Quick Take
Dozens of staff members and supporters rallied outside Santa Cruz's Dominican Hospital on Tuesday to oppose proposed layoffs and reductions to part-time status affecting 22 nurse educators, monitor technicians and unit coordinators, arguing that the cuts would undermine patient safety and place additional burdens on front-line nurses.
Dignity Health Dominican Hospital nurses and staff are demanding that owners CommonSpirit Health rescind proposed layoffs of 22 nurse educators, monitor clerks and unit coordinators, saying the impact on patient care will be severe.
“The nurses can’t absorb this work. … It’s not realistic at all,” said unit coordinator Erica Gutierrez, who is among those facing a layoff. “It’s going to take something scary, a fatality to happen, for CommonSpirit to turn around and do something about it.”
On Tuesday, about 100 nurses, staff and supporters held an informational picket outside of the hospital on Soquel Drive in Live Oak to demand that the layoff notices announced on June 1 be reversed. The unions representing the two groups of affected workers – the nurses and the staff members – told Lookout that while CommonSpirit said the layoffs would be implemented Wednesday, the layoffs have to be negotiated between the unions and CommonSpirit.
California Nurses Association/National Nurses United represents the five nurse educators who the union says were issued notices reducing them to part-time, while the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW) represents the nine unit coordinators and the eight monitor technicians who received layoff notices and reductions to part-time, respectively. However, without agreements signed between the unions and CommonSpirit, the nurses and staff will continue working until a final agreement is reached.
CommonSpirit communications staff didn’t answer questions such as why CommonSpirit proposed the cuts or how it was addressing the nurse and staff concerns. But they provided a statement from a Dominican Hospital spokesperson saying the hospital’s highest priority is the safety of its staff and patients.
“We recognize and respect our employees’ right to participate in today’s informational picket, and those who took part are valued members of our healthcare team,” the statement reads. “Importantly, hospital operations were not affected by today’s event.”
Cardiac unit nurse Carly Chavez-Ellis told Lookout she’s devastated about the proposed cuts because she regularly receives critical support from monitor techs, nurse educators and unit coordinators.
“They’re like the brain and communication hub of the entire hospital,” she said of the unit coordinators, adding that nurse educators inform the staff of “best practices.” Chavez-Ellis said it’s unclear who is supposed to take on all the responsibilities amid the reductions, and fears that nurses, who are already overwhelmed, will be expected to.
“The healthcare system has already been at the brink of disaster for a while. … They’re taking our ancillary staff away and putting it on the nurse,” she said. “The nurse is supposed to be nursing.”
Nurse educators provide staff with ongoing training in best practices and ensure nurses are best equipped to provide evidence-based care. The unit coordinators respond to calls, manage patient transfers to other units or hospitals and manage communication and patient flow. Monitor technicians constantly observe cardiac telemetry and are often the first to detect life-threatening conditions.
“Dominican Hospital has continuously failed to adequately staff our units while asking nurses to do more with less,” said registered nurse Crystal Crafton, chief nurse representative, in a statement. “These cuts place additional burdens on front-line caregivers and remove critical support systems that help keep patients safe. Short staffing is not safe for our patients and is unfair to our nurses, and is harmful to our community.”
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