CANTON, Mass – Nurses at MetroWest Medical Center/Leonard Morse Hospital in Natick, represented by the Massachusetts Nurses Association/National Nurses United, have reached a tentative agreement with hospital management and Tenet Healthcare on a new contract.
The settlement, reached Wednesday after just one day of negotiations, covers 200 registered nurses at Leonard Morse and includes a variety of agreements that will improve conditions for nurses and patients. A ratification vote of all Leonard Morse MNA members will be scheduled by the RN bargaining committee.
“We are pleased to have quickly reached an agreement that will benefit our patients and all Leonard Morse nurses,” said Katie Murphy, the Intensive Care Unit representative on the RN bargaining committee. “A new preceptor program will improve nurse recruitment and retention through professional mentorship, with a goal of creating a better-staffed environment for patients. Evidence shows that when the number of patients a nurse is assigned to is limited, those patients experience superior outcomes.”
Highlights of the agreement include:
- A new preceptorship program to improve recruitment and retention of nurses. All newly hired RNs or RNs who are promoted to a new position will enter the program
- All nurses will receive a 2.25 percent raise each year for a total of 4.5 percent across-the-board increases; all nurses not yet at the top of the scale will also receive three step increases (each step is 3.5 percent) within two-and-a-half years
- Nurses will maintain their current health insurance instead of being forced into the more expensive and poorer coverage plan that Tenet has required all other Natick and Framingham employees to use
The two-year deal, if ratified by the full nurse membership, will extend the current contract, dated Jan. 1, 2014 to June 30, 2016. It will instead expire June 30, 2018.
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Founded in 1903, the Massachusetts Nurses Association/National Nurses United is the largest professional health care organization and the largest union of registered nurses in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Its 23,000 members advance the nursing profession by fostering high standards of nursing practice, promoting the economic and general welfare of nurses in the workplace, projecting a positive and realistic view of nursing, and by lobbying the Legislature and regulatory agencies on health care issues affecting nurses and the public. The MNA is a founding member of National Nurses United, the largest national nurses’ union in the United States with more than 170,000 members from coast to coast.
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