Registered nurses at Kindred Hospital Westminster (KHW) in Westminster, Ca. will hold a one-day strike beginning Thursday, September 3, the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United announced today.

Contract talks are scheduled to resume on Wednesday, August 26, and nurses are calling on management to avoid a walkout by reaching a fair contract agreement that respects nurses’ legal and patient advocacy rights.

"It is essential to quality care that we reach a contract agreement that includes patient safety regulations and protections," said Sunita Kumar, an RN in the Medical/Surgical Unit." "It is also important to retain our long-term, experienced nurses. The strike will send a strong message to KHW that RNs are serious about fighting for patient care," said Kumar, who has worked at KHW for 10 years.

"Management has delayed an agreement for 20 months and during that time, the poor conditions that led us to organize in the first place, have continued to erode. We feel we have no choice but to strike to insure that these issues are addressed so we can deliver the highest quality of care for our patients all year long," said Janet Williams, an RN in the Medical/Surgical Unit who has worked at KHW for over 14 years.

The 150 nurses at KHW voted overwhelmingly to affiliate with the California Nurses Association December 4, 2013. The issues nurses have sought to address since that time include chronic short staffing, lack of adequate meal and rest period breaks, a high turn-over rate and the attrition of experienced RNs seeking better working conditions in the region.

In April 2015 the California Department of Public Health cited the hospital for patient care violations in planning and implementing patient care, staffing plans for nursing, infection control, respiratory care, pharmaceutical services and general safety and maintenance.   

KHW is a long-term acute care facility owned by Kentucky-based Kindred Healthcare. In the past year, Kindred made over $15 million in profits from KHW and Kindred Hospital Brea in nearby Brea, Ca.