Union nurses at McLaren Flint (Mich.) hospital held an emergency meeting June 21 to speak out about the facility's nurse-to-patient ratio and its potential threat to patient safety, WEYI reports.
McLaren Flint's nurses are being assigned too many patients to properly care for, which violates their contract and may put their patients in harm's way, AFSCME Local 875 President Kelly Indish told WJRT.
In the past year and a half, the union has filed 975 grievances about this issue, Ms. Indish said. Although the union has met with hospital administrators, Ms. Indish said the issue remains unresolved.
Certain hospital floors have a nurse-to-patient ratio of 4-to-1, while other floors are 2-to-1. On average, McLaren Flint's nurses may be assigned an extra two patients per nurse, Ms. Indish said.
Ms. Indish met with about half of her members June 21 and said she plans to meet with the rest to determine the union's course of action.
"Patient safety is definitely something that's very serious to all of our nurses," she said.
"McLaren Flint and [the union] negotiated a four-year contract for registered nurses with improved staffing guidelines in October of 2016," hospital officials wrote in a statement obtained by WJRT.
"The hospital schedules nurses according to this current contract with our nursing union, which outlines staffing levels based on patient volumes," the statement continues. "McLaren Flint continues to provide safe, compassionate, high quality care to our patients as the centerpiece of our commitment to a healthier community."