Citing safety fear amid coronavirus outbreak, union files complaint against PeaceHealth
State regulators are investigating after a nurses’ union filed a complaint against PeaceHealth, alleging it was failing to provide a safe work environment for workers on the front lines of the COVID-19 outbreak.
The Washington State Nurses Association is accusing PeaceHealth of not giving nurses the personal protective gear they need while working at its St. Joseph hospital in Bellingham and of other actions it said could harm them.
The union, which represents 900 nurses at the hospital, filed the complaint on March 11, the day after the Whatcom County Health Department reported its first case of the new coronavirus.
Washington State Department of Labor and Industries has six months to complete the investigation it has opened.
The state agency has requested documents from the hospital and is interviewing nurses and others who might have knowledge of the situation, Tim Church, spokesman for L&I, said to The Bellingham Herald.
In its complaint, the Washington State Nurses Association said nurses were told to re-use and share personal protective equipment such as “PAPR without proper cleaning per manufacturer guidelines” and that “nurses were directed to remove masks before leaving a patient’s room.”
PAPR stands for powered air-purifying respirator.
“Removing a mask before leaving the room could expose nurses and other caregivers to the coronavirus, especially if there has been an airborne procedure or the patient has been coughing,” said Ruth Schubert, spokeswoman for the Washington State Nurses Association.
The complaint also said there was a lack of training for those using personal protective equipment, including the proper way to put them on and take them off, which is referred to as donning and doffing.
“Donning and doffing is an issue because if it is not done properly, it increases the chance of contamination,” Schubert said to The Herald. “If a nurse doesn’t usually work in an area where personal protective equipment donning and doffing is performed, he/she would not know how to do it properly,” Schubert said to The Herald.
The union isn’t alone in its rebuke of PeaceHealth, which has been facing ongoing and widespread criticism since Ming Lin, an ER doctor who had worked there for 17 years, said he was fired after publicly calling out the administration for reportedly not doing enough to protect its workers and prepare for the COVID-19 pandemic.
In a previous statement supporting Lin, the union also said nurses at the hospital “report that they have run out of proper gowns to care for suspected and positive COVID-19 patients, are being directed to re-use and share personal protective equipment (PPE) without proper cleaning per manufacturer guidelines, are being given one surgical mask per day and being told to keep it in a paper bag between patients, and other unsafe measures.”
For its part, PeaceHealth has defended its preparations and said it has “adequate” staff and supply resources to battle the coronavirus pandemic.
Sudhakar Karlapudi, chief medical officer and chief patient safety officer for the hospital, reiterated that point and addressed the re-use question, which also was raised by Lin in a Facebook post, by referring to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Caregivers and physicians currently have the PPE they need to care for COVID-19 patients, i.e., patients who require special precautions. However, given the national shortage with PPE, we are using a preservation strategy, recommended by the CDC and supported by our infection preventionists, to help ensure that we can meet the need long term, i.e., should we receive a surge of COVID-19 patients,” he said in an email to The Herald.
“This preservation strategy is coupled with our efforts to procure and/or manufacture more PPE from local and worldwide sources, including from our community in the form of donations, which are coordinated through Whatcom Unified Command,” Karlapudi said.
Those same CDC guidelines allow one surgical mask to be allocated to a caregiver for use for eight hours, provided it doesn’t become compromised or soiled, Karlapudi added.
Shawna Unger, system vice president human resources, for PeaceHealth said the health care provider, which operates medical clinics as well as the lone hospital in Whatcom County, has been in touch with the union.
“PeaceHealth has had open and ongoing dialogue with WSNA, and we fully agree that the safety of our caregivers is our utmost priority during this public health crisis. PeaceHealth is currently appropriately stocked with personal protective equipment (PPE) throughout our health system, including at PeaceHealth St. Joseph,” Unger said in an email to The Herald.
“We continue to monitor supplies daily and are actively planning for both the short- and long-term safety of our caregivers and patients. We are following national and international recommendations for the use of PPE in times of shortage endorsed by the CDC, the World Health Organization and state and local health agencies,” Unger added.
She said PeaceHealth reached out to the union the day after being notified that a complaint had been filed “to provide the communication and education materials related to our PPE program and protocol.”
It is cooperating with L&I and providing details about its PPE process, respiratory protection program and training materials, Unger said.
Schubert acknowledged that there is a national shortage of protective equipment but said health care providers shouldn’t be expected to care for patients under conditions she said were unsafe.
“Nurses and other health care workers are not being given the equipment to do their jobs treating COVID-19 patients safely,” she said. “Nurses are worried about themselves, their families and their patients. If nurses start falling sick, who will be left to take care of these very sick patients?”
This story was originally published April 7, 2020 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Citing safety fear amid coronavirus outbreak, union files complaint against PeaceHealth."
