Issue link: https://nnumagazine.uberflip.com/i/198531
NewsBriefs RNS DEAL THIRD STRIKE TO SUTTER h ey say th e th ird tim e usually does the job. Some 4,000 registered nurses at eight facilities across Northern California in early March approved their third strike against their employer Sutter Health, fed up with Sutter's "hostile" bargaining stance and refusal to negotiate over key issues for RNs. Unlike their previous two-day strikes, this third will be a 10-day walkout and is intended to up the ante on Sutter. Of paramount importance to registered nurses is resolution of serious patient care and safety issues. These include improvement of staffing by adding break relief RNs so that RNs can take meal and rest breaks while knowing their patients are safely cared for and instituting round-the-clock availability of trained lift teams to help RNs move or maneuver patients without risking injury to themselves or patients. "Sutter is not adequately staffing its units to ensure patient safety or appropriate care," said Genel Morgan, an RN at Mills-Peninsula Health Services and a CNA/NNOC board member. "This is no way to run a hospital T 8 REGISTERED NURSE system. Nurses are concerned over the quality of care our patients are receiving, and we will protect them." RNs are also determined to take care of themselves. Sutter has balked at improving healthcare for current and retiring RNs, and retirement benefits. On several bargaining tables, Sutter has proposed healthcare takeaways that would limit the choices of providers RNs and their dependents could see or require RNs to pay out of pocket for healthcare costs. They also want most retired RNs to accept a limited pot of money to pay for retiree healthcare instead of providing bona fide, ongoing benefits. On pensions, Sutter had not proposed any improvements. Sutter RNs note that hospital systems such as Kaiser Permanente are offering much better retirement medical benefits in a very competitive market during a nursing shortage, and as a result find it easier to recruit and retain nurses. Nurses also take issue with Sutter for wanting to close hospitals in underserved, poorer communities of color—a practice known as medical redlining. After numerous campaigns launched by CNA/NNOC and North Bay community groups, Sutter recently announced it would abandon attempts to close the Santa Rosa Medical Center, a victory which will, among other things, ensure ongoing reproductive healthcare for Sonoma County women. However, St. Luke's Hospital in San Francisco and San Leandro Hospital in the East Bay are two facilities which remain on Sutter's chopping block even though nurses say that cutting off access to acute-care services in those neighborhoods would be a disaster for patients. The ill would be forced to travel much farther for medical care, wait longer at the remaining overburdened hospitals, or give up seeking care altogether— possibly leading to unnecessary deaths. Activism to save St. Luke's Hospital has increased in recent weeks, with RNs, community members, and government officials staging a candlelight vigil Feb. 13 to call CALIFORNIA W W W. C A L N U R S E S . O R G MARCH 2008