On October 21, NUHW began an open-ended strike at Kaiser Permanente facilities across Southern California. We are grateful to our dedicated care teams, mental health leaders, and our extensive external network of highly qualified, licensed therapists who have ensured we continue to deliver on our promise of high-quality health care.
We also acknowledge the hundreds of mental health professionals who are choosing not to walk away from their patients during this strike. Their decision has helped us to ensure our patients have continued access to high-quality mental health and addiction medicine care.
We reached out to all our patients with appointments this week — connecting with all but the 3% who did not return calls or texts — and provided appointments to everyone who wanted one.
Most of our patients currently work with a provider who is not participating in the strike. For those members who usually receive care from a NUHW-represented therapist, we have been proactively reaching out to them to offer alternative options to meet their needs.
This open-ended strike is the union’s unproductive bargaining tactic. The union has been slow-walking negotiations and creating theatrical disruptions, despite the strong proposals Kaiser Permanente has put on the table. We ask NUHW to engage productively at the bargaining table to reach an agreement.
Across the board, Kaiser Permanente is a leader in pay and benefits. Our philosophy is to pay wages that are at or up to 10% above market. Today, our Southern California therapists make on average 18% more than their peers earn in other organizations. We are offering across the board wage increases that total an additional 18% increase in pay for therapists over the next four years. NUHW is asking for a 30% wage increase over three years, increasing therapist pay to nearly 40% above market. Our offer enhances the comprehensive benefits our mental health professionals enjoy — including health care coverage that costs virtually nothing with no deductibles and low co-pays, a generous retirement savings plan, and funds to cover medical costs after they retire.
Amidst a mental health crisis, the union is proposing its members spend significantly less time with patients. A key issue in our negotiations with NUHW is the amount of time our therapists spend caring for patients. Currently our therapists have about 25% of their work time available for record keeping, planning, administrative tasks, and meetings. NUHW is proposing that full-time therapists decrease time spent seeing patients and increase their time away from direct patient care by nearly 50% or at least 19 hours a week. This would reduce critically needed patient appointments by 15,000 every month. This is unacceptable for our patients.
We remain open to continuing negotiations. We understand give and take. We are committed to negotiating in good faith until a deal is done. We ask the same of NUHW.
Highlights of our proposal include:
Kaiser Permanente medical centers and medical offices remain open, including our hospitals, emergency departments, urgent care departments, primary and specialty care departments, pharmacies, and laboratories. We have worked to minimize potential disruptions the strike may have caused. Our urgent and crisis services are always available.
In Southern California, we currently provide mental health and addiction care services through our employed Kaiser Permanente professionals and an external network of contracted providers. This allows us to continue delivering care. It’s important to note that approximately 60% of our patients who are receiving mental health and addiction medicine care currently receive their care from providers who are not participating in the strike.
We are grateful to our employees who chose to put their patients’ needs first and continue to deliver care today.