Members of the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals have approved a three-year labor contract with Warren (Pa.) General Hospital, according to news releases from the hospital and union shared with Becker's.
The contract, approved Oct. 17, covers about 100 Warren General employees, including registered nurses, social workers and laboratory medical technologists.
Highlights of the deal, per the union, include:
- Staffing guidelines that establish limits on the number of patients nurses and technologists can care for at a time and are dependent on the unit type and patient acuity
- Improved vacation time and a better vacation accrual process for newly hired members
- New wage scales with overall increases of 16% over three years for nurses and technologists
"At the end of the day, I think the bargaining process and the results we were able to achieve reflect a hard-won mutual respect between our union and hospital management," Warren General Professional Employees Association President Char Fohrd, RN, said in the union release. "We kept care for our patients and the health of our community foremost in all of our minds, which is as it should be, of course. But I'm grateful for it and for the results nonetheless."
Warren General CEO Richard Allen said in the hospital release, "I am happy to see us reach an agreement with our partners in PASNAP that is economically reasonable, competitive and sustainable. We recognize and value our nurses, medical technologists and social workers for the outstanding care they provide for the residents of Warren County."
Warren General is an 85-bed independent community hospital.