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EDITOR'S
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Remember AB 60? Did you know that the regulatory language that restricts how 12-hour shifts can be used in health care is being rewritten? The conflicting politics of unions and employers make a poor foundation for designing effective 12-hour shift rules for healthcare employees. The Industrial Welfare Commission (IWC) appears to be influenced more by politics than the practical workplace realities and personal needs of healthcare workers. Unfortunately, bedside nurses remain unheard and misrepresented on an issue that will probably impact their quality of work life more than anything else that has come to public debate, including staffing ratios. In this case, both unions and employers profess to be representing the needs and desires of nurses and other healthcare employees who actually live and work the 12-hour shifts. While many nurses may be exempt from these regulations (public, government, district, or UC employees), we all should care about the outcome of these important decisions because it impacts our profession and our ability to recruit. Judging from the nurses I have talked to, it seems that most like 12-hour shifts, although they do require significant physical stamina and unique childcare arrangements. Twelve-hour schedules offer more weekend flexibility, permit more effective grouping of days off and improve availability for extra shifts, if desired. As our workforce ages, 12-hour shifts also may be amenable to job sharing by two nurses. In addition, it seems most employers like to offer 12-hour shifts, mostly because their current and potential employees want them. The advantages are one less shift change (hand-off) and, with shorter lengths of stay, caregiver continuity with patients. If managed carefully, 12-hour shifts can even be cost effective. However, the old IWC regulatory language on 12-hour shifts was inflexible, requiring all sorts of convoluted and administratively burdensome procedures. Not to mention it was hard for employees to understand how they were paid with the common "reduced rate of pay" scheme that employers frequently adopted. Other common pay practices, such as shift differentials, have been successfully modified to fit the 12-hour shift configuration. Paying for 12-hour shifts should be as straightforward as paying for eight-hour shifts. A normal schedule of 12-hour shifts within a two-week time period should not result in overtime unless work hours exceed 12 in a day and/or 80 in a pay period. It also seems reasonable that there be a safe limit to how many 12-hour shifts are worked consecutively. This approach does not seem overly complicated to me, and my guess is most nurses I know would agree. For the majority of nurses in California (those not employed by a public, governmental or UC employer, or represented by a labor union), this new regulatory language is intended for you. If the language remains restrictive and inflexible for 12-hour shifts as it is now written, your only alternative is to change employers or become unionized – alternatives not all nurses want to pursue. So I suggest that you take your favorite work schedule and apply the proposed regulatory language. You can access this current language on the Internet. Send your letters to: Commissioners and Executive Director, Industrial Welfare Commission, 770 L Street Suite 1170, Sacramento 95814, or fax (916) 324-1705. Carol Bradley,
MSN, RN |