Union nurse Michelle Boyle can understand why people walk away from the health care field despite having a passion for helping others and providing care. She said workers are forced to give up even though they don’t want to.
Long hours, low wages, lack of benefits and mental strain all culminate in a stressful and tiring situation that is, she says, exacerbated by hospital conglomerates such as UPMC.
“To put patients and their families under such stressful conditions by short staffing nurses, aides, everybody who provides care for those patients, is unconscionable,” Bayle said during Monday’s roundtable discussion.
Held on International Workers’ Day, which recognizes the struggles and gains made by workers and the labor movement, Mayor Ed Gainey, state Rep. Sara Innamorato (D-Lawrenceville) and city councilmembers gathered with UPMC workers and other health care staff in Downtown’s August Wilson African American Cultural Center to discuss the health care workforce crisis and holding UPMC accountable for its monopoly power.
Innamorato referenced a survey taken by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh that found that 93% of respondents who are workers at UPMC thought about leaving the profession. The state representative also mentioned a report she and U.S. Rep. Summer Lee, D-Swissvale, released in partnership with American Economic Liberties Institute that outlines the monopoly UPMC has not just in the region but also in the entire commonwealth.
UPMC is the largest nongovernmental employer in Pennsylvania and employs 76% of all hospital employees while controlling 71% of licensed hospital beds.
“UPMC is a trendsetter for hospital systems in Western Pennsylvania. Even competitors like AHN are left with little choice but to follow suit, in cutting staff, reducing wages and benefits and pushing higher workloads onto their employees,” Innamorato said.
Jodi Faltin has been a registered nurse for more than eight years. She said most of her career has been at UPMC due to the “absolute stronghold they have on health care jobs.”
Though the pandemic has certainly worsened staffing issues and mental health among health care workers, such issues have long existed and continue to persist, Faltin shared.
“You can say that our staffing crisis is a pre-existing condition and UPMC refuses recovery,” she said. “The chronic nature of our staffing woes has only continued to work since the height of COVID. While we were working long hours facing new and at times terrifying reality, and just trying to keep our patients alive, UPMC discovered that they can maximize profits by keeping us understaffed and underpaid.”
The solution to this crisis can be found in giving workers a seat at the table, Faltin proposed. Hospital executives must respect worker’s rights to organize a union that allows members to have a say in decisions without fear of retaliation or interference.
“We’ve been deemed as essential workers and are treated as disposable,” Faltin said. “I didn’t become a nurse to maximize UMPC’s billion-dollar profits. I’m not concerned about expanding the empire or increasing executive bonuses. I care about my co-workers earning a living wage, having affordable health care and being supported to provide safe and compassionate care.”
Hospital workers report not only struggling to pay their bills, but also “far too many” are experiencing depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, burnout and even suicidal ideation because of their work, said Jeffrey Shook, social work professor at the University of Pittsburgh, citing a recent Pittsburgh hospital worker survey and multiple focus groups. Yet workers are also faced with challenges when they seek support. According to Shook, 34% of workers surveyed reported being in medical debt.
UPMC administrative assistant Nila Payton said she is hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. This money has accumulated from procedures such as prenatal care, gallbladder removal and an MRI.
In 2021, Payton had an MRI done and was charged $965.35 after the UMPC Network discount. She said UPMC only paid $338.95, which left her with a bill of $626.40.
“That’s more than half of my monthly rent and about what I spend on groceries each month to feed my family,” Payton said. “The scary thought in the back of my mind is whether my recent raise will be just enough to kick me off of Medicaid, the only thing that’s helping me get by with two growing boys at home.”
Payton believes something is very wrong with the system when “you could spend all day helping to provide quality health care to people in your communities and not be able to stay healthy yourself or keep your family healthy because you can’t afford it.”
Innamorato mentioned that UPMC has been party to the 150 unfair labor practices filed at the National Labor Relations Board since Pittsburgh hospital workers started organizing a decade ago. The NLRB ruled in 2014, and again in 2018, that UPMC broke federal labor law by attempting to prevent workers from forming a union.
Video testimony was played of former UPMC nurse Dina Norris. Norris, who is currently a travel nurse, has been a nurse for more than 10 years and said her job in oncology has been her favorite. In September 2020, Norris began a job at UPMC Altoona. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, her five-patient responsibility eventually rose to eight, something Norris called “head-spinning.”
Norris said after she and her co-workers were unable to take on eight patients, the administrator told Norris and her team if they did not take on eight patients, they would be reported to the state board of nursing.
“That was absolutely horrendous thought just was absolutely crazy to think of,” Norris said. “Why would I be reported to the state board of nursing? I’m protecting my license here by saying I cannot handle it anymore.”
That night, Norris and the nursing staff got in touch with local media to amplify their message. A week later, Norris said she received a call from her recruiter informing her she was fired and recommending that she never apply for a job at UPMC again.
The National Labor Relations Board has taken Norris’ case on and is looking for reconciliations.
“To see this happen in health care, it’s just alarming, and it makes me want change for everybody working in healthc are,” Norris concluded. “That UPMC retaliated against me instead of fixing these issues that they have, it’s just mind-boggling. … UPMC needs to listen to their nurses, you need to respect our nurses, we are the boots on the ground, we are the core of their facilities.”
Tinisha Brockman is a care attendant at McKee Medical Center. She has worked in health care for more than 20 years. During her time in the field, Brockman said she has seen people become so burnt out they would rather work at Taco Bell or Amazon.
“I’ve thought about leaving health care, but I’m just afraid to leave because who would care for my patients?” Brockman said. “I love what I do or I would’ve left a long time ago, but I’m going to continue fighting for my patients and my co-workers. It is worth it, but it’s hard.”
Gainey closed out the event by thanking hospital workers for their dedication and the care they provide.
“Quality health care is not stated just because you could run a nice slogan to say, ‘We’re the health care that cares.’ It’s when you demonstrate you’re the health care that cares because you don’t have a shortage of staff because you’ve made sure your staff is able to meet the demand of our patients,” Gainey said.
“If we’re going to be known for med and eds, let’s start with the people inside meds and eds so they can tell the rest of the community, ‘I work for a place [that] cares.’”
Pittsburgh City Councilmembers Deborah Gross, Erika Strassburger and Barb Warwick were in attendance Monday morning, in addition to Lee’s chief of staff Wasi Mohamed as Lee was sick and unable to join the roundtable.
A video of the discussion can be found here.
Hannah is a reporter at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but she's currently on strike. Email her hwyman@unionprogress.com.
