Nurses' action gets results, but what will it take to get respect?

In the first bargaining session to take place after our informational picket earlier this month, we reached tentative agreement on floating language to help guarantee our patients receive the care they deserve.

With the new contract language, Nurses will only float down in acuity — no more being given floating assignments with patients that are higher acuity than we typically care for. And new grads will not be floated — period — until they have worked on their own for four months.

Safe floating language had been a HUGE sticking point since the first day we began negotiating over it. Our collective action — taking our patient safety message to the streets and to the public - helped move this forward.

Management's counter-proposal on compensation would not make Garfield competitive with area hospitals, and would give Nurses little reason to come to work at our hospital. And unless Garfield begins to respect Nurses' contributions, new hires will turn around and leave. We're already witnessing this. Without Nurses, our hospital's unsafe staffing problem will only worsen.