Workers Of The World - 26

 On Strike To Improve Mental Health Care

Thousands of social workers, psychologists and therapists are set to start a week long strike Monday against Kaiser Permanente medical centers throughout California, the largest action of its kind in the nation. The labor dispute isn't emphasizing wage increases or better benefits. The clinicians feel compelled to act on behalf of their patients, contending that the Kaiser model for providing mental health care is woefully inadequate. On Monday, Kaiser's 2,600 mental health professionals will begin the week long action of 65 picket lines across 35 cities in response to failed negotiations. Organized by the National Union of Health Workers (NUHW), the strike is slated to be the largest labor action of its kind in the country.
"We began bargaining almost five years ago," says NUHW president Sal Rosselli. "These clinicians demonstrated at the bargaining table the fact that Kaiser was not obeying the law meeting minimum requirements for access to mental health care. Kaiser dismissed it."
The central grievance surrounds what the NUHW calls continued "systemic understaffing" in Kaiser's psychiatry departments. Not having enough staff leads to appointment delays of weeks, and even months in certain circumstances, that are detrimental to patient health.
"It didn't just happen overnight," Clement Papazian, a clinical social worker in Oakland and president of NUHW's Northern California Chapter of mental health clinicians, tells Truthout. He's been an employee with Kaiser for 25 years witnessing changes, only not for the better. "It's just gotten progressively worse." Papazian's occupational specialty is in psychiatric emergency and acute care. He's seen the negative impact of lengthy periods in between appointments for patients suffering from bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression and other mental health conditions.
In 2013, the California Department of Managed Health Care fined Kaiser Permanente to the tune of $4 million after a survey concluded they failed to provide timely access to those seeking mental health services. It was the second largest penalty levied by the agency in the history of the state.
After battling for a year-and-a-half, Kaiser finally agreed to pay the fine in September 2014, promising a "comprehensive effort to improve the experience of our members, patients, and purchases in the area of mental health care."
For soon-to-be striking therapists, there's been nothing but a rearranging of the chairs of the deck of the Titanic since then.



Mental health workers say the impending strike is very much a working-class issue. "Many of the patients that have a Kaiser Permanente plan are working people; they're truck drivers, they clean hotels, they make food," says Elizabeth White, a Los Angeles-based Kaiser psychiatric social worker for 16 years. With the Great Recession and its ripple effects, people continually come through her office with economic devastation morphing into mental maladies. Kaiser's problems with staffing and consistent appointments prevents her from effectively using preferred and proven models of treating depression, whatever the underlying cause may be.
A Kaiser spokesperson responded to the December 31st strike notice with a statement in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat calling it "irresponsible," while noting contingency plans are in place for patients for the pickets.
"No one wants to not come in for patients but we've chosen to give the employer the necessary preparation time," says White. She's prepped people on her caseload with emergency hotline numbers along with self-care tools to make it through the strike week. "This is not an easy decision to make but Kaiser gave us no choice."
Mental health workers have been unionized since 2000, but it wasn't until 2010 that that they decertified from SEIU, which Rosselli called "a company union in bed with Kaiser" and entered into a representation arrangement with NUHW.
"Being a bottom up, democratic organization, NUHW listened to the interests of mental health workers and set upon a mission to express those interests in policy and action," Papazian says. The union points to Kaiser's $14 billion in profits since 2009 as more than enough to adequately staff its psychiatry departments.
"The staffing situation in mental care is very complicated," Rosselli says. "Our proposal is simple: Set up a clinic of psychologists and Kaiser managers by medical center to come up with the appropriate staffing solution for that facility with the help of a third-party mediator if an agreement could not be reached. That would settle the strike."


taken from here