National Nurses United

NewsBriefs_DEC 12/22/10 6:20 PM Page 8 WRAP-UP REPORT Veterans Affairs nnu-va chair Irma Westmoreland, RN continued on her visits to NNA-VA units, in December meeting with nurses in Buffalo, N.Y. and Director Bonita Reid to discuss California registered nurses at Sutter Roseville Medical Center, a suburb just outside Sacramento, staged an information picket Dec. 9 to protest serious systemic understaffing that is hurting their ability to safely care for patients. "They are frequently out of compliance with California's safe staffing law, and the people who pay the price are the patients," said Paul Netto, a Roseville RN. The nurses have been working without a contract since July 1, and besides improved staffing, are also pushing for lift teams and better retirement benefits. Iowa registered nurses at two Iowa hospitals, Marshalltown Medical and Surgical Center and Jennie Edmundson Hospital, recently voted to join National Nurses United through the Minnesota Nurses Association. About 123 RNs are represented at Marshalltown, 8 N AT I O N A L N U R S E upcoming changes there. At other sites, assignment despite objection (ADO) training was done by Westmoreland and Abass Wane, labor specialist, this month at the NNU-VA North Chicago unit with Director Thelma Fuentes and at the NNU-VA Des Moines facility with Director Linda Salvini. While at these facilities, they toured the hospitals, meeting many great RNs who verified that staffing problems continue to be prevalent throughout the VA system. One big issue at the North Chicago facility is mandatory comptime. The immediate issue was addressed at the visit. At the Des Moines, Iowa VA, a major issue is unequal pay for nurses in the clinic versus nurses who work on the inpatient units. This is an ongoing issue that has been addressed in several venues without a satisfactory result for the Des Moines RNs. NNU will be looking at ways to correct this inequity. —Staff report From top: Sutter Roseville Medical Center RNs in California picket over unsafe staffing; VA nurses at the North Chicago facility meet. W W W. N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G Registered Nurses Are Tops N urses typically aren't the bragging type, but sometimes we just have to toot our own horn. Or let the Gallup Poll do it for us. For the 11th time, registered nurses have topped the respected opinion group's annual listing of the most trusted and honest professions, dominating almost every year since Gallup started including nurses in this survey in 1999. Some 81 percent of Americans rated registered nurses as having "very high" or "high" honesty and ethical standards, a far greater percentage than the next highest-rated jobs of military officers and pharmacists. Interestingly, nurses ranked highest of all the medical careers in the survey; 10 percentage points above pharmacists and 15 points above doctors. Business executives, members of Congress, and car salespeople ranked at the bottom of the list. "Every year, this poll shows that the public really trusts us to be their advocates and, among all healthcare providers, to look out for their best interests," said Zenei Triunfo-Cortez, RN and a member of the CNA/NNOC Council of Presidents. "We nurses need to live up to those high expectations and fight our hardest on national issues like ratios and healthcare reform. Americans are depending on us and we can't let them down." —Staff report DECEMBER 2010 NADYAPHOTO | ISTOCKPHOTO.COM which is located in Marshalltown in central Iowa, and 200 RNs are represented at Jennie Edmundson, which is located in Council Bluffs near the western border of Iowa. The Minnesota Nurses Association and NNU is glad to welcome these two groups of Midwestern nurses and looking forward to building the RN movement with them in their state.

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