University Of Chicago Medical Center Prepares For Nurses' Strike

The National Nurses Organizing Committee/National Nurses United announced in a news release late Wednesday that the hospital was making final preparations for its first-ever nursing strike, which is expected to go ahead at 7 a.m. Friday.

Although the strike is scheduled to last one day, the hospital said union nurses will be replaced with temporary nurses for five days, meaning the striking nurses won’t go back to work until Wednesday, the same day contract negotiations are scheduled to resume. UCMC said it trained and hired replacement nurses in anticipation of the strike, and needed to provide them a five-day guarantee.

The union said nurses are striking mainly over concerns about staffing levels.

“Right now there are times when nurses take care of more patients than they safely should be,” National Nurses United chief nurse  representative Talisa Hardin said. “So what we want are things like that not to happen.”

However, the hospital said nurse staffing levels at the U of C are actually the best of in the state and the city. UCMC accused the union of distorting the facts on staffing issues.

“As we really made a generous proposal around that, recognized as a generous proposal by the union negotiator, she put additional things on the table as core issues, and it was clear that we’re so far apart on those that both sides determined there was no more productive conversation to be had," University of Chicago Medicine senior vice president Debi Albert said.

Albert said the main additional issue is compensation.  According to the hospital, nurses represented by the union are already the highest paid in Chicago and Illinois.

The hospital said it is making final preparations for the nurses' strike.




CBS Chicago
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