Eden Medical Center: 'Nurses Strike Won't Affect Patients'

Despite a nurses strike affecting 34 hospitals in northern and central California this week, Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley said patients will not be affected because the hospital has replacements on hand.

More than 23,000 nurses will strike this Thursday at Children’s Hospital as well as many Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health centers.

The is not affected by this week's strikes, according to its spokeswoman Sandra Ryan.

But the dispute over pay at Eden Medical Center affects the regional because it's one of the few Bay Area hospitals that has a helicopter landing pad and takes lots of critically hurt patients.

Castro Valley’s Eden Medical Center expects to see every one of its 425 registered nurses walk off the job at 7 a.m. on strike day but said there will be no stoppage of care at the center.

Cindy Dove, Eden’s marketing and communications manager said that, while the nurses union said it would only strike for one day, the hospital will shut them out for five days due to requirments in the hiring contracts with replacements.

“We were given notice by the nurses union—a 10-day notice—that the strike is starting this Thursday at 7 a.m. and it’s expected to end on Tuesday, Sept. 27, at 7 a.m.,” said Dove. “Obviously we need to hire replacement nurses while our nurses are on strike and the company we work for requires five days. That’s the requirement every time this happens so they know this is going to happen. This is not unusual.”

The California Nurses Association and National Nurses United, the strike's organizers, said they are responding to “Sutter’s attack on RN patient advocacy rights, big cuts in nurses’ healthcare, and to support Kaiser co-workers.”

On its website, the CNA says that Sutter is trying to remove the RNs' paid sick days—leaving patients potentially open to having an unwell nurse treat them.

They also resent the proposed slashing of their healthcare benefits and Sutter’s attempt to cut incoming RNs' wages by $20 an hour, the CNA says.

Sutter says the contract concessions are necessary given the current economic climate.

Sutter’s website says that the average Sutter nurse takes home $136,000 a year plus full health benefits and $7,000 a month in pension benefits.

“The economy has been something everyone has struggled with—hospitals are no exception,” said Dove. “We’re having to really watch our expenses and make sure that our services are accessible and affordable to our community. We value our nurses [but] I think that, in light of [an] economy where other workers have made concessions, we do think what we’re asking is fair.”

Nurses, however, claim that Sutter is taking advantage of a poor economic climate to cut patient services and employee benefits to ensure more profit.

Despite the economy, the CNA website says that Sutter has earned more than $3.7 billion in profit over the last six years.

Eden Hospital RN Michele Ross has been with the center for five years and said that Sutter has made regular cuts in patient services while giving raises to its executives.

Ross said that the with the new construction at Eden Medical Center, the hospital has fewer beds, has downgraded its nursery from a Level 2 facility to a Level 1, which limits the care they can give children.

She said that the emergency center is sometimes overrun with patients such that the injured have to wait in the halls for extended periods of time before receiving care.  

“This isn’t an economic matter,” said Ross. “The corporation we work for is consistently cutting patient care where it’s needed most. This is all about the patients not our salary.”