Registered nurses at two HCA San Jose hospitals will hold social distancing actions Thursday to protest inadequate staffing and the threatened closure of maternal health care services, both of which they say will have harmful consequences for area patients.

What: Social distancing protests over poor staffing, Women’s Services closure
When: Thursday, April 24, 3:45 p.m.
Where: Good Samaritan Hospital, 2425 Samaritan Dr., San Jose
             Regional Medical Center, 225 N Jackson Ave, San Jose
                       
At Good Samaritan Hospital, the RNs, members of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United, warn that HCA has been failing to adhere to the state’s safe staffing law in its emergency room, especially after cancelling per diem and registry RNs, which they say puts patients at risk.

“When we have short staffing, it is increasingly difficult to provide safe care especially with patients coming in infected with the coronavirus in the midst of the global pandemic,” said Good Samaritan ER RN Amy Schaar.

Additionally, the Good Samaritan RNs will protest the lack of proper personal protective equipment, both an inadequate supply of both N95 respirator masks and gowns, for nurses who are exposed to confirmed or suspected COVIS-19 patients..

At HCA’s Regional Medical Center of San Jose, the RNs will continue to protest the planned shutdown of the Women’s Services that will adversely impact thousands of Latina and other working-class San Jose residents who utilize Regional’s birthing services, including maternal-child health and neonatal intensive care.

“We are very concerned about the health and safety of the women of our community who will either have to travel long distances for the care they, and their newborns need, or give birth in our emergency room where they and their newborn risk exposure to COVID-19 patients,” said Maureen Zeman, a labor and deliver RN at Regional.

Labor and delivery RNs have been required to begin training neonatal resuscitation to ER nurses who have never delivered a baby and do not have the clinical expertise with at-risk infants in a hospital that will no longer have a neo-natal intensive care unit, notes CNA.

CNA/NNU is demanding HCA, the largest and wealthiest hospital system in the country, to reverse its decision to end Women’s Services at Regional Medical Center.

Several San Jose area legislators last week voiced their concern over the closure and support for the nurses and patients who will be harmed.

Assemblymember Ash Kalra joined a protest at Regional, tweeting afterward “Joined nurses to protest Regional Medical Center closing women’s services, forcing pregnant mothers to seek care elsewhere, an attack on healthcare for families in East San Jose & Women’s health in midst of #COVID19
 crisis. We must demand HCA put patients over profits! @calnurses”

U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren tweeted: “I support the nurses fighting to protect women's services at Regional Medical Center in San Jose. During this pandemic, we should be expanding access to care, not stymieing options for working-class families. Thank you @NationalNurses & @CalNurses for the work you do every day.”

California State Sen. Jim Beall also issued a statement: “I am troubled by HCA’s decision to close its Women’s Health Services at Regional Medical Center of San Jose, especially in the middle of a devastating global pandemic that has hit Santa Clara County, remarkably hard. Everyone deserves access to the health services they need, when and where they need them without suffering financial hardship or having to travel extended distances for care.”

“I intend to work with all my legislative colleagues in Sacramento to respond to this threatened closure and advocate for a reversal,” said Beall. 

More than 2,600 babies have been born at Regional the past five years, with a 20 percent increase in the hospital birth rate since 2014. Regional accounts for 13 percent of the births, 23 percent of the perinatal beds, and 16 percent of the newborn baby bassinets of hospitals within a 10-mile radius.

An online community petition to stop the closure has already garnered thousands of signers at https://www.change.org/p/community-of-east-san-jose-support-our-community-stop-the-closure-of-labor-and-delivery

HCA has more than enough wealth to maintain the services at Regional and assure proper protective equipment and staffing in its hospitals. Over the past decade, HCA has made more than $23 billion in profits.