Update: After unionized nurses at Austin’s Ascension Seton Medical Center carried out a one-day strike on June 27, Ascension Health refused to allow them to return to work until July 1. Ascension said this was a requirement of the staffing agency it used to bring in replacement nurses for those four days, but nurses—who’d hoped to return to work the day after their strike—described it as retaliation that could endanger patients.
Kris Fuentes, a registered nurse in Ascension’s neonatal intensive care unit who returned to work with her colleagues on July 1, told the Texas Observer on July 5 that myriad problems occurred while the regular nurses were locked out. In her unit, she observed that blood samples had been collected improperly, requiring additional “sticks” of newborn infants, and that babies on respiratory support had not had their oxygen levels recorded often enough. She also heard from colleagues in other units that adult patients with wounds had gone without dressing changes, that cardiac infusions had been administered improperly, and that surgeries had taken longer than expected.
“Quite honestly, it was appalling,” Fuentes said. “It’s really unfortunate that Ascension chose this route.”
