The California Nurses Association (CNA) has been in the forefront of trying to protect Americans from abuses from Big Insurance and cost-cutting malpractice by huge medical corporations, over and above the day-to day care they provide their patients. Now they are involved in a labor dispute over patient care protection.
The sudden release of stored energy could easily describe earthquakes, of which we are very familiar in California. But this week, tremors of a different sort will shake the state from north to south.
The sudden release of pent up frustrations from more than 23,000 registered nurses at 34 Northern and Central California hospitals will explode to the surface in a one-day strike on Thursday, September 22.
The work stoppage affects two of California’s largest and most profitable hospital chains, Sutter Health and Kaiser Permanente, as well as Children’s Hospital Oakland.
“The strike at Sutter comes after nine months of failed negotiations,” Deborah Burger, R.N., told me. Burger is president of National Nurses United and co-president of its affiliate, the California Nurses Association.
“We staunchly refuse to be silenced on patient-care protections,” added Sharon Tobin, writing in a CNA press statement. Tobin is a 24-year R.N. at Sutter Mills-Peninsula in Burlingame, Calif. “A common theme throughout management’s proposals is removing our presence on committees that address important patient-care issues and nursing practices.
“Sutter doesn’t want to hear about anything that might cut into their huge profits.”… [emphasis added]
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Once again, organized labor is standing in the gap on to protect Main Street Americans from the ravages of corporate greed. I fully support the CNA and urge you to do likewise.
8 Responses to “Support California Nurses!”
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“A common theme throughout management’s proposals is removing our presence on committees that address important patient-care issues and nursing practices.
They would be absolutely nutty to accept something that so vitally address real patient care issues!
You’re right, Phyllis!
I always fully support all nurses. Even though I’m retired now; once a nurse, always a nurse.
Thank you for your service!
Patient care is always a hot topic no matter where the hospital, Cut backs lead to inadequate patient care and can lead to more serious illness. My stepfather was diagnosed with colon cancer and had undergone either his second or third operation to remove tumours. Of course he had several IVs for what I’m not sure. One of them ‘broke loose’ during the night and wasn’t discovered until morning when he awoke and found his entire bed soaked. An hour later after ringing the nurse, the nurse arrived and fixed the IV. But she didn’t do because she was so pressed with other patients, was to change or have someone change the sheets of his bed. He lay in the wet bed for almost 3 hours after waking. As a result of this, he developed shingles from his neck to the bottoms of his feet, mostly down the back. This was clearly nurses being expected to do too much with too little, if any, suppport.
Added to this in the US is the worry of ‘can I afford this treatment?’ That worry and others add to the dynamics of patient care. And who deals with all these dynamics; who understands how the patient feels; who listens and consoles the patient? Certainly not doctors! Nurses have the pulse. (no pun intended) When I broke my ankle and had to have it surgically repaired, I saw the surgeon when I arrived at the operating room and then did not see a doctor again for over a week, and then it was my own doctor in his office on the day I was discharged, to give me medicine for diabetes which I hadn’t known I had until the day of the operation. So who looked after me — nurses and physios,
Nurses do far more than they are given credit for. In addition to caring for patients they have to work with doctors, some of whom are an arrogant buch. Without nurses, doctors would be nothing.
One of the things I remember from the TV programme “MASH” was the celebration of nurses as the unsung heroes. I stand behind nurses.
Lynn, I’m do sorry that happened to your dad. Nurses are the best!
Nurses deserve our utmost support and encouragement. It is criminal that so many hospitals take them for granted and want to balance their own top=heavy budgets on the backs of these dedicated nurses!
Jack, in this case, it wasn’t about their pay. It was about locking them out of patient care decisions.