5,000 RNs at 10 Northern California Hospitals Will Strike Over Patient Care Problems

10-Day Strike Begins March 21—Sutter Health Faces Mass Walkout Over Understaffing and Patient Safety

Some 5,000 registered nurses at 10 Bay Area facilities today will file an announcement of a 10-day strike beginning March 21st , caused by serious problems with patient care, medical redlining, and healthcare for nurses, the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee reports. 

Sutter Health is the focus of the walkout, as 4,000 RNs at eight Sutter facilities will conduct their third, and longest, strike.  Nurses from Fremont-Rideout Health Group (FRHG)  in Marysville and Yuba City and Contra Costa Regional Medical Center (CCRCM)  in Martinez will also file a 10-day strike announcement in an attempt to improve patient care at those facilities.  The FRHG strike will last one day, while the CCRMC strike will last three days.

Thousands of RNs have struck Sutter facilities twice already.  The key reason for the walkouts is the pattern of patient safety risks caused by Sutter’s refusal to schedule RNs to care for patients when nurses are on legally-mandated meal or rest breaks.  Such scheduling gaps leave patients unattended and at risk for sentinel events.  Nurses are also concerned over Sutter’s practice of medical redlining by closing three hospitals in medically underserved areas (St. Luke’s Hospital in San Francisco, San Leandro Hospital, and Sutter Santa Rosa Medical Center), and their refusal to agree to fair settlements on issues of healthcare and retiree healthcare and pensions. 

Some 500 RNs work at the hospital and clinics in Contra Costa Regional Medical Center, where they are facing an offer that contains inadequate patient safety protections and sub-standard health proposals.  The 450 RNs at FRHG have yet to be able to reach a first contract with the facility, which was recently rated as “poor” and “below average” by the California Healthcare Foundation in terms of patient care.  Nurses there protest management’s refusal to commit in the contract to following California’s safe RN-to-patient ratios law, as well as the policy of unsafe floating, where nurses are sent to units outside their areas of expertise.

“Sutter cannot expect RNs to sit idly by and watch the ongoing problems with patient care and patient safety at our hospitals.  When there are not enough nurses, patients are put at risk, period.  We don’t want to strike, but our ethical obligation as patient advocates demands it,” added Sharon Tobin, an RN at Mills-Peninsula Hospital.

“FRHG has shown a complete disrespect for the nurses, for the patients that our proposals are written to protect, and for the laws that guarantee the rights of workers to negotiate a fair contract in an atmosphere free of intimidation and harassment,” said Heather Avalos, an RN at Rideout Memorial Hospital.

“The County needs to plan for the future. That means retaining the nurses we have and recruiting new ones. County has low wages but has been able to compete for nurses with a good benefits package. Now they’re contemplating gutting this benefits package, including major cuts to our current medical benefits.   What nurse is going to come and work here if the wages are the lowest in the Bay Area and they are given just pennies to purchase their own healthcare,” said Kelley Taylor, an RN at Contra Costa Regional Medical Center.

Patient Care Problems at Sutter

The key area of dispute at Sutter is patient care protections. Sutter has rejected the nurses’ proposal for dedicated meal-and-break relief RNs as well as for trained lift teams available 24 hours a day to protect patients from falls and nurses from back injuries. Another important concern is a proposal that all patients are assigned directly to an RN.  Sutter RNs are also incensed by the chain’s attempt at most facilities to cut back healthcare benefits and attempt to shift cost, premiums, and fees onto the nurses, both those currently working and retirees. 

Sutter Hospitals Affected

Sutter hospitals affected are St. Luke’s Hospital and California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, San Leandro Hospital, Alta Bates-Summit Medical Center in Berkeley and Oakland, Mills-Peninsula Health Services in Burlingame and San Mateo, Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley, Sutter Delta in Antioch, and Sutter Solano in Vallejo.