Thousands of union nurses rise up across U.S. to demand safe staffing now
We’ve all seen news stories of patients languishing in feces, waiting multiple days for a bed in emergency departments, or acquiring preventable infections while in the hospital. Ask hospital employers, and they’ll claim they are suffering through a “nursing shortage.” But nurses know “staffing crisis” and “nursing shortage” must not be mistaken for the same thing. More than a million actively licensed registered nurses are not currently employed as RNs. Constant staffing cuts, driven by employer greed, simply drive them away.
“The United States is not short of nurses, we are short of nurses willing to jeopardize their licenses, their moral integrity, and their patients’ safety by working in subpar conditions,” said National Nurses United (NNU) member Matthew Clark, an RN in the intensive care unit at Ascension Seton Medical Center in Austin, Texas. Clark and his colleagues, including nurses who work at two Ascension hospitals in Wichita, Kan., held historic strikes June 27 over the Catholic health care giant’s refusal to bargain a contract that would help correct unsafe staffing conditions.
And Ascension nurses aren’t the only ones rising up. NNU members held a national day of action on Tuesday, June 13, to demand that their employers address the current nationwide staffing crisis by ensuring there is safe staffing on all units at all times and that nurses have the resources they need to care for their patients.
“We had already seen cutbacks on staffing well before the pandemic,” said Clark, whose unit has been so regularly understaffed that patients have faced an uptick in bed sores due to the inability of overwhelmed RNs to reposition them often enough. He and his colleagues often work 12-plus hour shifts without a meal or rest break. And sometimes, short staffing can literally mean the difference between life and death for patients — like the day Clark and his colleagues had to scramble to find enough staff to transition a patient from CPR to an advanced form of life support called ECMO.
“Every minute that is prolonged in having to do CPR and chest compressions is directly equated to less chance of survival,” said Clark. But Ascension didn’t have enough experienced staff on hand to start ECMO, and there was a long delay. “I don’t know what the outcome was, but I do know that this instance of trying to issue this critical response — one that we are supposed to be known for — was completely inadequate.”
Ascension, the nation’s largest Catholic hospital system, has no excuse for cutting corners on staffing. A 2021 investigation by STAT News found that Ascension is building a private equity operation, “using its wealth to invest like a Wall Street firm.” Ascension CEO Joseph Impiccichi made over $13 million in 2021 according to 990 IRS tax filings. Sen. Tammy Baldwin even recently blasted Ascension, questioning whether its $1 billion in private equity investments, in partnership with private equity firm TowerBrook Capital Partners, were actually going to help patients — and specifically to achieve its mission of helping the most vulnerable patients.
RNs across the country see this story play out day after day. Musu King, an emergency department RN at Lincoln Hospital in the Bronx and a member of NNU affiliate New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA), said in the critical care zone of her unit, RNs can safely care for two critically ill patients. Instead, it’s typical for these nurses to be overwhelmed with up to seven critically ill patients at once.
“My number one concern is safety for the patients and even for us,” said King. “When patients get frustrated with long wait times, they take it out on us. We are trying to take care of everyone at the same time, and that’s impossible.”
An RN at McLaren Lapeer Region Hospital in Lapeer, Michigan — a member of NNU affiliate Michigan Nurses Association — has experienced such severe under staffing that she spent one shift with seven patient assignments between two completely different units.
“It’s scary. Someone needs oxygen, someone is on a cardiac drip. You’re just worrying about a lot of different things,” said the RN, who preferred not to use her name. “You end up on your feet all night, just poking your head in the door. At that point, you’re just running around trying to make sure everyone is alive.”
According to 990 IRS tax filings, McLaren Health Care CEO Philip Incarnati’s pay increased from about $8.15 million in 2020 to approximately $8.75 million in 2021.
“It’s hard to square the fact that so many health care corporations had their most profitable years during Covid. Where were those resources allocated?” Clark wondered. “My hospital didn’t lose staff because of Covid. They lost staff because of their own refusal to retain their staff.”
To address the staffing crisis, nurses know we must increase RN retention and bring licensed nurses who have left their jobs back to work. To do this, it is critical that the federal government pass legislation and impose regulations that require the hospital industry to provide safe patient care and safe workplaces. Paramount among them is “The Nurse Staffing Standards for Hospital Patient Safety and Quality Care Act,” an NNU-backed bill which would mandate safe nurse-to-patient staffing ratios across the country. NNU is also backing a suite of federal bills to improve patient care and workplace safety.
There’s a positive ripple effect when we have enough staff to safely care for patients; it can reduce workplace violence when patients receive care before they and their families or visitors become agitated. RNs who are not continuously losing colleagues are collectively stronger to advocate for optimal protections at work. And we already know safe staffing limits improve patient and RN health and safety because California passed them decades ago.
Left to their own devices, hospital employers will continue lining their pockets while failing to invest in safe patient care conditions. That’s why nurses are rising up for change.
“Part of the American dream is the prospect that things can be improved for the next generation to come,” said Clark. “We all want to leave this profession better than we had it.”
