WASHINGTON -Hundreds of nurses and supporters from around the country picketed in the nation’s capital on Wednesday to demand a staffing increase, which they say will provide better patient care. It’s the latest in a series of nationwide nurse protests. The rally comes during National Nurses Week, bringing nurses to Washington for lobbying on Capitol Hill.
The site of the picket line was the Washington Hospital Center, which is in contract negotiations with its union, Nurses United of the National Capital Area. Many nurses are saying the staff shortage at the level-one, shock-trauma center can risk the safety of patients.
In Minnesota, nurses from the Minnesota Nurses Association picketed at three major hospitals in the area May 6. There have also been protests in Philadelphia and California within the past month.
Stephen Frum, a registered nurse, works at the Washington hospital, the same place he was born. He has worked there for 10 years and is assigned to the Burn Center.
“On my unit our target was to have seven nurses per shift for a 10-bed unit and recently we’ve gone to six nurses,” he said.
Nurses United represents 1,600 registered nurses in the Washington area. The union calls the picket a national movement and says good benefits attract good employees, and if pensions are cut the hospitals could lose experienced nurses.
“It makes me very sad that after all of these decades of working so hard to get a decent wage and decent benefits, they want to take it all away or at least slash it,” said Dottie Hararas, president of Nurses United.
The 63-year-old registered nurse started her career at Washington Hospital Center as a student nurse and has worked there for 46 years. Hararas insists that money isn’t an issue for the hospital when it comes to the low staffing levels and potential benefit cutbacks.
“Our benefits analysts told us the hospital is in very good shape financially. They simply don’t want to give us the benefits that we deserve and we work so hard for,” said Hararas.
The Washington Hospital Center is the largest private non-profit medical center in the nation’s capital and one of the largest hospitals in the mid-Atlantic region, according to its website. The hospital released a statement explaining the contract proposals are works in progress.
“We are committed to reaching agreement on a reasonable but sustainable contract that recognizes the nurses’ central and valuable contribution,” the statement said.
The protest comes weeks after negotiations between the union and hospital failed to reach an agreement.