Nurses concerned about patient safety amid thousands of nurse vacancies at the VA

Nurses from the James J. Peters Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in the Bronx will be caravaning to Tarrytown, N.Y., on Thursday, Nov. 7, to call on the VA to lift barriers to hiring staff to fill RN positions to ensure safe patient care, announced National Nurses Organizing Committee/National Nurses United (NNOC/NNU) today).  The “Care-A-Van” of RNs will travel to the VA regional office and headquarters for Vertical Integrated Service Network (VISN) 2, which oversees facilities in the New York/New Jersey VA Health Network, including the Bronx VA.

National hiring restrictions announced in January of this year have contributed to the more than 66,000 vacancies across the VA health system, including 13,000 RN positions. RNs say the barriers to hiring are putting patient safety at risk and undermining the VA’s commitment to providing veterans with high-quality, integrated, veteran-specific care that only VA nurses have the experience and expertise to provide. 

“We know we at the VA are best qualified to care for our nation's veterans,” said VA NNU Director Yesenia Novaton, RN at the Bronx VA. “That’s why we need to invest in our VA and the VA system. With the proper resources, we can provide care that honors our Veterans’ service and their sacrifices. When we don’t have enough staff, we are effectively cutting services to veterans. That is why we are calling on the VA to lift all barriers currently in place to hiring sufficient nurses, so we can get back to providing holistic, specialized, veteran-centric care to our nation's heroes.” 

Who: Nurses from James J. Peters VA Medical Center (Bronx VA) 
What: Speakout and Care-A-Van  
When: Thursday, Nov. 7, 5:15 p.m. - 5:45 ET (depending on traffic)  
Where: VISN 2 office, 20 White Plains Rd., Suite 5000, Tarrytown, N.Y., entrance of facility on sidewalk 

According to the VA inspector general, 82 percent of VAs are experiencing critical nurse shortages. Concerning effects of this staffing crisis on patient care in the VISN 2 region include unsafe patient assignments. Due to a lack of nurses, management is mandating involuntary overtime, forcing nurses to work after the end of their shift or pick up extra shifts on their biweekly schedules. There are not enough RNs to cover patients coding, rapid responses, or routine transportation and testing needs. 

“We have nurses who are getting eight veteran patients in their assignments when they should have no more than four,” said Wanda Maria, RN in the medical-surgical unit at the Bronx VA. “Our ability to safely care for veterans should be paramount to our regional leadership. Due to the hiring restrictions, there are not enough nurses to sit with patients who need one-on-one care, and nurses are being transferred to work areas for which they are untrained.” 

According to a NNU analysis of data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and National Council of the State Boards of Nursing, there is no shortage of nurses, but there is a serious hospital staffing crisis. In New York, there are more than 260,000 RNs with active licenses who are not working at the bedside. For more information on the reasons why, please read here.

"We treat veterans who are suffering because of service-connected health problems,” said  Heather Espinal, RN in the intensive care unit. “These veterans deserve the best care – the care they earned and were promised.” 

NNOC/NNU represents more than 15,000 registered nurses at 23 VHA facilities across the country, many of whom are veterans themselves.

National Nurses United is the largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses in the United States with nearly 225,000 members nationwide. NNU affiliates include California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, DC Nurses Association, Michigan Nurses Association, Minnesota Nurses Association, and New York State Nurses Association.