SEIU Nurses Set Priorities at 2010 Nurse Legislative Conference

Nurses From Throughout California Strategize, Learn, Lobby

SEIU nurses from around the state gathered at the 2010 Nurse Alliance of California Legislative Conference May 4 and 5 to hear updates on healthcare reforms taking place in Washington, D.C., and Sacramento, and how that will impact our patients and our daily work as RNs. “Last year, we called the code on healthcare,” said Ann Kempski, SEIU’s director of Health Policy. “Now we can say it’s in the progressive care unit—not perfect, but improving.”

SEIU RN members spent the first day in workshops, and the second day meeting with and educating legislators about priority issues and current bills affecting nursing practice and patient care.

This year’s legislative conference also emphasized the theme of “meanwhile, who is taking care of nurses?” Nurse Alliance members participated in several presentations and workshops designed to help RNs improve their personal health maintenance and stress management, and techniques to learn to identify indicators of poor coping/increased stress.

During workshops, nurses spent time building awareness of state laws and regulations, and learned about the proud history of SEIU nurses winning landmark achievements—including the nurse-patient ratio laws that are still being pushed at the national level. (See separate box.) Nurses discussed the importance of being nurse citizens, and pushing for important issues at the local level. Collectively we set the goal of having each RN in attendance work to reach out and educate in their community to create five more nurse citizens like themselves by next year’s conference.

“Power is in numbers. If we stick together as nurses and support each other, there is nothing we can’t accomplish," said Rita Wright, senior mental health counselor, Hollywood MHC, SEIU Local 721 (pictured on right.)

Members spent significant time learning about the connection between nursing and Health Information Technology (HIT). Joanne Spetz, a professor at the University of California–San Francisco, described why it’s important for nurses to be involved with HIT changes at their worksites; as hospitals make changes in recordkeeping to try to improve patient care.

Ann Kempski explained the details of the new federal healthcare reform that we helped win in 2009 and how it will impact our patients. Ann emphasized that SEIU RNs will need to be vigilant as the law is implemented. While the law creates a huge need for more healthcare workers in the future (32 million more Americans will be covered by 2019), some employers may see certain items in the legislation as incentives to cut worker hours, and push workers to pay more for their own healthcare as insurance companies seek to raise premiums.

The afternoon of Day 1 was spent learning how to take better care of ourselves. Robert Ferguson, creator of the “Food Lovers Fat Loss System,” addressed the crowd about the importance of eating a healthy diet; balancing protein and carbs in combinations that form “weight loss plates.” Workshops on maintaining daily activity and “laughter yoga” got RNs up and out of the seats at the end of a busy day.

All in all, attendees felt the legislative conference was a positive step forward for our Nurse Alliance activities. Attendees were provided a valuable opportunity to network and learn to work together, and will work for the next year on improving the healthcare system in California.

“By being involved with the SEIU Nurse Alliance of California, we can learn actions that we can take to fight for better patient care, and also to protect and strengthen our BRN," said Aida Pena, public health nurse, Santa Clara County, SEIU Local 521 (pictured at left.)