Rayleen Gentry is used to making tough choices.
As a respiratory therapist in the neonatal intensive care unit at St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood, she says those decisions are often dictated by a severe staffing shortage.
“We can never find adequate staffing,” the 43-year-old Los Angeles resident said. “We have patients who need their IVs changed, but they’ll end up waiting for hours waiting to be seen — or won’t be seen at all during our shift.”
Meanwhile, they could be sitting in their own waste, which increases the chance of bedsores and infection.
That scenario and countless others like it prompted an estimated 1,800 workers at St. Francis and three other local Prime Healthcare hospitals to kick off a five-day unfair labor practices strike on Monday, Oct. 9.
Armed with picket signs reading, “Bargain in good faith and protect patient safety,” and “Our patients deserve safe care,” employees marched in front of the four Prime facilities to get their message out.
Chronic understaffing, they say, is impacting patient care while management fails to address the crisis.
Their walkout closely follows a three-day, multistate strike by 75,000 Kaiser Permanente workers that ended Friday. Those employees — including 23,000 in Southern California — have also called for increased staffing.
The latest strike is affecting Prime operations at St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood, Centinela Hospital Medical Center in Inglewood, Garden Grove Hospital Medical Center and Encino Hospital Medical Center.
The licensed vocational nurses, certified nursing assistants, medical assistants, ER techs and others are represented by SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West. Their contracts expired in June and August and no additional bargaining sessions have been scheduled.
At St. Francis, 600 registered represented by the United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals also joined in Monday for their own week-long strike….
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