Nurses Protest at the Joliet Ascension Saint Joseph's Medical Center:

Noëllie Inard 

Credit: www.shawlocal.com

On the night of Saturday, October 21st, the nurses of Joliet Ascension Saint Joseph’s Medical Center held a rally in front of the hospital. More than a hundred people attended the protest against the staff shortage and, according to the St. Joseph Nurses Association, against the suspension of three nurses who started raising concerns about the staffing in the emergency department. According to the World Socialist Website, an online publication focusing on social equality, a staff representative of the hospital, John Fitzgerald, explained that when the nurses complained about the inadequate covering of their shifts, security was called on them and they were escorted out. More importantly, Fitzgerald added that “[...] there were at least two sentinel events in this hospital that derive from unsafe staffing in this past week.” According to the medical dictionary website, a sentinel event is described as “an adverse event in health care delivery or other services, which either leads to or has potential to lead to catastrophic outcomes [...],” which could lead to death or serious harm. 

    According to the World Socialist Website, the staff ratio in the emergency room was lower than Illinois’s guidelines of 10 nurses per unit. On a typical Friday night, only 10 nurses are available to care for 50 patients and weekly, nurses are facing a patient ratio of one nurse to 12 patients. This is not the first time nurses had to protest to make their voices heard, indeed, in 2020 they conducted a 16-days strike already demanding improvement for staff shortages. While the strike protest was contained and dissolved by union officials, the issue was not addressed which has led to the recent events. The hospital has tried to blame nurses but did not yet comment on the situation.