PITTSBURGH (TNS) — Nurses from UPMC Altoona gathered in front of UPMC headquarters in Downtown Pittsburgh’s U.S. Steel Tower on Wednesday, demanding the health care giant invest more resources into retaining nurses and staving off a staffing shortage they said is jeopardizing patient care.
The nurses, represented by the Service Employees International Union Healthcare Pennsylvania, cited emergency department wait times of as long as 50 hours at the Altoona hospital and patient ratios they say are causing some colleagues to leave nursing altogether.
”We need UPMC to take bold action to address the staffing crisis by investing in nurses through significant retention bonuses and wage increases,” said Sally Wagner, an Altoona ICU nurse.
A statement from a UPMC spokesperson said health care officials “do not have any reports of 50-hour wait times to start care or even a 24-hour interval to begin care at the UPMC Altoona emergency department or at any of our hospital emergency departments.”
Leann Oppel, a registered progressive care nurse, said her unit — a step-down unit between the ICU and regular medical beds — has a roster of 45 nurses when it’s fully staffed.
She said the roster has recently dipped to as low as 12. She said another unit in the Altoona hospital is operating with a staff of two full-time nurses.
”UPMC has the responsibility to put nurses in positions to provide quality care for our community,” Oppel said. “The emergency department wait times are unacceptable and a clear reflection of UPMC’s failure to invest in nurses and patients.”
While hefty incentives and sign-on bonuses have been offered regionally and across the country in an attempt to draw in nurses with experience, nursing leaders have said previously that the focus should be on keeping the longtime and experienced nurses they have.
Gov. Tom Wolf cited staffing shortages in his request Wednesday for additional support from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
”Our health care system is strained from covid-19 cases and further exacerbated by persistent staffing shortages across the sector,” Wolf said in a statement, noting he outlined key areas that he and health leaders believe would “garner the most impactful support for our deserving health care professionals.”
{p class=”krtText”}Those key areas include staffing support in the form of hospital strike teams, skilled nursing facility strike teams and ambulance strike teams. He also requested specific support for the state’s rural areas in the form of 1 million at-home covid tests and an increased allocation of monoclonal antibodies.
{p class=”krtText”}”I am hopeful that these critically important supports will be addressed to alleviate the strain on our health care system and ultimately be able to provide Pennsylvanians the care they need during this time,” he said.
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