D.C. hospital fires 11 nurses, 5 staffers for snowstorm absences

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/27/AR2010022703793.html?hpid=topnews ^

[kcvl]

The District's largest private hospital has fired 11 nurses and five support staff members who failed to make it to work during the back-to-back snowstorms that paralyzed the region earlier this month.

Dozens of staff members at Washington Hospital Center face internal investigations, union representatives say, and it is unclear how many employees will lose their jobs. On Friday, the nurses union, Nurses United of the National Capital Region, filed a class-action grievance with the hospital.

"I see it as so unfair and uncaring," said Shirley Ricks, a 57-year-old nurse who has spent her entire career at the hospital. "That's it. You call in one day in the biggest snowstorm in history and you're out. No ifs, ands or buts about it. . . . You go from getting a salary every two weeks to nothing. It's scary."

In a letter sent to the staff on Friday, hospital President Harry J. Rider sought to quell rumors that hundreds of people had been fired. He said he expects fewer than 20 people will be dismissed.

"Sadly, we did experience some issue with associates who did not show the same commitment as most of their co-workers to the community, our patients and their fellow associates. They are the few who turned away from their scheduled shifts and who tried -- and are still trying -- to turn the focus on themselves rather than the thousands of Washington Hospital Center workers who fulfilled their commitment to their patients and colleagues, and made it to work," he wrote.

[kaila]

The reason floor nursing is very hard to do is the stress and hard work involved.
Nursing is different than it was even 15 years ago. Patients are much sicker, they have multiple IV lines that need to be maintained, often patients can be belligerent . You deal with patients of all social strata, that you would never even want to talk to outside work. The same reason why police burnout- you deal with a lot of losers .
The patient load is incredible. Often you miss lunch and bathroom breaks.Your mind is always thinking, “if I walk 15 feet to there, what can I accomplish in that time period to save me time”. That thought process is on overdrive all day.
Everything is timed. You must give meds and treatments by a certain time, if you are late no matter the reason,an incident report must be written that your supervisors review.
Every hour of the day is a time block.
Patients are heavier, and often the hospital does not provide help to ambulate or lift these patients.
I had a 350# stroke patient that I had to lift myself, and my back hurt for days after.
If you make a mistake, you risk killing someone, losing your job and license.
A lot of times, you have to do mandatory overtime and work 16 hour shifts, go home to sleep 8 hours, then return.
This is why nurses burnout, and leave floor nursing.

[TankerKC]

Nursing grads are having a hard time finding jobs in our area.

My wife graduated in Alabama with a BSN, just before we moved to southern California. She hasn't found work...going on 6 months now.

[Rembrandt]

“The money for the cab comes from the hospital.
You know,just like the the employers who pay for benefits, continuing medical education at a resort hotel ,free meals and coffee on occasion,use of the company car, etc.
The cab issue is like the benefits that all good employers give to retain good employees. If they do not offer good benefits, highly trained employees find work with another company.
It is the other side of Capitalism 101.
I have no problem with this.
Nurses are highly trained. If they bailed out of a hospital becuase of stingy benefits- they would be hard to replace.
I live in an area that has limited snowplows, and even with my 4 wheel drive, I could not leave my house for a couple of days during a snowstorm last year. The work issue did not occur, as I was not scheduled to work those days.
I am sure you have a lot of problems with the snow- living in Florida. “

At the risk of boring you, I’ll repeat my question (which you didn’t answer): Where does the hospital get its money?

Possible answers:

a. It’s self-supporting since it pays for its own expenses. It pays for the cab - unlikely.
or
b. It gets City/County/State/Federal support - i.e., Kaila and I pay for the cab.

[kaila]

The hospital pays for the cab.
It gets money from patient care in terms of insurance reimbursement.
You can also say it gets money from the government- because of Medicare and Medicaid.
However, it delivers a service which is underpaid by the government. Government is taking advantage of hospitals..

You can take the question further- how does the hospital pay for it’s nurses?
Your question makes no sense- because somehow you are inferring that if a organization receives government money, it's employees should not receive any benefits (for example- like getting to work safely)

I do not work for the government- if I did- we would have had a snow day off like every other government worker.
Hospitals are 24/7 organizations.
You would scream bloody murder if your neighborhood hospital was closed due to a storm.

[SQUEAKY1]

At Maryland General Hospital in Baltimore we were only paid for the two days the city shut and we had to use our personal time for this. For the other 3 days of the storm we were told we could not use our personal days to cover our time. So what happen we did not get paid. Even after calling work to get transpotaion and one even called me back, I still was not paid. Now how greatful is that.

[HighlyOpinionated]

Very sad. I’m retired so I stay up till all hours and usually don’t awaken [other than to walk the dogs] until it’s early afternoon. Snow or not.

If you have a Union, you might want to talk to them. If you don’t . . . I’m sure there’s some way to include “paid snow days” [cumulative] each year.

Unfortunately people don’t always do the ethical thing when it comes to costing them money.

In Europe, they use the trains or live within walking distance to their businesses. Europe has crowded cities that Americans would not want to live in. That “acre with a house and a two car garage” thing, probably from our English forebears’ gene.