Why registered nurses at a California hospital plan to hit the picket line in March
A hospital less than an hour south of Sacramento could be without registered nurses for a short time.
The RNs at French Camp’s San Joaquin General Hospital announced Monday that they are planning a two-day strike March 5-7 because they could not reach agreements on safe staffing for patients or on hiring and retention of experienced RNs.
“The nurses at San Joaquin General Hospital know what it is like to face a dangerous nurse staffing crisis, as we lived through it in the not-so-distant past,” said Kelly Mertz, a registered nurse in the trauma department. “We worked with the county to improve working conditions and we have seen those protections translate into better retention and recruitment of experienced nurses who are serving our community. Unfortunately, the county now wants to eliminate many of these improvements, and we know these changes will drive away experienced nurses, which has a negative impact on our patients.”
San Joaquin County officials did not immediately return a Monday evening call for comment about bargaining.
According to a news release issued by the California Nurses Association, the RNs have been bargaining on a new contract with hospital management and the San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors for 15 months. CNA represents roughly 740 registered nurses at the hospital. The nurses say the county is proposing changes that would require nurses to work in nits outside their field of expertise.
“I treat some of the tiniest and most critically ill infants,” said Vicky Hoge, a registered nurse in the pediatric intensive care unit. “Our patients and their families depend on us to come to the bedside with the expertise to care for these very fragile patients. ... What the county is proposing would erode the quality of care we provide the community.”
She and other nurses said they are also concerned that wages are not competitive enough, resulting in 375 nurses leaving the hospital between January 2016 and August 2018. County numbers show it cost more than $8 million to retrain nurses for those positions, the CNA stated in the news release. From January 2016 to December 2018, the county paid out $43 million to retain temporary nursing staff for the hospital.
“It makes no sense for the taxpayers of San Joaquin County to be subsidizing a revolving door of nurses at this hospital,” said Marisa Lozano, a registered nurse in the oncology unit. “It would be far more fiscally responsible to retain the nurses who live in our community and keep them and their families here where they can care for their friends and neighbors.”
The CNA said the planned strike will begin at 7 a.m. March 5 and end at 6:59 a.m. March 7.
