Oregon’s Providence Health & Services has requested that federal mediators reexamine talks with physicians and other advanced clinical providers who are scheduled to go on strike the next week.
Following the announcement by 5,000 nurses, physicians, and other frontline healthcare professionals that they would be going on strike starting next Friday, the appeal was made. The open-ended walkout was announced Monday by the Oregon Nurses Association, which advocates for nurses and other healthcare workers at the Catholic non-profit health system. (In order to provide health institutions time to plan for disruptions in health services, health workers must issue a 10-day notice of strike.)
The walkout would be the biggest among health workers in Oregon history, affecting all eight Providence hospitals in the state as well as six Providence women’s clinics in the Portland metro area.
In the sake of community health, the non-profit Catholic health system is offering a strategic olive branch to 150 doctors and advanced clinical practitioners who are scheduled to go on strike, even though it claims it is prepared to deal with the nurses’ absence.
According to the health care behemoth, it has requested that federal mediators resume negotiations with seventy hospitalists, including doctors and nurse practitioners, who are employed at Providence St. Vincent. In 2023, the providers filed for a union, claiming they were given an excessive quantity of patients. The Oregon Nurses Association staffs the negotiation team for the Pacific Northwest Hospital Medicine Association, which represents them.
According to Providence, it has also requested to resume discussions with the 80 doctors, nurse practitioners, and nurse midwives who work at its chain of six women’s clinics in the Portland metropolitan region.
In a statement released late Friday, the hospitalists and practitioners said they would not return to mediation until Providence committed to engage in negotiations with the other striking employees.
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Providence reported that while it has hired temporary nurses to meet nearly all of its staffing demands, it has had more difficulty hiring doctors to replace the striking physicians.
In a statement released Thursday, Providence urged the physician/provider groups’ representatives to put mediation first and set aside their walkout preparations.
The health care behemoth’s statement was rejected as contradictory and deceptive by the Oregon Nurses Association, which supports the doctors’ union.
The union stated that no one should trust Providence’s shifting reasons and that health care workers would not be split by these deliberate actions.
Last Monday, the union complained to the National Labor Relations Board about unfair labor practices, claiming Providence had engaged in bad faith negotiating by declining to engage in further talks following the strike notification. Additionally, the union has urged political leaders to press Providence to carry on with talks.
Providence’s persistent refusal to engage in negotiations over the 10-day period preceding a strike has drawn criticism from union officials. However, the healthcare provider has stated that it must prioritize employing temporary employees.
The hospital behemoth stated in a statement that the main reason the Providence bargaining teams have not been at the negotiating table with union officials is to get ready to hire and train these temporary employees. For doctors, there isn’t a comparable temporary replacement workforce.
–Kristine de Leon uncovers tales about data enterprise, small company, retail, and consumer health. [email protected] is her email address.
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