Nurses at PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center will hold a picket on April 18th from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. outside the hospital at 400 N.E. Mother Joseph Place, Vancouver (Click here for a PDF map of the picket line so you can see important information about the picket and where to join them.)

Nurses say the hospital is operating on a lean model, which means management schedules as few staff members as possible in many areas, such as the emergency room and medical-surgical. PeaceHealth SW is a Level II trauma center, so it receives complex patients with high needs – drug and alcohol issues, mental health emergencies, car crashes, strokes, and heart attacks.

“The hospital doesn’t currently staff for acuity, such as a violent patient or a patient with complex needs,” said Travis Elmore a WSNA nurse representative relaying concerns of nurses. “The post-COVID world is a new frontier. There’s a lot more anger in the world among patients and visitors, and that puts nurses at risk if we’re not staffed sufficiently to respond to it.”

For an update on bargaining at PeaceHealth Southwest, visit https://www.wsna.org/union/southwest-medical-center and for more information on the situation nurses face at PeaceHealth Southwest, see this recent article in The Stand.

Please join these working people in our community at their picket on Thursday, April 18th! Be sure not to park on PeaceHealth property, and wear your union gear if you have it.

We're looking forward to seeing you there!