Kaiser has about 50 mental health clinicians to provide care for the HMO’s 266,000 members in Hawaii. Their open-ended walkout starts on Aug. 29.
Kaiser Permanente mental health workers in Hawaii will soon join their California counterparts on picket lines to protest what they say is woeful understaffing for mental health services.
"Kaiser's business model is to starve its behavioral health services and short-change patients who can go months without care," says Sal Rosselli, president of the National Union of Healthcare Workers, which represents Kaiser mental health clinicians in California and Hawaii.
"Through strike activity our members are using their power to make Kaiser stop treating mental healthcare as a second-class service and start providing care that its paying customers are legally entitled to receive," Rosselli says.
Kaiser has about 50 mental health clinicians to provide care for the HMO's 266,000 members in Hawaii, according to the NUHW. The Hawaii clinicians held a three-day strike in May, and this latest walkout starts on Aug. 29 and will be open-ended, the union says.
Kaiser's accreditation in Hawaii is under "corrective action" with the National Committee for Quality Assurance after the clinicians filed a complaint documenting what clinicians say are dangerously long waits times for mental health appointments.
NCQA determined that the "lack of access to (behavioral health care) for Kaiser members poses a potential patient safety risk" and that "Kaiser's prior efforts to improve access… have largely been ineffective."
More than 2,000 Kaiser mental health clinicians in Northern California walked off the job on Aug. 15 to protest the HMO's chronic understaffing, which the NUHW says is continuing despite Kaiser having $54 billion in reserves. The striking clinicians are actively picketing Kaiser hospitals across Northern California.
Kaiser spokeswoman Deb Catsavas has called the walkout "perplexing" and the union’s tactics "unethical and counterproductive."
"In our last bargaining session we were about 1% apart in our respective wage proposals, and we came to bargaining … with hopes to bargain vigorously and bring negotiations to a conclusion," Catsavas said after the Aug. 15 walkout. "Unfortunately, union leadership delivered a fully new economic proposal from NUHW that avoids reaching agreement and pushes us further apart."
“Kaiser's business model is to starve its behavioral health services and short-change patients who can go months without care.”
Sal Rosselli, president, NUHW
John Commins is a content specialist and online news editor for HealthLeaders, a Simplify Compliance brand.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Kaiser has about 50 mental health clinicians to provide care for the HMO's 266,000 members in Hawaii.
The Hawaii clinicians held a three-day strike in May, and this latest walkout starts on Aug. 29 and will be open-ended.
More than 2,000 Kaiser mental health clinicians in Northern California walked off the job on Aug. 15 to protest the HMO's chronic understaffing.
The striking clinicians are actively picketing Kaiser hospitals across Northern California.