AlbanyMed management, nurses at odds over staffing

ALBANY, N.Y. ( NEWS10 ) – Albany Medical Center and the union representing its nursing staff continue to be at odds over staffing concerns, NEWS10 heard from both sides on Thursday. Nurses said they are experiencing a staffing crisis, while the hospital said there is no crisis.

Nurses represented by the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) and AlbanyMed CEO Dennis McKenna both addressed the media at separate press conferences.

Both sides made allegations against the other, but what both have agreed on one point, that the DOH has issued a deficiency report to hospital management and nurses on the clinical staffing committee were presented that information on Thursday, after the initial meeting was rescheduled from Wednesday.

Frustrated NYSNA nurses, who have been working without a contract for two months, said the hospital is trying to keep the staffing crisis a secret and have been calling on the hospital to release the full report from the Department of Health. McKenna addressed those claims.

“Let me say with absolute conviction AlbanyMed is not hiding anything we never have,” said McKenna. “There’s not a staffing crisis here, what there is — and I walk the floors every day as do many of the other senior leaders here in the room — we recognize that we have full effort to do many things related to retention and recruitment of nurses here.”

In addition to more recruitment and retention, the nurses said they want respect. They made formal complaints with the New York State Department of Health.

McKenna said they’ve received the deficiency report from the DOH and the department surveyed six months of staffing patterns – reviewing 20,640 shifts – and found that 2.2 percent, or 480 shifts, fell short of the staffing plan.

“But even that does not tell the full story in those 2.2 percent of shifts it could be that a singular nurse or singular tech called out,” said McKenna.

Nurses said that doesn’t reflect their experiences working on the floor. Matt Looker is a nurse in the emergency room and said nurses are still being pressured to make room for patients that the hospital does not have bed space, or staff, for.

“After the Department of Health visit our chief nursing officer sent us an email saying we needed to immediately offload patients regardless of the situation. It’s not a workable solution. If it wasn’t so dire it would be comical,” said Looker.

He said he’s had patients come from out of state and has had to move patients to hallways for care to make room for the new patients.

“It should not be a normal thing, but that’s what we have to deal with on a regular basis,” said Looker.

McKenna said it makes him proud to take in patients that other hospitals at capacity turned away.

“We can always figure it out. The process is very dynamic. Flow in the emergency department, flow in the hospital. It is something that we work on and do every single day,” said McKenna. “I would bet you if we went back and looked at that case we provided safe care to that person in the hallway and we also took care of that person who we were asked to care for.”

Looker said it creates situations where nurses have to decide which patients get care and which patients are left alone for an indeterminable amount of time.

“We have support from our coworkers but not from the hospital. They put no plan in place to change this. When we speak up about it we’re basically shrugged off. There’s no real headway with any kind of problem that we face,” said Looker.

McKenna said the clinical staffing committee was presented with the full deficiency report Thursday, as well as the hospital’s plan to address those deficiencies. He said he’s certain the hospital will submit the plan to the state by Monday’s deadline.

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