The Senate Health and Human Services Committee will hear our safe staffing bill on Tuesday, April 2 at 3:30 p.m.
It’s critical that lawmakers hear from you about why safe staffing will lead to greater patient protection and improved quality care in Nevada.
If you’re able to attend the hearing in person, it is in the Legislative Building, Room 2149, Carson City. If you’re in Southern Nevada, you can attend the meeting and provide testimony via videoconference. The meeting is in Room 4412 of the Grant Sawyer State Building, 555 W. Washington Ave., Las Vegas.
Wear your work uniform and come tell lawmakers why safe staffing is so critical.
Bargaining began March 14 for Desert Springs and Valley hospitals with management from UHS.
SEIU members expressed the need for change in the two hospitals to improve patient care. Specifically, three proposals were unveiled:
Surgical ICU 1:2 Critical Care Unit 1:2
Medical ICU 1:2 Intensive Care Unit 1:2
ER 1:3 Clinical Decision Unit:1:5
Critical Care 1:2 Labor & Delivery 1:2
Well Baby Nursery 1:6 Gero Psych 1:7
Stress Lab 1:1 Med-Surg: 1:5
Intermediate Care 1:3 NICU 1:2
Antepartum 1:3 OB, GYN 1:5
Outpatient Surgery 1:2 Pre-op 1:3
Rehabilitation 1:5
Discharge Unit / Chest Pain Center 1:4
Endoscopy 1:2 (Procedural) 1:1
Postpartum 1:8 (1:4 couplets) 1:6 (mothers only)
Post Anesthesia Care Unit Unstable 1:1 Stable 1:2
Discharge Unit / Chest Pain Center 1:4
OR General 1:1 CVOR 2:1
Neuro 2:1 Holding 1:3
Cath Lab & EP Lab Procedural 2:1
Holding 1:1
Special Procedures Procedural: 2:1 Holding 1:1
Respiratory Therapist 1:5 Treatment 1:32
Health care workers know one of the best tools in their protective arsenal are Assignment Despite Objection forms.
They protect licenses and careers.
Whenever, in your professional opinion, conditions on the floors are unsafe for patients and employees, an ADO form should be filled out, submitted to a supervisor and faxed to the Union.
This could protect you if a mistake or sentinel event occurs while working in those conditions. Over time, ADO forms illustrate the broad frequency of sub-optimal conditions. They illustrate the need for Staffing Ratios! That’s why on March 4, SEIU members from Valley, Desert Springs, UMC and St. Rose hospitals submitted hundreds of ADOs to Nevada’s Bureau of Health Care and Quality Compliance. Separately, SEIU members at Sunrise, Mountain View and Southern Hills hospitals have begun moving staffing issues through the HCA-SEIU Labor Accord process.
With the SEIU Safe Staffing and Patient Protection bill sponsored by state Sen. Patricia Spearman and moving through the Nevada Legislature, We Are On The Move to WIN Staffing Ratios in Nevada!
Katrina Alvarez-Hyman, an RN at Desert Springs, said the detail on ADO forms offer clear protection for health care workers. “We need to keep filling them out,” she said. “Our licenses and patients’ lives are in jeopardy.”
The Bureau of Health Care and Quality Compliance is entrusted with protecting the safety and welfare of the public through the promotion and advocacy of quality health care through licensing, regulation, enforcement and education. Sparked by our ADOs, the agency began its review of Valley, Desert Springs, UMC and St. Rose hospitals on March 4.
To Desert and Valley RNs and Technolists:
Mark your calendars.
We are quickly approaching bargaining in 2013. Our planning session will be held on Tuesday Dec. 18 at 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.
For more information: Contact Aurora at 210-3269, Dolores at 210-6469 or Lanita at 738-3968.
The following can be read in its entirety on SEIU International’s blog:
My fellow nurses and I are celebrating National Nurses Week this year by using it as an opportunity to make sure everyone in Nevada knows about the positive changes that the Affordable Care Act has made in the lives of nurses, patients and our community.
I have a real appreciation for what access to timely, quality care can mean because I am a nurse–but also because my husband is the recipient of a kidney transplant which saved his life.
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