HealthBridge Management, a nursing home company, was forced to take back workers who were on strike after a federal judge found the management company to not be negotiating in good faith.  HealthBridge was imposing significant wage and benefit cuts before negotiations were deadlocked.

 

The New York Times stated that the strike began “after HealthBridge declared the negotiations deadlocked and then imposed changes that included freezing the workers’ pensions, requiring many to pay at least $6,000 more a year for family health coverage and eliminating six paid sick days and a week’s vacation for many workers.”

 

You can read the full article here.

 

We find that in troubled facilities, problems are generally caused at the ownership and management levels rather than level of the individual worker.  The ownership and management levels are where the staffing quantity and quality decisions are made.  Like any other workplace, a stressed facility creates unhappy workers; in a nursing home or assisted living facility, this can have an impact on resident care.  Many times, individual caregivers are doing the best they can with what they are given.  When this is inadequate, residents can suffer severe consequences.