Nurses from University Medical Center gathered on the hospital’s campus lawn on Friday (Oct. 25) for a one-day strike, following months of slow-paced negotiations with LCMC Health over the nurses union’s first contract.
At the picket on Friday, nurses said that the hospital administration hasn’t been listening to their demands regarding staffing shortages and workplace violence.
UMC is the only Level 1 trauma center in southern Louisiana and serves 11 parishes. The city is preparing for an especially busy weekend, with an estimated 150,000 tourists coming into New Orleans for three nights of Taylor Swift concerts. The hospital has hired temporary nurses who will work through the weekend, despite the unionized nurses only striking for a day.
Dana Judkins, a registered nurse in the trauma ICU who is also on the union’s bargaining team, said that will force her to lose valuable working time over the weekend.
“I know UMC is gonna do everything they can to try to deter us from striking and coming out here,” Judkins said. “[We’re] missing our shifts so…we don’t get paid. And obviously our pay is very important to us, because we get paid so bad that we need to work all of our days.”
A spokesperson for UMC referred a reporter to two videos released the day before the strike in which UMC president and CEO John Nickens says that the hospital is ready to accept patients and has been preparing for the possibility of a strike for months.
In the videos, Nickens references the history of Charity Hospital, the public hospital that was a long-standing medical institution in New Orleans before it closed in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and its culture of consistently serving the community through hurricanes and public health crises.
“The union leadership is not aligned with who we are at UMC New Orleans,” Nickens says in the video. “We certainly intend to make it through this union-called strike. We owe it to you, our professionals, who choose UMC because of our spirit of Charity.”
In a speech at the rally, Judkins said the administration has been villainizing nurses for their efforts.
“We know that our patients and our community depend on us, and we will not let them down,” Judkins said. “We will continue fighting for improved patient care and workplace conditions, whatever UMC may throw our way. Any attempt to weaken us will only make us stronger.”
Unions across the city joined the nurses on the picket line, including the International Longshoremen’s Association and Unite Here Local 23. Nurses spoke at a rally outside UMC on Friday morning to demand a fair contract and compel hospital management to continue bargaining.
“If we come [to] the table, if nurses sit at the table, our decisions are made based on what we want to advocate for our patients,” nurse Terry Mogilles said in a speech at the rally. “We, the unionized nurses, are the spirit of Charity. Our passion, our resilience, our desire to ensure UMC lives up to that charitable idea.”