Members of the Service Employees International Union's United Healthcare Workers-West (SEIU-UHW) will go on strike Friday at five Hospital Corporation of America hospitals in California in an effort to target what they call unfair labor practices by the national company.
More than 90 percent of SEIU-UHW members in California have voted to engage in the one-day strike at Good Samaritan Hospital in San Jose, Regional Medical Center of San Jose, Los Robles Hospital and Medical Center in Thousand Oaks, Riverside Community Hospital in Riverside and West Hills Hospital and Medical Center in West Hills.
The strike is scheduled to begin at 6 a.m. Friday, Dec. 3 and end at 6 a.m. Saturday, Dec. 4.
Based in Nashville, Tenn., HCA owns and operates approximately 163 hospitals and 105 free-standing surgery centers in 20 states as well as London, England.
The union members are voicing concerns over patient care, safety and workers’ rights issues at the five hospitals across California. For nearly a year, 2,700 SEIU-UHW members in the HCA hospitals have been seeking a contract with improved staffing, pay and benefits that will recruit and retain experienced caregivers.
“The bottom line for SEIU-UHW members at HCA is patient care," said Susan Denardo, a radiology tech at HCA West Hills Medical Center and Hospital. "We don’t know what management’s bottom line is, but we do know that we’re short-staffed and patients are affected.”
According to the union, HCA management has made “unilateral changes that may put workers and patients at risk, and begun a campaign of threats and intimidation of employees." They say HCA also made changes to staffing and infection control policies that affect patient and employee safety without consulting caregivers.
“Instead of working with us so we can take care of our patients the way we need to and negotiating a contract that improves staffing and care, HCA is going after our coworkers by threatening and intimidating them, and violating their rights," said Lauren Stewart-Roberts, a CNA at HCA Riverside Community Hospital. "We need HCA to drop these illegal tactics and negotiate with us in good faith for real improvements."
In collective bargaining, caregivers proposed a staffing matrix that has been implemented at other hospitals to improve staffing and ensure patient and caregiver safety. HCA management rejected the proposal.
“We are so short-staffed that I recently ended up being a sitter for four patients," said Fely Ta-a, a CNA at HCA Regional Medical Center San Jose. "The hospital would not pay to have the one-to-one ratio that our patients need, even when one got very agitated and had to be restrained. We need a staffing matrix that guarantees we have enough caregivers on nursing floors.”