Hiring freeze has led to ‘horrific’ conditions, workers say
Twenty labor advocates who refused to leave a UC Board of Regents meeting on Thursday, protesting what they called a staffing crisis that’s left patients vulnerable, were arrested by university police officers, a union representative said.
UCSF healthcare workers had started picketing outside a UC Board of Regents meeting in Mission Bay in the morning, saying San Francisco’s underserved populations — including refugees, the unhoused, and people struggling with mental illness — are most affected by understaffing and high turnover rates.
Following the close of public comment at the board meeting, a group of labor advocates refused to leave. It is unclear where police took those who were arrested, and what charges they face.
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Conditions are dire as it is, protesters said. Even when city services are available, people are left waiting up to 50 hours in the emergency department because there aren’t enough healthcare providers to see them.
“It’s just horrific,” said Cecily D., a social worker in the emergency department at UCSF’s Parnassus Campus. “The dam is exploding and we’re just trying to patch it.”
Yesterday, when her emergency department was at capacity, Cecily said 30 patients waited between nine and 15 hours. A physician, she added, emptied a urinal because there weren’t enough nurses.
UCSF social workers, who said they are paid up to a third less than their hospital-based peers, were part of a crowd of over 100 UCSF researchers, doctors and technicians. Led by union organizers, they chanted as they circled the Mission Bay campus: “UC, UC, you can’t hide. We can see your greedy side.”
The university says it is providing fair compensation.
“Given the continued threats to federal funding, the University is grateful it has been able to provide its UPTE and AFSCME-represented employees with fair and reasonable wage and health-care offers,” said Heather Hansen, a spokesperson for the University of California Office of the President.
According to Hansen, the university’s last offer met the unions’ original wage request of $25 an hour and a five-percent wage increase. She added that while the University of California supports employees’ free speech, protesters are expected to abide by “reasonable time, place and manner rules.”
According to a union statement, the San Francisco Homelessness Oversight Commission has cited UCSF for noncompliance because of hiring and retention issues, and the city’s healthcare network, Citywide, has received a performance letter about under-spending.
After a year of negotiation, organizers said, the goal of Thursday’s rally was to bring the university back to the bargaining table, lift the hiring freeze, and hire more front-line workers.
When Cecily started a decade ago, sensitive conversations with patients were held behind closed doors. Now, after an influx of people in need over the last few years, she said they’re held beside beds in the hallway. “There’s no dignity.”
Often, she added, emergency departments act as the city’s “safety net” because, unlike shelters or treatment centers, they accept people in crisis 24/7.
But long wait times can make the difference between someone with a substance-use disorder going into treatment or going into withdrawal, Cecily said. They can cause someone on an involuntary psychiatric hold to be physically and chemically restrained in a hallway overnight, or even over the weekend, until a clinician can see them.
“Patients are committing suicide because they cannot wait on this waitlist that is so long we cannot keep it staffed appropriately,” said Chey Dean, an Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s drug researcher and union organizer. “And the university doesn’t even care.”
Several healthcare providers gave examples of how employee attrition had hindered their ability to provide quality service.
Burnout recently left a six-person team serving Black clients in a 400-patient network understaffed, said Robyn Miles, a clinical social worker of 13 years. UCSF’s hiring freeze meant that they were unable to fill the gap with an intern who had been training with the team for the last year, she said.
Senior physician assistant and union secretary Matt Stephen said his head and neck surgery team had lost two physicians, one assistant, two speech therapists, and three audiologists in the last month alone.
“Turnover is unsustainable for a healthcare system,” Stephen said. “Treating it like a 1980s Toyota assembly line is not how you provide good care.”
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ABIGAIL VÂN NEELY
Abigail covers criminal justice, accountability, and behavioral health. She’s originally from New York City, where she was a youth advocate and watched hundreds of arraignments. Now, she enjoys foggy San Francisco mornings with her cat, Sally Carrera. (Yes, the shelter did in fact name the cat after the Porsche from the animated movie Cars.)More by Abigail Vân Neely
