San Francisco nurses protests closing of elder care program

In a rally held by the California Nurses Association (CNA), registered nurses said they could not stand by and watch their patients in the Home Health Care Program at UCSF Medical Center no longer receive vital health care.

This, as the program is slated to end on September 30, after 16 years of service.

“It’s heartbreaking, it’s outrageous. We’re angry and sad that our institution where we pour our heart and soul into taking care of our patients and our community would consider cutting what is a vital service,” said Erin Carrera, RN of the California Nurses Association.

According to CNA, 56 positions will be lost when the program ends in September, however, it does not compare to the thousands of patients who will lose out on services.

In a statement from UCSF, the program faced difficulty in financial stability, citing how reimbursement from insurers could not keep up with costs of the program. UCSF also cited how they decided to shift financial resources toward education since they are an academic medical center.

The nurses say that UCSF can easily support the program because its revenues have gone up in the past five years.

“Health care should be a right, not a privilege and we should be putting patients…patient care before profits, simple as that,” said Carrera.

San Francisco Supervisor Jane Kim stood with the nurses calling for the need for more health care for the medically under-served.

“This program keeps costs down and also provides equal sharing between our private sector and our public sector to serve our entire community,” said Kim.

According to UCSF health, current patients will be assisted in finding appropriate providers for their home care needs and that the program employees will also be assisted in finding positions within or outside UCSF.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Fil-Am doctors, nurses rush to help Nepal quake victims

CALIFORNIA - Two weeks after the devastating earthquake in Nepal which left more than 8,000, another quake has struck the country.

The 7.3 magnitude earthquake caused more buildings to crumble even as the country is still reeling from the massive devastation two weeks ago.

Video captured by the Canadian Red Cross shows rocks tumbling down a mountain north of Kathmandu.

As the latest quake compounds ongoing relief efforts in Nepal, Filipino-American doctors and medical workers have pitched in.

Top Fil-Am doctor in California Herminigildo Valle recalled the scene as the quake struck midday Tuesday.

"The whole building was shaking really hard and then there was this loud noise. When I go to the streets, I saw everybody, a lot of people running in all directions crying and yelling and people just lying on the ground," Dr. Valle said.

Officials say the epicenter was midway between Kathmandu and Mount Everest, close to the Chinese border.

Its tremors were powerful enough to be felt as far away as New Delhi, India, where several people also died.

As Dr. Valle visits the remote regions of Nepal to offer medical support, he said the devastation is simply staggering.

"I haven't seen this much death and destruction. You see people living in tarpaulin tents from 90 year olds to 3 year olds with cast on the leg. The worst thing is the smell. I could still smell the dead in the area.

Valle said he was supposed to go back to the devastated area of Sindhupalchowk, which is known for its treacherous terrain, but was lucky not to have made the trip when the latest quake struck.

"Maybe by the grace of God, we were supposed to go back there this morning. That terrain is like 10 times that of Kennon Road in Baguio with the road going the side of the mountain and with that kind of earthquake you never know what's gonna happen to the highway, the landslides and all. So today was my lucky day. Someone was watching over me," he said.

Rescue helicopters have been sent to remote areas.

Officials fear the death toll may rise even further with reports of people buried under the rubble near the Himalayas.

More Filipino-American nurses under the California Nurses Association will be deployed in the coming days to help in the medical efforts.

Read more from Balitang America

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Pinoy nurses join rally against Kaiser

OAKLAND, California – Filipinos joined about 300 nurses and union representatives who gathered in front of the California Nurses Association building last week to accuse their employer Kaiser Permanente of dismissing the importance of patient care.

They said this is alarming because Kaiser is the largest health insurer and hospital system in California.

"We were supposed to have bargaining but our employer failed to show up so we went to them instead. So we rallied over at their office and let them know that we were there and what are purpose was to be there," Mike Beshears, a 21-year nurse at Kaiser L.A.M.C.

The nurses say that despite the $1.1 billion increase in Kaiser profits for the first quarter of 2014, the company still allows chronic understaffing and continues to cut patient services.

Those cuts include hospital admission restrictions, holding patients in “observation” for over 72 hours, and prematurely sending patients from Kaiser Hospitals to others settings that include homes where the burden of providing care falls on the families.

Even nurses from southern California made the trip up north to join the efforts in protecting their patients.

“We came up here to support our nurses up north because we are all one company and we are all here for the care of our patients,” said Beshears. “We want everyone to know we are united on this. We want our patients to get the care they deserve and that they paid for.”

“We as nurses are the voice of our patients,” said Tessie Costales, a 28-year nurse of Kaiser L.A.M.C. “So being their voice, we want better care for them and Kaiser is starting to cut back on all the services. So as a nurse we are the voice of our patient and we want to be heard.”

Many Pinoy nurses here say they take their profession seriously and it means being the best nurses they can be.

“A lot of the nurses were sent here by their parents and have sacrifice so much to sell everything they have to send their children to school to be nurses to be here to better their lives,” said Marilu Ramirez, a nurse on the 2014 bargaining team.

Balitang America has reached out to Kaiser to respond to these allegations.

In an email, Kaiser says the reason why they didn’t meet with the nurses is because they did not agree on a neutral location.

Kaiser also says it is ready to come to the bargaining table with the nurses and it is confident that both parties will have a meaningful dialogue.

But for now these protesters have a clear message for Kaiser.

“I want you to obey what the nurses are saying,” said Ramirez. “We are for our patients and that is the best, best way we can do this. If you follow what’s in your heart, not the pocket, but what’s in your heart it’s always patients first.”

 Read more from Balitang America.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Discrimination in the US medical industry

In recent years, blatant instances of discrimination against Filipinos in the medical industry have come to light. Some of the highly publicized cases have come to light and they happened all across the country – including one on nationwide TV.

In San Francisco, Sutter California Pacific Medical Center was sued by the California Nurses Association (CNA), which found that Filipino Registered Nurses (RNs) were being discriminated against per the medical center’s hiring practices.

The medical center’s management reportedly instructed supervisors specifically not to hire people of Filipino origin; this was an order that was put into effect between 2006 and 2008.

According to a CNA press release, “Before February 2008, 65 percent of St. Luke’s RNs were Filipino.

After February 2008, only 10 percent of RNs hired were Filipino.” How the center got away with its crooked hiring practices for so long is a question not yet answered.

In Baltimore, four Filipino nurses — Corina Yap, Anna Rosales, Hazel Granada and Hachelle Natano — brought a wrongful-termination lawsuit against their employer, Bon Secours Health System.

The nurses, who won their case, claimed that the hospital fired them for speaking their native language, i.e. Tagalog, at the hospital.

In November of 2009, a policy was enacted at the medical center in Baltimore that required all medical personnel to speak only English in the workplace.

According to an ABS-CBN North America News Bureau report, US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Director Gerald Kiel “concluded that the Filipina nurses were subjected to ‘unequal terms and conditions of employment, [a] hostile work environment, [and] disciplinary action and discharge because of their national origin.’”

As in Baltimore, the EEOC filed a complaint in 2010 against the Delano Regional Medical Center in California for its English-only policy in the work place.

The complaint states that the hospital created a “hostile working environment” for Filipino nurses.

Talk about art imitating life. ABC’s “Desperate Housewives” ran an episode in which a main character, played by Teri Hatcher, makes a blatant discriminatory remark about Filipino doctors.

After being told by her doctor that she may be going through menopause, the doubting character’s response is: “Can I just check those diplomas because I just want to make sure that they are not from some med school in the Philippines.”

These instances of discrimination raise the most important question: When will the discrimination stop?

If you’ve endured discrimination at your health care job and are still employed, here is what you should do (If you’ve been fired, skip to step 4):

1. Act now. There is a statute of limitations on when you may file your legal complaint. If you wait too long, even if you are completely in the right, the law can do nothing to rectify the situation.

2. Inform your supervisor of the discrimination you incurred; give dates and all relevant details.

3. If no action is taken, file a complaint per your company’s complaint procedures.

4. If nothing is done to rectify your situation, you must act quickly to notify proper authorities. File a complaint with the EEOC.

5. Track everything you can on paper. Make copies of your complaints, track which dates you sent them, write down the date/s you were discriminated against as well as the details of the circumstances. Make notes of phone calls, conversations, and so on. Keep and print emails.

6. Be careful of what you say, and to whom you say things to.

7. Seek a lawyer to see if you have a workplace discrimination case. - The FilAm

source: gmanetwork.com