Hi Helpful REDDIT Humans,I wrote this letter, below the numbered points, for the Betterment of the Group, along with the input of my co-workers. I uploaded this letter to the Town Hall site for the February 10th, 2023 meeting for reduced hours or think out of the box for the retainment of staff. We are burnt out and no one is listening. I don't even think they even read the letter we submitted below. I modified some of this for protection. We are a Union workplace, I have not involved the Union.
- We followed up a month later in March to Mike, Jeff, Liz and our manager Kelly (who likes to please leadership) and asked if they have come to any decisions, and also said if we could set up an appointment with any of them and it was CRICKETS.
- Two weeks later we followed up again and invited any of them to our floor to talk to us. Again, met with CRICKETS. No one is replying to us.
- We sent a 3rd follow-up a week later and asked to meet or they come to our floor. This time I included the National President of our company.
- We finally got a response when we sent it the the National guy!!!! The state Leadership, Mike and Jeff and Director Liz were not happy about this and We finally got a response that said that we have been spoken to by management several times over the last few months regarding there will be no changes to the FTE. This is how they are going to retain nurses for the current shortage.
- I replied that he received misinformation and no one came and talked to us. I asked 10 of my co-workers if they recall anyone talking to us about reducing hours or working 4-10's and no one recalls anyone coming to our floor.
- Director Liz comes down to our floor the next day for our 0720 huddle unannounced huffing, puffing and pissed. She has her arms crossed and said she s here to talk but nothing is going to change. So we asked if we can try out 4-10 hours shifts. She said yes, but no reduction in FTE or the use of PRN's (as needed nurses).
- I asked my manager Kelly for a blank schedule with how many nurses a day we need for the week, we took all the vacation requests for June and made it work using 21 nurses and no PRN staff!! We needed only 4 PRN nurses for the end of June to grant everyone the time off they asked for!!!!!
- I submitted it to Director Liz and AGAIN had to follow-up a week later of what they thought. I asked my manager how the meeting went and she said they are running the numbers and I told her to please send this information out because the staff, at this point is demoralized. She did and it has been 2 weeks.
- THIS IS WHERE WE NEED HELP. They just want us to go AWAY. This is very dysfunctional and neglectful. What is our next step? It has been 4 months of this.
THIS IS THE INITIAL LETTER WE SENT IN FEBRUARY: To: Mike - Regional President Jeff, MD - President, Executive Medical Director
From: Gastroenterology Staff - RN’s and MA’s
Re: Flexible Schedules to Reduce Burnout and Increase Quality of Life Hello Mike and Jeff Thank You for holding this Town Hall meeting for the Region employees. We would like to take this opportunity to share with you our thoughts, ideas, feelings, and concerns regarding our life here in GI. Please know, GI is a wonderful place to work, our team is dynamic and patient care is fulfilling. As healthcare professionals, we are always looking for ways to improve patient safety and member satisfaction, improve our efficiency and make Kaiser Permanente Thrive. Our concern and frustration are that the required full-time employment (FTE) is unThriving many of us into the ground. It is demoralizing and makes it challenging to create a work-life balance. We have tried going the normal route of speaking to our managers. We have been told by Kelly our manager, that GI leadership says to talk to the Union, and we have spoken to the Union ad nauseam about this. A petition was circulated in the three GI departments to garner support for addressing FTE, which is below and shared with Nate our Union representative. Nothing has come of it. Union Reps have spoken to Steve, who is Kelly's Boss and it ends there, we have no idea if he presents it to Liz, who is the Ambulatory Surgery Center Admin. We are trying a new route, going from the top down. Our People Pulses reflect our dissatisfaction on several levels, but we never get to go over them as a Department to see if we can make improvements and talk about issues. We feel as though we are not Seen or Heard. Company has approximately spent $160,000 training Eight nurses that have left for three 12 houfour 10 hour shifts or went PRN THIS YEAR. Because Five/8 hour days are not sustainable. It takes approximately 2 months to train a nurse to get them up and running and a year or two to feel seasoned in GI. It is very stressful for the department to keep training people only to have them leave because the FTE is a 1.0 and then they realize the required hours are not sustainable. At the end of our workday, and work week we have very little time or energy to take care of family, home responsibilities and ourselves. As RN’s and MA’s our jobs in GI are very dynamic, physically, mentally and emotionally demanding. Physically we are constantly moving beds in and out of rooms, adjusting beds and patients for each case, getting patients ready for their procedures, making beds, and restocking supplies. During procedures some patients require a great deal more hands-on, applying pressure on the abdomen to help the doctor advance the scope through the colon, upper endoscopies may require us to hold hands, and or bracing the patient to help the DR. perform the procedure. Mentally we always have to be on. We are always assessing patients. Pre-oping patients many skills and assessments. During intra-op we are constantly assessing patients for safety and ensuring patient comfort, documenting the many patient assessments, and medication administered all while taking biopsies, cauterizing polyps, inking sites in the colon, dilating the esophagus, getting through tortuous colons, etc.
Also, many of the patients are anxious/angry or are being diagnosed with cancer and other GI diseases, all of which require extra care and can be emotionally draining. Our many work demands are unique to this department. Demands, that make us both love our job and also a need to create a balance of self-care to help us fulfill the Kaiser Permanente Mission. Quite simply, many of us are burnt out: There is increased absenteeism - which costs Company $ Increased employee turnover - which cost Company $ Increased employee workplace stress between employees - which costs Company $ Decreased employee trust, loyalty, motivation and morale - which costs Company$ Decreased employee productivity - which costs Company $ Harm to Company's Reputation and decreased respect for the organization’s mission and vision - which costs $ Please consider that St. Joe’s has openings for part-time work with benefits. GI in Oregon has 4/10 hour shifts, so does GI in California, California barely has a lot of 1.0’s, So it can be done, and it has been done at Kaiser in the past. Please consider changing the required FTE to 0.8 for Full Time/and the flexibility for 4-day/ 9-hour shifts, and 4-day /10-hour shifts for the RNs, and MAs. This would be beneficial and the staff would have the flexibility to schedule healthcare appointments for themselves and their families, get their car fixed, take their pets to the vet, increase their quality of life, and decrease stress. As we prioritize patient care, we also want all of our coworkers to have the ability to take care of themselves and their families. We have attached a screenshot of the seniority lists at all three GI locations. I think it's important to mention the inequality of FTE distribution across the three locations- Franklin has a much higher number of over all 1.0's, 13 total. All the 1.0 staff are getting resentful of fellow co-workers' lower FTE. Franklin alone has lost 5 - 1.0 just that have left Franklin GI this year. People who left (or are leaving) that were 0.6-0.8 FTE who then had their positions posted as a 1.0: Robin 0.7 last day 3/3 Heidi 0.6 People who left due to being unhappy with a 1.0 FTE in GI: Matthew - moved out of state Sara - went to KASC Lone Tree - 3/12’s Sara - went to KASC Franklin - 3/12’s Jane - went to Minors Lone Tree - 4/10’s Anna - went to Minors Rock Creek 4/10’s Jason - left for reduced hours outside of Kaiser Heidi - just gave her notice and is going to Ortho PRN Chanda-left procedures to do fibroscans With a 10-hour day shift this would allow us to; call patients, scrub schedules, and have a list of patients that can come in the next day when we see an opening. For example, a doctor had 3 cases fall off that cost Kaiser $3,000 - $1,000 per 30 minutes. We have about a 11 percent no show rate at Franklin, we could improve that by calling patients and filling in the gaps if the patient cancels with another patient. Scrubbing the schedules and increasing profits for Kaiser..there are so many ways we can be more dynamic and profitable. We can start a little earlier to set up our rooms, right now we have 15 minutes. Since Kaiser is coming down on the Doctors to do more and more and more, they are coming into our rooms earlier and earlier because Kaiser is making them do more in the same amount of time. It’s RUSH, RUSH and RUSHing all around. Please let us know how we can help support our case for a .8 FTE and/or 4 ten hour shifts. Thank you for your time and attention to this matter as it is very important to many, if not all of the RNs in the Colorado GI departments.
If this doesn’t make it to the Town Hall, would you please respond to us regarding your thoughts about our letter, People Pulse, and maybe a visit to our Unit? It would mean a lot to hear a rationale instead of deaf ears and the word NO all the time, Or we can’t change it, because your schedule revolves around the Doctor’s schedule. Why is it so hard to TRIAL and/or TRY DIFFERENT schedules out to see if it makes an improvement? Thank you for your time and for listening to us, GI Colorado
The letter below was from GI, circulated July 2022 Dear Company, We, the Employed Registered Nurses (RNs), Advanced Practice Providers (APPs) and Local 7 Healthcare Professionals, are respectfully requesting that full time employment (FTE) hours be reconsidered.
As committed employees of Company, we share the mission to deliver quality health care to every member. Our training to assess and care for our patients demands we be at our best with every patient contact, prioritizing patient safety and wellbeing. Currently new Registered Nurses are being hired at a 1.0 FTE, whereas RNs in the past have been hired at .9 and there are long term RN’s that are employed at a .8, .7 and .6 FTE. A five day, forty-hour work week does not allow for a balance between work and life, and limits flexible scheduling options for many RN and APP positions.
Kaiser invests a considerable amount of time to train newly hired RNs, and APPs. These new hires are initially excited to be a part of a respected and prestigious organization. They soon learn that the demands and inflexible scheduling are not conducive to creating a balance between career and family responsibilities or interests outside of work. We are hearing from our colleagues that they will not apply for a position that requires a forty-hour work week. We are losing good people to other organizations so that they can maintain a work life balance. As RNs, APPs, Local 7 Healthcare Professionals who value our careers as health care providers for Kaiser Permanente Members, we respectfully request that full time employment be flexible and part time positions be offered to allow for a work life balance. We are available to have an in person meeting to discuss this in further detail. Thank you for your serious consideration, GI
https://www.thepermanentejournal.org/doi/10.7812/TPP/05-092 Some takeaways from the article: “If we’re not taking care of ourselves, then how can we take care of our members future and to our reputation,” from the late Bernard Tyson. He goes on to say, “They are critical to our future because we depend upon people to deliver our health care. Sure, technology and well-calibrated equipment are also key tools in health care delivery, but it’s the people who bring the experience to life for our members and key stakeholders. Plus, in order for us to be respected in our field and viewed as America’s health leader, we must walk our talk.” Supporting a work environment that promotes employee health, wellness, and work-life balance is directly aligned with KP and Labor Management intentions and goals. KP leaders will continue to demonstrate our commitment to the wellness of our workforce by caring and respecting the physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being of employees and physicians.” Work-Life Balance: Care Instructions -
https://healthy.kaiserpermanente.org › health-wellness As America’s health leader, we must walk our talk.
https://www.theskimm.com/money After dealing with labor shortages and employee burnout, companies are taking things up a notch with work perks in 2023. And we’re not just talking about lunch stipends or ping-pong tables in the office. It’s called proactive rest. And it’s more than just taking your vacation days. Because waiting until you’re burned out to take care of yourself is so 2022. What is proactive rest? Proactive rest is how some companies are stepping up to prevent employee burnout at work, according to a Gartner workplace trends report. Instead of only relying on PTO, workplaces are adjusting their policies to give their employees breaks and flexibility. It's similar to active recoveries in fitness — rather than taking a full day of rest from working out, you might opt for a walk or some stretching instead. At work, proactive rest might look like: No-meeting blocks. When your company designates certain hours or days for no meetings. Flexible lunch breaks. Meaning, employees can choose when they take their breaks. Mandatory breaks. And that could be in addition to lunch. It may look like “wellness time” for you to take naps in the afternoon. Four-day work weeks. As in, getting the same amount of work done in fewer days — with no pay cuts. Office closures. That could mean a week-long company-wide break or summer Fridays. So you can switch from “TGIF” to “TGIT” from June through September. View post on Instagram Why is proactive rest important? Prioritizing rest can help companies boost productivity. It may sound counterintuitive, but a Gartner survey found a 26% increase in performance at companies that incorporated proactive rest. Plus, it could incentivize people to apply for jobs at these companies — and even slow turnover rates. Because burned out employees are more than three times likely to look for new jobs. For employees, burnout is still extremely common. And being able to get ahead of it can help avoid having to recover from burnout later on. Building rest into the work calendar can help encourage employees to actually use it. Because Americans aren’t the best at taking their PTO, even when it’s offered. And they typically put in extra hours: The average employee worked nine unpaid hours per week in 2022. If it sounds like hustle culture, it is. While it may be helpful for climbing the corporate ladder, it might come at the expense of your mental health. View post on TikTok theSkimm Companies are taking extra measures to keep employees’ mental health in check in 2023. Because free office snacks just aren’t cutting it anymore. And having the freedom to take care of yourself now can prevent you from struggling down the road.
I saw this at a gym and was told it was homemade. Well I imagine it could be done with a cricut so I thought I'd ask the group. Anyone got any thoughts on how to do this? TIA.
Just returned from a trip to Japan and coming back to Toronto is..tough.
Toronto is a decent place to live, but in terms of what it offers as a city, it is just painfully mediocre.
Let's start with food, dining out has become incredibly expensive with mediocre food. If you want to eat anything decent, you're looking at at least $30 + tips + tax, and most of the times the food isn't even that good. There isn't any cheaper, affordable, quick, good meal options anymore, since even a meal at fast food place is expensive. Not to mention now every fucking shop is asking for tips, buying a coffee and the tipping option starts with 15%, like wtf am I even tipping for?! (Don't get me started with tipping on buying cookies!)
The city seems big but the new or novel things to do are just so few. All the ones you guys will probably mention I have tried. Kingston market, St Lawrence Market(like this one is just beyond lame), and all Little Italy, Danforth areas etc. They are just so boring to even visit. And walking on those streets is just painfully pointless. All the festivals etc are filled with same types of food vendors and uninspiring performances. And what is everyone's favourite activity to do in the summer? Drinking at a patio! I really don't get how this activity is so popular, most of the patios are just tiny little area facing the streets and it's not that much more fun just because you're drinking 10m away from an indoor place, and it's..just drinking. Or going to Toronto island for the 100th times.
Lastly, the people, the people in Toronto just give me this vibe of that they think they are such hot shit(but in fact they are really not). Going out in Toronto is probably the worst going out experience I ever had in my life, everyone is just hanging out in their own friends group and don't really want to interact with others. It's such sad thing that supposedly that a diverse city like Toronto don't have people with more open attitudes.
Of course, I know it's a very different visiting a place as a tourist, and this is just another weekly(daily) shitting on Toronto, but still, I wish the city could be more fun and interesting, but I just can't wait to move away!