To whom it SHOULD concern in the Scripps Health System and Healthcare everywhere:
 
     We would like the opportunity to air our grievances that have fallen on deaf ears for far too long. It is no surprise to anyone that 2020 was a rough year for all of us in healthcare working on the frontlines and continues to be as we face the new covid pandemic of the unvaccinated in 2021. We all showed up to work everyday and night exposing ourselves and our families to an unknown danger. We saw an endless amount of suffering and death firsthand. Initially we had the outward visible support from the system. We had food sent to us, cards of appreciation, small gifts, etcetera. And now? Silence.

     The pandemic raged on through the whole year and we all adapted. People floated to different units they had never worked before, covid specific units were opened and/or created, people worked countless amounts of extra hours to help. And where was leadership, we asked. Doing photo ops using precious PPE that was already in high demand and short supply. Hiding in their offices and command centers sending out new policies and directives without seeing firsthand what we were dealing with and what was needed, some never having done bedside care in their careers. We who work at the bedside doing actual hands-on patient care do this because we care. We show up day in and day out no matter the personal cost to our physical and mental health. And for that reason, we are taken advantage of. It wasn’t until the end of 2020 that double time was offered for extra shifts and even then, it was not offered to everyone and it was stopped without any warning. Some staff never received double time pay for shifts they had signed on for with that promise. There was repeated inquires to have hazard pay with no response. There was a span of only one month starting at the end of December 2020 that a bonus was offered for working a specific number of shifts and there is staff that are still waiting to see that money paid to them. 

     Is this how a multi-billion-dollar company who is supposedly a leader in healthcare operates? There has been a known nursing shortage approaching as more of the baby boomer generation leaves the workforce but now you have droves of people leaving the bedside after sometimes only two years of experience because we are fed up. Scripps claims that patient safety is their number one priority, we are here to tell you that is not true. Safe patient ratios save lives. Every single person wants to give the best care possible whatever their role. Every single team member is important and deserves to be treated with respect and compensated well. Sick calls have increased due to people being at their wits end, we are mentally and physically suffering, many of us have developed PTSD due to the past year. It is known that we in healthcare have dark humor to cope with what we see daily but it has now become the norm to mention quitting and even hurting ourselves daily as a joke. This is not okay and not normal. Every single day multiple messages go out asking for help covering shifts. Where is leadership? Staffing floors appropriately is not the nurses’ or other staff’s responsibility and yet, we are made to feel this way. We punish our bodies by repeatedly coming in to help our coworkers weather the continuous onslaught of patients leaving our families at home wondering when they will get to spend time with us. We are tired of not being able to eat or use the bathroom for 12 plus hours and not receiving a break, yet we get in trouble if we don’t take our breaks. Every hospital in the county is going on diversion with multiple off load delays for the medics due to admit holds in the emergency rooms and not enough staff for the beds needed for all these patients. There are millions of dollars being spent on improvements and new buildings; where will the staff come from to staff these new beds? Nurses and other staff are consistently verbally and physically abused by patients and their companions for doing their best with what they are given to work with. HCAPS scores and money are what talks and has been shown to be more important by the behavior displayed by leadership at Scripps.

     This is all without discussing the mayhem that was the ransomware attack in May 2021. The entire Scripps system was affected and left scrambling to figure out how to care for patients, some that had been in the hospital for months, with no access to their medical histories, lab results, imaging results; so much information that is required to care for a patient safely and effectively. Not to mention the breach in confidentiality and trust in the Scripps system. All the staff can agree that none of us felt we were giving safe patient care. There was no back up plans set in place. It was pure chaos as we had to figure out a process to care for a patient from start to finish with the multitude of departments that need to interact with each other. There were no back up order sets to be had and staff had to be dedicated to this job alone for days in order to care for our patients. And how did we receive information about what was happening? The media. There was no communication from leadership to staff as to what was happening at all. Many of us saw the supposed memo from Chris Van Gorder because the media was circulating a copy of it. Without that many of us knew nothing. And when directly asked what was happening, we were told it was not a ransomware attack. There was no direction as to how to respond to our patients or the community. We were lied to. And when the attack was supposedly resolved it was business as usual and again, we received empty words of thanks through email. 2020 was the Year of the Nurse. What did we receive in thanks aside from said email and a memo for this repeated onslaught of challenges? Stress balls, lanyards, pins and a tote bag.

     Not once did any of us see anyone from leadership on the floors either during the ransomware attack or during the continuing pandemic rolling their sleeves up to help. Leaders should not be ahead of their people; they should walk alongside their people and this is simply not done at Scripps. Chris Van Gorder has now been in his position for 20 years; did he create much needed change in the Scripps system? Yes. However, power changes people. Chris Van Gorder has said himself; change is necessary for any company to progress and to keep up with the times. That change is needed now. No one should be in a position of that much power for that long, it skews your world view and can make you lose focus of the very people you should be serving. There must be turnover of those in leadership to facilitate change. Many of us are tired of seeing photo ops and press releases being more important than being in the trenches with the very people who make it possible to pay your exorbitant salary. For Scripps being a non-profit organization Chris Van Gorder and several other executives make quite a bit of money; millions of dollars in salaries and bonuses every year.

     Why is that money not being shared with the boots on the ground? It is no secret that Scripps nurses and other staff make less working for this system than others in San Diego County. Scripps is the only system in the county whose nurses are not unionized. Is it time that we form a union? Do we possibly need to go on strike to prove how fed up and serious we are about our concerns? That is where we are heading if nothing is changed. If we were to go on strike, we know that travel nurses will be brought in and those nurses will be paid in excess of what full time staff is paid currently. We KNOW that staff can be paid what they are worth. We are told we are one Scripps. This is simply not true. Some floors are offered ERI and bonuses to pick up shifts while other floors are offered no incentives. Everyone; nurses, CNAs, techs, environmental services, respiratory therapists, radiology technicians, supply chain, transporters, food services, physical therapists, the list goes on, we ALL deserve to be paid what we are worth. An employee of a multi-billion-dollar company should not be living paycheck to paycheck or need to work two or more jobs to make ends meet. Those of us that have stayed and stuck it out with Scripps for the love of our coworkers and our patients not only deserve to be paid what we are worth but also deserve retention bonuses. People that are offered positions here end up accepting offers elsewhere due to pay. This is without mentioning critical care pay which should be a benefit to our nurses. Those that work in the emergency departments and intensive care units require multiple certifications and skills to be considered baseline proficient to function on those floors. Why are those nurses not compensated appropriately for that critical care they provide? A couple years ago when we were discouraged from talking to union representatives someone from HR told us that Scripps views a nurse as “a nurse is a nurse” that all nurses are the same. That is simply not true. Would you want a medical/surgical nurse delivering your baby on the labor and delivery floor? No. Just as you would not want a primary care physician operating on you. All of us have a role and specialty and spend the time and energy to do it well.

     The culture at Scripps and in healthcare everywhere has unfortunately become toxic to the very people that keep it afloat. Many of us do not speak out for fear of retaliation. Despite this we have decided to come together as one voice for not just Scripps but for healthcare workers EVERYWHERE and speak out. We voice these concerns as the Press Ganey survey for Employee Engagement and Culture of Safety Survey has been sent out system wide to all employees. We constantly put ourselves last in order to care for our patients and have continued to do so even when more was asked of us. We are tired and we are hurting, and we want what is owed to us. We want our voices to be heard and we want a say so in how things are run.