‘Staffing shortages, unsafe situations’: Hundreds of Faulkner Hospital nurses vote to strike

Hundreds of nurses at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital voted to authorize the bargaining committee to call for a strike on Thursday night.

Now the hospital has ten days to respond before the nurses walk out for one full day.

“We are having a lot of trouble retaining staff, leading to a lot of staffing shortages and unsafe situations at the hospital and part of the reason is that nurses leave to make more money elsewhere,” said Elise Hurley, a nurse at Faulkner Hospital.

Staffing shortages, salaries, and safety issues are among the top concerns for nurses at Faulkner Hospital in Jamaica Plain.

“We had an incident in the emergency room the other day where a couple of nurses were injured quite badly by a patient, and so far we are not happy with management’s response to that incident, we feel they are not taking it seriously enough,” said Hurley.

Nurses say they face similar challenges as the nurses at the Brigham, but they’re paid less for the same work.

“We follow Brigham and Women’s procedures for things like setting up OR rooms or GI procedures, patients are admitted to Faulkner from the Brigham emergency room sometimes,” said Hurley.

On the issue of wages at Faulkner, Mass General Brigham says: “Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital is licensed as a community hospital, with lower reimbursements from the insurance carriers and less specialized care. The nursing salary scales reflect these differences.”

Thousands of nurses at the Brigham voted Wednesday to authorize a strike if Mass General Brigham doesn’t meet their demands for this next contract.

‘Really fired up’: Fed-up nurses at Brigham and Women’s Hospital vote to strike

Now the 500 nurses at Faulkner Hospital plan on doing the same.

Mass General Brigham released the following statement Thursday:

“We have been negotiating with the Massachusetts Nurses Association since August of 2023 and have participated in 28 sessions with the union to date, along with a federal mediator since May 6. We made progress, reached tentative agreements on several issues, including workplace safety, and feel confident that we proposed a fair and equitable contract. Our focus remains on supporting our nurses while providing high-quality, safe care for our patients. If, through this vote announced today by the MNA, the bargaining committee is authorized to call for a strike and one is called, we are positioned to continue to provide the same high-quality care that patients expect.”

“So even though we do worry about the impact on the patients that striking would have, the goal is that in the long term it would help us provide better care and a better environment for them,” said Hurley.

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