Registered nurses at Doctors Hospital of Sarasota will hold an informational picket and rally on Thursday to urge that the hospital consistently comply with its own staffing plan to improve the recruitment and retention of experienced RNs.

“We are organizing an informational picket because it is our professional duty as RNs to advocate for quality patient care. To achieve that it is very important for the hospital to consistently comply with its staffing plan," said Geniece Hunt, an RN in the Special Procedures department. "That includes enough relief nurses to allow nurses to take meal breaks so that they are alert and focused on the job," said Hunt, who has been an RN for 22 years.

What: Registered nurses hold informational picket and rally
When:  Thursday - August 20, 6 - 8 pm. Rally at 7:30 p.m.
Where: Doctors Hospital of Sarasota, 5731 Bee Ridge Rd. Sarasota Fla.

One purpose of hospital staffing plans is to assure that there are enough nurses to attend to patients' needs in a safe and timely way, taking under consideration the kinds of care required in each unit including the degree of acuity or sickness. In addition, when a hospital is out of compliance with its staffing plan, nurses are more likely to miss rest and meal breaks.  Research shows that these breaks are vital to prevent fatigue that contributes to medical errors and injury to patients and staff.

Over the past eight weeks, between June 22 and August 17, the 13 full-time nurses in the Outpatient Unit documented that they missed 103 meal breaks, or nearly eight meal breaks per nurse in that time period. The Outpatient Unit includes many very sick elderly patients on ventilators awaiting discharge to nursing homes. Nurses missed their meal breaks because there were no relief nurses to attend to their patients.

The Doctors' nurses are also asking the hospital to address the dismal wage conditions for RNs in Florida, which contribute to high turnover rates and loss of experienced RNs. Doctors Hospital can play a leadership role, nurses say, by aligning wages with the national average. Currently Florida RNs are paid $3.00 below the national average and although Florida is the third largest state it ranks 28th in terms of RN wages.
     
The approximately 230 registered nurses at Doctors Hospital, affiliated with the National Nurses Organizing Committee, NNOC/FL are in ongoing contract negotiations and their contract expired May 31, 2015. NNOC/FL is affiliated with National Nurses United, the largest organization of registered nurses in the United States with 186,000 members.