UPDATE: UPHS Marquette Nurses take out ad in Duke Chronicle
Photo courtesy: UPHS Marquette RN Staff Council/Michigan Nurses Association
UPDATE — Tuesday, December 5th 6:30 p.m.
Duke LifePoint has released a statement in response to the nurse’s ad. It reads:
“UPHS – Marquette will continue to bargain in good faith and strive to find the common ground necessary to negotiate a labor agreement that meets the needs of all parties and constituents. We have no comment on this tactic employed by the union.”
The nurses and Duke LifePoint have been contract negotiations since April. The nurses contract expired in July and they have continued to work without one.
MARQUETTE — The UPHS Marquette RN Staff Council and the Michigan Nurses Association are continuing to draw attention to chronic RN short staffing, forced RN overtime and unsafe patient care conditions at UPHS Marquette.
According to a news release from the Michigan Nurses Association, the nurses ran a full-page color ad in yesterday’s edition of the Duke Chronicle, a paper for students and alumni of Duke University, asking why trustees would allow the Duke LifePoint partnership to drag their health system’s sterling reputation through the mud in exchange for a small cut of hospital profit.
“Duke University Health System presents itself as a world-class institution, but conditions in Marquette tell a different story. Maybe they put patients first down in North Carolina, but it seems like they are just cashing in on their partnership with LifePoint in the U.P.,” Scott Balko, Operating Room RN and President of the UPHS Marquette RN Staff Council/MNA, said in the statement. “Hopefully this gets Duke’s attention, and they live up to their responsibility to our patients.”
In 2012, non-profit Marquette General Hospital was purchased by Duke LifePoint, which is a for-profit partnership between Duke University Health System and LifePoint Health. Nurses say that the result is a “profits over patients” mentality that tarnishes Duke’s good name.
ABC 10 has reached out to Duke LifePoint and we are currently waiting for comment regarding the ad.
View the entire ad below.
