Unions anyone?

Specialties Geriatric

Published

Hello everyone,

I've been doing alot of reading in these boards and I'm amazed at the unfair treatment we nurses are tolerating with understaffing and being forced to take responsibility for not only big things out of our control but even for the most minor mishaps.

I've been thinking of starting a union but I don't know the first thing about how to start. Does anyone have any suggestions or know where to get some info? I can't believe we are putting up with this in LTC and something has to be done. I'm usually not an activist but I feel so strongly about this and I can't get it out of my head.

Thanks,

Vonique

"And as for the posters who think the nursing homes are making a huge profit, think again"

Oh, the poor nursing home owners! Let's help them dry their tears, boo hoo.....

Yes they DO make huge profits! That is why they are in it. And the DONs and administrators and CEOs also make 5 times what we make! Yet, they want the staff nurses to sign in a million areas of documentation, that way, when there is an error or a doubt, the nurse gets it up the you know what! Even though it was not his/her fault since

they were expected to do 5 hours of work in just 1.

Sorry, but that's the way it is.

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Specializes in Gerontology, Med surg, Home Health.

That's NOT the way it is everywhere. I see the financial statements of my company every month...and every month we are losing money. And, frankly, since the administrator and director of nursing have much more responsibility they should be paid more.

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"And as for the posters who think the nursing homes are making a huge profit, think again"

Oh, the poor nursing home owners! Let's help them dry their tears, boo hoo.....

Yes they DO make huge profits! That is why they are in it. And the DONs and administrators and CEOs also make 5 times what we make! Yet, they want the staff nurses to sign in a million areas of documentation, that way, when there is an error or a doubt, the nurse gets it up the you know what! Even though it was not his/her fault since

they were expected to do 5 hours of work in just 1.

Sorry, but that's the way it is.

What do they do with these "huge profits" ?? Administrators should make more then the staff. You would expect that if you were an administrator. Regulatory agencies (medicare, Jacho, HFAP,etc) are the reasons there is so much documentation. It is required to get payment or the highest reimbursement for the patients care. Documentation also protects you the nurse if you were to get sued . Reimbursement monies keep your place of business running , pays your wages, keeps you employed. There are many nurses that can not find jobs. I wonder why so many nurses complain about there working conditions but continue to stay ?

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Well, maybe you are right when it comes to the smaller nursing homes, but I'm sure the larger corporations still rake in substantial gains. I understand the DON and administrator should make more because they have more responsibility, but I just wish they were a little more supportive toward the staff.

"I wonder why so many nurses complain about there working conditions but continue to stay ? "

I'm sure they stay because if they had to make a choice between feeding their children and working in a rathole or having the kids go without they would choose the former any day. The nursing home where I work has a large turnover of nurses. Some stay as little as two days. I have only been there five months but already I've seen at least six or seven nurses come and go, mostly staying a couple of months. Once another position opens up somewhere else, they are gone..............

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Specializes in Gerontology, Med surg, Home Health.

You shouldn't let your bad experience in that particular facility make you think all facilities are bad or all managers are uncaring, evil people. I support my staff in every way. They told me the old DON would believe anything any of the patients said and would fire people without any investigation. They were all told they were stupid. That is no way to treat people...my nurses know they can count on me to stand behind them. I investigate when I need to and if they are in the wrong of course they are counseled but they trust me to do what's right. They don't think they need a union because they are treated fairly by the management.

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Specializes in Assisted Living nursing, LTC/SNF nursing.
You shouldn't let your bad experience in that particular facility make you think all facilities are bad or all managers are uncaring, evil people. I support my staff in every way. They told me the old DON would believe anything any of the patients said and would fire people without any investigation. They were all told they were stupid. That is no way to treat people...my nurses know they can count on me to stand behind them. I investigate when I need to and if they are in the wrong of course they are counseled but they trust me to do what's right. They don't think they need a union because they are treated fairly by the management.

I wish my Supervisor and DON would stand behind the nurses more. Your danged if you do and danged if you don't when it comes to residents and family complaints. They always have the "you should have done this, you should have done that," mentality but they weren't there in that particular position at that time and always believe the embelished statement from the resident/families. Oh, and it always looks so nice on your yearly evaluation that you had no idea about but find out during that evaluation, then when a place your are thinking of applying at wants to look at your evaluations, you feel like a failure since that is right there to see and nothing much about the good you do. Sorry about this, not really a situation about unions, although I support the union my company has, although I am an RN and not covered and since a staff RN, am really on the bottom of food chain it seems.

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Specializes in Gerontology, Med surg, Home Health.

Wow...I've never made a bad comment on someone's yearly eval out of the blue. If there was a problem they would surely know about it before that and would have had some teaching/training/counseling and a chance to improve.

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I can tell you that my facility is not making much of a profit. We do more than break even, but rake it in? Hells, no.

My DNS probably makes 40% more than I. And it wouldn't be worth the extra money to me to take on the stress she is under.

I hear a lot of grumbling about their alleged bonuses yada yada yada. Lemme tell you it's nonsense. Utter nonsense.

Now, I have had horrible managers who would throw someone under the bus rather than find the root cause of the issues or, Heaven forfend, accept that their relative (and in a small town believe that's rampant) messed up, but a union doesn't protect you from lousy bosses. So you go in and are miserable but can't be fired.

A big problem is that we are still reimbursed at rates set when residents were far less frail and dependent and flat-out demented. Almost every one of my residents has a pysch diagnosis in addition to multiple morbidities. In my area the base rate is $170 a day. For room and board and nursing and ADL care. Anything their insurance doesn't pick up - special medications, etc. - have to be picked up by us.

And I don't need CNAs who don't show up repeatedly protected. I do not call in. If I do you can bet I am hooked up to an IV or have a cast on. Halloween weekend I was on as supervisor (every third) and took a med cart because of short-staffing because we ended up staffed at the minimum to start with. Two floor nurses are out with serious conditions and another one was airlifted to the best hospital here with a major MI last Friday. After call-outs we were down to 6 aides in the building on evenings for a census of 120. Who does that to their coworkers?

Bah.

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