On Jan. 11, a nursing strike in New York City, that has disrupted patient care, entered its third day impacting some of the city’s largest hospitals with a union official saying that some progress has been made toward a possible settlement at one of the institutions.
Two hospitals, Montefiore Medical Center and Mount Sinai Hospital have postponed nonemergency surgeries and have diverted ambulances to other medical centers, relying on temporary staffers and assigning administrators with nursing backgrounds to work in wards after upwards of 7,100 nurses walked off the job.
Judy Sheridan-Gonzalez, a union official at the hospital located in the Bronx said that some progress is being made toward a settlement at Montefiore, CTV News reported.
On the picket line nurses are saying that they were forced to strike due to chronic understaffing that they say leaves them with too many patients to tend to.
“We’re tired now – overwhelmed. Nurses are burned out,” said Saffie Sesay, an emergency room nurse, adding that, “It’s just getting worse.”
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As of noon on Tuesday, negotiations were still halted at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan with hospital spokesperson Lucia Lee expressing optimism that talks would resume with the union saying that “The impact is being felt,” regarding the strike.
Mount Sinai and Montefiore are the remaining hospitals still without a deal. Their contracts each expired simultaneously. Initially, the union had warned that all hospitals could have gone on strike; however the mass majority of them reached agreements as the Monday strike deadline approached. The hospitals were able to secure pay raises of seven percent, six percent and five percent, respectively, over the next three years.
On the picket line nurses are saying that staffing levels are more important than pay raises, and are put off after being hailed as heroes over the course of the pandemic only to succumb to burnout due to poor staffing levels, an issue they say has been a problem for years.
Mount Sinai nurse, Nagie Pamphil, said, “Remember, even prior to [the] pandemic we’re already short of staff” adding that nurses in her unit are expected to care for twice as many patients as they can safely handle. “That’s impossible,” she said.
Montefiore has reportedly said that it has agreed to add 170 more nurses and Mount Sinai’s administration said that the union’s focus on nurse-to-patient ratios “ignores the progress we have made to attract and hire more new nurses, despite a global shortage of healthcare workers that is impacting hospitals across the country.”
Patients and their loved ones are beginning to speak up with mixed opinions concerning the strike.
Shivie Tahal, whose wife is a nurse at another hospital that is not on strike, told CTV News that his daughter had to wait longer than usual for care and the waiting area in the hospital he took her appeared overrun.
“It felt like there wasn’t enough people” he said, adding that he hoped that the dispute “works out for the best for both parties – the patients and the nurses.”
Barbara Roman on the other hand took her 10-year-old daughter to the hospital on Monday with respiratory problems and told CTV News that staffing appeared adequate.
“If there’s a little less staff on the floor, it doesn’t matter as long as she’s getting the care she needs,” she said.
