Brigham and Women’s Hospital nurses locked out after ending one-day strike in Boston: “Let us in!”
The one-day nurses strike at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston ended Thursday morning, but a four-day lockout began, keeping the 4,000 union nurses out of the facility.
Hundreds of nurses walked off the picket line at 7 a.m. marking an end to their 24-hour strike over better pay. When they went to the front door of the hospital chanting “let us in!” they were turned away. The nurses then returned to picketing outside the main campus on Francis Street.
“We want to go back to work”
“It was defeating. It was absolutely defeating and demoralizing. We want to go back to work. We only wanted to do this for 24 hours. We want to be in there and take care of our patients and that’s what we’re asking to do and they just won’t let us,” said lead union negotiator Kelly Morgan.
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Mass General Brigham (MGB), which owns the hospital, hired nearly 1,300 replacement nurses to cover shifts for five days. The strike was planned for one day, but the nurses will be locked out for four more days. The hospital said that’s because the replacement nurses are contracted for five days of work.
It was the largest health care strike in Massachusetts history. MGB has been negotiating two contracts for several months – one for the 4,000 nurses at Brigham and Women’s and another for nearly 500 home health care workers.
The home health care workers are on strike for a week. That’s scheduled to end on Wednesday, July 15 at 8 a.m., the hospital said. More than 175 replacement clinicians started covering shifts for the striking staff Thursday.
The hospital said the Brigham nurses are already paid competitively and they receive annual five-percent raises with their seniority. But the union said the hospital offered them zero-percent raises to their base salaries when the cost of living in the Boston area is at an all-time high.
Both sides met with Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey at the State House Wednesday but failed to reach an agreement on a new contract.
Mass General Brigham said the hospital “remains open and fully operational, and patients should continue to come to scheduled appointments unless they hear directly from their care team.”
“We understand how stressful this moment is for patients and that is why the hospital has activated comprehensive operational and emergency preparedness plans, including leadership coverage, clinical staffing plans, patient communications and coordination across Mass General Brigham to ensure that patients continue to receive high-quality, safe care,” MGB said in a statement.
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Dispute over medical emergency
There was also a disagreement between the union and MGB over how a medical emergency was handled Thursday morning outside of the hospital.
“There was not quick attention to by the people on the inside to respond to that emergency, so I went across the picket line and I took care of the patient. I brought the patient in the hospital to the place the patient needed to be. There was a delay in the responsiveness of the code team, or of the code even being called, and it delayed the patient getting the care that they needed,” Morgan said.
MGB responded with a statement, saying, “We immediately mobilized the emergency specialized care team necessary who arrived at the designated location within minutes of receiving the call. Upon arrival, the patient was no longer at that location because she had been escorted elsewhere in the hospital by nurses participating in the work stoppage.”
“Our adult, obstetric, and neonatal emergency response processes exist to ensure the fastest possible expert clinical assessment and care for patients who need urgent medical attention,” the hospital said. “The action that occurred this morning was outside of these established processes and interfered with emergency response efforts, creating unnecessary risk.”
When will the BWH nurses lockout end?
The lockout is scheduled to end on Monday, July 13 at 7 a.m.
“We’re not going to go away. We’re going to stay here and we’re going fight until they let us in,” said Brigham operating room nurse Felicia James.
The Brigham has posted more information for patients and families on its website.
The lockout does not affect the Brigham’s sister facility, Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Their nurses are not in a union.
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