More than 3,000 nurses at six Oregon hospitals were on picket lines for a second day Wednesday holding signs that read “Patients before profits” and “We want to keep our hospitals safe” as they continued to demand fair wages and better treatment.
Nurses are on strike at six health care facilities across the state, from St. Vincent Medical Center in Portland in the north to Medford Medical Center in the south.
Organizers said it was the largest nurse strike in state history, and Providence stressed that no patients’ health was at risk because it had hired contract workers to temporarily fill vacancies.
Scott Palmer, chief of staff for the Oregon Nurses Association, said nurses have been negotiating since December but they “have not been able to get Providence to a fair contract.”
Palmer said the negotiations focused on “recruitment and retention issues,” including salary, benefits and adequate staffing standards.
Jennifer Gentry, chief nursing officer at Providence Central, said the organization contracted with a company to provide replacement staff to ensure patient care was not affected. Gary Walker, a spokesman for the company, said the strike did not affect their facilities. On Tuesday, they treated about 800 patients in the emergency room and did not delay any elective surgeries.
Palmer said the striking nurses want people to get the care they need, but they want caregivers to be supported.
“It’s really important for people to know from nurses and the American Nurses Association that if you’re sick, don’t delay getting medical care,” Palmer told The Associated Press. “Patients should seek hospital care immediately if they need it. Obviously, We nurses would rather provide this care, but Providence forces our hand, and instead we find ourselves on the picket line advocating for these patients.
Palmer said staffing and competitive salaries were the focus of their requests. When staffing is low, he said, nurses can’t eat lunch, there are delays in taking patient calls and it’s even difficult to find time to go to the bathroom.
Palmer said the ongoing stress has led to record levels of burnout among nurse practitioners.
“We know that nurse practitioners are choosing to leave the profession in droves, and that nurse practitioners are suffering moral harm from being unable to provide the quality care that their patients deserve because, at least in Oregon, the main reason is unsafe staffing levels,” he said. explain.
Providence Nursing Officer Gentry said Oregon has passed a “safe staffing” law and the company is following the law’s staffing requirements.
Palmer said the nurses wanted Providence to write those staffing levels into the contract, but Gentry said they offered to say in the contract that they would comply with the law, rather than include specific numbers, in case the law changes.
The strike is expected to last until Thursday.
