be passionate about this subject because Nursing is one field that cannot be "out sourced" and we are taking a hit all over the country by union organizers who have lost steelworkers etc... We have a giant target on our profession and I am passionate about protecting our profession and our patients, I don't need a union to do either, all they will eventually do is cripple the hospitals as they've crippled the steel industry.
I am truly grateful that you consider the source of my comments as well! I welcome anyone to investigate this subject on their own. I do not fear the truth. I only fear blind ignorance!
I am not sure what planet you are on, but rather than being out- sourced as factory workers are, nurses are being INSOURCED by foreign nurses being brought in from other, too often, third world countries. We are being targeted by union organizers, because NURSES ARE TOO DISGUSTED WITH MANAGEMENTS, and getting no where and gaining NOTHING from the hospitals that we that WE KEEP IN BUSINESS. The nurses are calling the unions for help.
As I stated in my previous thread, this is not something that is happening by accident. This is a carefuly thought out plan by the hospital associations, management, and insurance companies. They realize that there is going to be a meltdown of health care in the next decade (with baby boomers retiring). They know full well that to supply health care workers to all of these individuals will take alot of $$$$ to have sufficient nurses to care for them.
So what is their solution? Piss off as many nurses as they can, make their(our) live so miserable that we all quit, which is happening now, and that then allows them to whine to law makers about the "CRITICAL SHORTAGE OF NURSES THAT WE ARE FACING". And that society is going to have to have health care workers to care for all of these people. And the only way there will be enough health care workers to care for these people is to import foreign nures, (who co- incidently, will not complain and demand more $$ and better working conditions. Who can, and will, be deported if they make a fuss, and complain and try to unionize). There is no shortage of nurses. There is a shortage of nurses who will stay in bedside nursing. In other words, the unions aren't ruining nursing, hospital management is ruining health care in this country, and by the way, steel workers did not ruin the steel industry, the greedy steel industry did.
You must have fallen off of the turnip truck if you believe that, or, as I have famously stated on these threads, you must be one of the martyr marys of the nursing profession who will sacrifice everything of their career, lives, etc, and the misguided "passion", about "protecting your patients". Your patients need to be protected from management greed, unsafe staffing, mandatory overtime, and the bean counters who are bound and determined to cut health care to the bone to maxize their profits. Not from unionized nurses. You, as an individual will not be able to stop it. There are few nurses who can. We do not have the education, knowledge, expertise, political clout, and unity, to accomplish what needs to be accomplished. Nursing needs to reform and transform the nursing profession to be the autonomous group that we need to be to control our profession. Others control and define nursing, nursing does not. We are too splintered, and too busy fighting each other to accomplish anything worthwhile. They have us right where they want us- divided, by education, un-educated, (bareful and pregnant), and helpless.
Nurses have fought unioninizing for years, to our detriment. We have never been able to grasp our profession from the individuals who want to control us. Those of us who have figured it out, are out outnumbered by the ones who think that, well someday, they will finally realize how valuable we are. Really. As they pressure Congress to give them more visas, to continue to de- skill our professional practice and allow more unskilled, minimally educated health care workers to take over our professsional practice? Until we no longer have a professional practice to fight for? What would you have nurses do ? I am still waiting to hear this wonderful plan you, and all of the other anti- union nurses have. You haven't come up with one, and you won't. Nurses are not socialized to be in control, assertive, and take command. That is why we are nurses. We are screened by the educators when we take our NLN exams to get into nursing school, are screened out while in school, and when we get into the workforce, we are targeted if we have an assertive bone in our bodies. The nurses who are the natural leaders leave the profession, and the ones who are left, are the ones who are unable to make any effective change.
When you can come up with a workable plan, you can tell me how bad unions are, and your plan can make it better. Until then, I tire of hearing about how bad things are with the only union in this country that has made any meaningful and measurable change in the practice of bedside nursing. That,by the way, is the place where nurses are leaving in droves from.
I am not sure what planet you are on, but rather than being out- sourced as factory workers are, nurses are being INSOURCED by foreign nurses being brought in from other, too often, third world countries. We are being targeted by union organizers, because NURSES ARE TOO DISGUSTED WITH MANAGEMENTS, and getting no where and gaining NOTHING from the hospitals that we that WE KEEP IN BUSINESS. The nurses are calling the unions for help.
As I stated in my previous thread, this is not something that is happening by accident. This is a carefuly thought out plan by the hospital associations, management, and insurance companies. They realize that there is going to be a meltdown of health care in the next decade (with baby boomers retiring). They know full well that to supply health care workers to all of these individuals will take alot of $$$$ to have sufficient nurses to care for them.
So what is their solution? Piss off as many nurses as they can, make their(our) live so miserable that we all quit, which is happening now, and that then allows them to whine to law makers about the "CRITICAL SHORTAGE OF NURSES THAT WE ARE FACING". And that society is going to have to have health care workers to care for all of these people. And the only way there will be enough health care workers to care for these people is to import foreign nures, (who co- incidently, will not complain and demand more $$ and better working conditions. Who can, and will, be deported if they make a fuss, and complain and try to unionize). There is no shortage of nurses. There is a shortage of nurses who will stay in bedside nursing. In other words, the unions aren't ruining nursing, hospital management is ruining health care in this country, and by the way, steel workers did not ruin the steel industry, the greedy steel industry did.
You must have fallen off of the turnip truck if you believe that, or, as I have famously stated on these threads, you must be one of the martyr marys of the nursing profession who will sacrifice everything of their career, lives, etc, and the misguided "passion", about "protecting your patients". Your patients need to be protected from management greed, unsafe staffing, mandatory overtime, and the bean counters who are bound and determined to cut health care to the bone to maxize their profits. Not from unionized nurses. You, as an individual will not be able to stop it. There are few nurses who can. We do not have the education, knowledge, expertise, political clout, and unity, to accomplish what needs to be accomplished. Nursing needs to reform and transform the nursing profession to be the autonomous group that we need to be to control our profession. Others control and define nursing, nursing does not. We are too splintered, and too busy fighting each other to accomplish anything worthwhile. They have us right where they want us- divided, by education, un-educated, (bareful and pregnant), and helpless.
Nurses have fought unioninizing for years, to our detriment. We have never been able to grasp our profession from the individuals who want to control us. Those of us who have figured it out, are out outnumbered by the ones who think that, well someday, they will finally realize how valuable we are. Really. As they pressure Congress to give them more visas, to continue to de- skill our professional practice and allow more unskilled, minimally educated health care workers to take over our professsional practice? Until we no longer have a professional practice to fight for? What would you have nurses do ? I am still waiting to hear this wonderful plan you, and all of the other anti- union nurses have. You haven't come up with one, and you won't. Nurses are not socialized to be in control, assertive, and take command. That is why we are nurses. We are screened by the educators when we take our NLN exams to get into nursing school, are screened out while in school, and when we get into the workforce, we are targeted if we have an assertive bone in our bodies. The nurses who are the natural leaders leave the profession, and the ones who are left, are the ones who are unable to make any effective change.
When you can come up with a workable plan, you can tell me how bad unions are, and your plan can make it better. Until then, I tire of hearing about how bad things are with the only union in this country that has made any meaningful and measurable change in the practice of bedside nursing. That,by the way, is the place where nurses are leaving in droves from.
Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN
Spokane, Washington
Lindarn,
With all due respect, you obviously have had some bad experiences in the past with management that leaves you absolutely convinced that unions are the only way.....................I would just ask you to think about a few of the things you just wrote........
First of all......yes, we are insourcing Foreign nurses and actually, I'd be interested to know the statistics on how many of those nurses are wanting the union and courted by the unions. I think the numbers would be very high.
Secondly, I spent a large part of my nursing career in management and I can assure you that I NEVER thought of or worked with the hospital association, insurance agencies or anyone else to "piss off as many nurses as I could so they would quit."
Now that I have been a staff nurse for a number of years, I strongly feel that the staff nurse is THE answer to all of our problems and if hospitals would LISTEN to staff nurses, they would get the answers they need to move forward.
Your anger and frustration is understandable and heard. I agree that management frequently has let us down by not listening or taking us seriously. They spend WAY too much money on consultants, union busters and surveys when all they really need to do is LISTEN to staff and then ACT on suggestions, complaints, etc.
I just don't think the union is going to come along and answer all of those problems for you. They will just take your money, bring you out on strike when they don't get what they want and use your money to grow across the country, leaving you to fend for yourself. The biggest problem I see with the unions and many of my colleagues agree with me, is the fact that they use divisive tactics, non-nurse organizers, their Executive Director is not a nurse and they use unprofessional means to try to show hospitals in a bad light to the very public that uses them...........Then they want nurses who work at the hospitals they have maligned, to join their darn union...................Go figure that one out.
I think what we all need to do is LISTEN to each other as I have listened to you. I appreciate the points you have made but choose not to agree with them all. I do, however, support your right to have them and to have the freedom to express them.
I don't approve of unions, but I have personally seen how For profit groups like Tenet have "manufactured" a nursing crisis to suit their needs.
Hahnemann hospital in Philadelphia, a Tenet hospital. The ratios on the MS floor and the conditions that the nurses work in are abysmal. The place gets a lousy rep even among travelers ...so much so no one wants to work there. So what do they do???? They recruit large numbers of Canadian travelers to work on the telemetry unit, deliberately overstaffing it. As travelers are first to be floated, the nurses get floated repeatedly to MS... so much so that they rarely spend time on the tele floor.
MCP hospital, also a Tenet facility. Shifts routinely are short, and there was a great deal of mandated overtime. The one benefit..the hospital has to pay double for the mandated time. The hospital decides to use 9/11 paranoia and say that the mandated OT for emergencies should be paid as regular time. They want understaffed shifts considered as "an emergency". They also want no limits on mandating for "emergencies".
Interestingly, I tried to get an assignment there (prior to knowing it's problems). After repeated phone calls and claims of "she didn't call" to my recruiter and "we lost your info" to me, I took an assignment at another facility. There, I spoke to numerous nurses, travelers and nontravelers, some of the best in the business. And virtually anyone that had applied to MCP told the same story. One of the local nurses that had actually worked there had gotten the same run around. However, she was familiar with the manager, who contacted her directly and told her to go to orientation...even though HR was still saying the "she didn't call" and "I've lost the paperwork".
When MCP nurses went out on strike, over issues like the mandated OT, the hospital tried to close. To my understanding, it has.
Many of the hospitals that have staffing problems have brought them on themselves by bad behavior, poor conditions and mistreatment of staff. And while I choose to vote with my feet (leave a lousy job) rather than support unions, I do agree that many facilities manipulate the system to create a shortage.
i've seen nurses only post in ob/gyn, crna, psych or school nurse forums who never post elsewhere on allnurses. 
caroladybelle, BSN, RN
5,486 Posts
And Thank you for more of your antiunion postings. We hear very little else from you.