National Nurses United

NewsBriefs:March alt 2 4/22/09 3:52 PM Page 5 Big Bargaining for Catholic Chains This Year The Catholic Healthcare West bargaining team (above) is at its largest ever as it negotiates a master contract this year. The Daughters of Charity bargaining team (left) is coordinating bargaining for four facilities. CALIFORNIA | NEVADA 2 009 marks a big year of bargaining for CNA/NNOC registered nurses working for Catholic hospital chains in the West, as contracts for Catholic Healthcare West, St. Joseph Health System, and Daughters of Charity RNs are now being renegotiated. Some common themes and goals for bargaining have emerged: winning enough staffing to meet ratios at all times including during meals and breaks, protections against technology that overrides RN judgment, lift teams, better retirement benefits, and zero tolerance for takeaways. The largest of these groups is the master contract that will cover 10,500 CHW nurses. For the first time, the CHW RN bargaining team will realize its longtime vision of hashing out an agreement that covers both Northern and Southern California hospitals, as well as Nevada—a total of nearly 30 facilities. RNs have patiently coordinated bargaining over the past decade in anticipation of this year. Current contracts end June 30, 2009. APRIL 2009 "It's more power to have one master contract that's bargained at the same time," said Allen Fitzpatrick, a St. Mary's Medical Center RN in San Francisco and chair of the CHW caucus. "It's an issue of justice and fairness where all nurses who work for CHW have the same retirement benefits, the same work standards. There's no reason why nurses at one hospital should have a lesser contract, and we won't stand for it." Besides getting all CHW RNs on an equal footing, the bargaining team has also identified understaffing, the encroachment of technology, the adoption of lift teams, and blocking any takeaways as the priorities in bargaining. On staffing, RNs report that some departments such as ICU have dedicated break relief RNs, while in others, RNs are missing their meals and breaks, or forced to unsafely double up to get any sort of down time. The CHW RNs want dedicated break relief RNs for all units. They are also seeking limits to floating and a no cancellation policy. Reining in inappropriate use of technoloW W W. C A L N U R S E S . O R G gy is another main goal of CHW RNs as the company prepares to implement its CareConnect electronic charting system chainwide. "It's taken over nursing practice," said Kathy Dennis, an RN at Mercy General Hospital in Sacramento and a bargaining team member. "This is computer care and not patient care." Dennis said that with CareConnect, which rolled out at Sacramento CHW facilities in early March, charting that used to take 30 seconds on a piece of paper now takes on average five minutes as RNs have to log in, wait for the system to move from page to page, and wade through screens of checkboxes. Those minutes add up and suck time away from directly seeing, touching, and talking to patients. "The program doesn't tell a story about the patient," said Dennis. "It's a disaster waiting to happen." The CHW bargaining team will be proposing that it build upon existing technology contract provisions to allow RNs to assess new technologies the hospital wants to use before purchasing. Finally, the CHW bargaining team is firm against takeaways in this year's bargaining. "We hope to maintain everything we have and improve all the different areas that affect the practice of nursing to make our lives better and our patients' lives safer," said Lorna Grundeman, an ICU RN at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz, Calif. Some 1,000 registered nurses with St. Joseph Health System are learning from the model CHW RNs have forged and pushing this year to win a single master contract covering three California hospitals: St. Mary REGISTERED NURSE 5

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