New York State Veterans Home at Batavia

In the beginning, 42 resident-handling injuries accounted for 1,862 lost work days in 2002 at the New York State Veterans Home at Batavia.

In 2003, the New York State/CSEA Statewide Safety and Health Committee, as a result of negotiations for the 2003-2007 collective bargaining agreement , agreed to address the high rate of injuries sustained by Certified Nurses Aides and other nursing titles. To empower its efforts, an Ergonomics Labor-Management Sub-Committee was created, one of its members being a CNA at Batavia, and a pilot project was began to unfold.

Through the efforts of the Ergonomics Sub-Committee, in November of 2005, the New York State Veterans Home at Batavia applied for and subsequently received a workforce grant from the New York State/CSEA Partnership for Education Training. The funding was applied toward the cost of a consultant to assist the veterans? home in implementing an effective Zero Manual Lift/Safe Resident Handling program.

A facility labor-management committee at Batavia was formed in April of 2006 that facilitated the creation of four labor/management sub-committees: Marketing, Operations, Policy, and Implementation, along with accident/incident review teams. A focus group consisting of frontline caregivers met with the consultant to discuss the positives and negatives of resident direct care at the facility. Many committee meetings and dedicated hard work has led to a comprehensive policy and procedure manual.

Today at Batavia, five resident-handling injuries accounted for 444 lost work days in 2006, or a 75% decrease. As of March, 2007, six injuries accounted for eight lost work days. The policy at Batavia is to involve frontline caregivers when purchasing lifting and handling equipment. Training is a top priority, nursing and management included. Staff communication with management is in itself a form a compliance with the policy at Batavia. Management has been re-trained on the accident/reporting forms. All injuries and near misses are reported to nursing supervisors followed by written employee incident reports. Committees meet regularly to assess and improve. Workers are able to get time off and lost vacation time is no longer lost or taken away. A recent labor-management agreement allows for more flexible scheduling of nursing students.

Last but not least, a philosophy and a culture of safety exists at Batavia. Direct-care workers have commented that they would no longer be working there if it were not for this program. The initial investment involved toward the safety, health, longevity, and well-being of frontline resident caregivers, as well as the added security of care for the residents of the State of New York in our long-term care facilities has proven a zero manual lifting and safe patient handling program works.



Dec 1, 2009

Local 1168's Campaign is the CWA Triangle in Action
Lifting patients in hospitals and other care facilities is one of the leading causes of neck and back injuries suffered by health care workers in the United States. It also is a leading cause of injury to patients.

Under a landmark safety and health policy established by CWA Local 1168, both CWA-represented health care workers and their patients in western New York's Kaleida system of hospitals and health care centers now have real protection from these serious injuries.

By early 2006, about 18 months after Local 1168's "zero-lift" policy took effect, the number of lifting injuries fell dramatically. Workers' neck and back strains and sprains dropped by more than 70 percent. Fractures suffered by long-term and critical-care patients fell 64 percent. In addition to reducing injuries, the new policy resulted in a 26 percent improvement in upper extremity range of motion for long-term patients.

"This program has been an unqualified success because our members had been getting an astounding number of lifting injuries," said local safety and health director Dana McCarthy. "We were lifting patients all the time and we knew it had to change." Instead of workers lifting their patients, the "no-lift" policy that Local 1168 negotiated with Kaleida requires the use of mechanical lifts, he said.

The safe patient handling policy also has reduced the number of lost work days from lifting injuries, saving Kaleida Health millions of dollars a year.

Health care workers in hospitals across New York soon could benefit from the "no-lift" policy. A Safe Patient Handling bill modeled after the CWA-Kaleida program has been introduced in the New York State legislature and is gaining widespread support.

At this year's CWA National Safety and Health Conference, McCarthy credited the program's development and success to having a highly organized workforce, a strong bargaining history, and a successful community and political action program. "It is the CWA Triangle in action," McCarthy explained. "We organized, we bargained strong contracts, and we reached out to friends in labor and our community to become a strong and positive force for change," he said.

Those friends include officials at the Western New York Council for Occupational Safety and Health, who worked with the Local 1168; other health care unions; the New York State Department of Labor, and Kaleida Health, all of whom worked together to create a New York Zero Lift Task Force.

In 2006, the task force won state funding for a safe-patient handling demonstration project at three non-Kaleida health care facilities modeled after Local 1168 program. The project produced similar reductions in worker and patient injuries.

Local 1168 President John Klein said the local's effectiveness in gaining the Kaleida safe patient handling policy was its campaign to build the union's strength by organizing thousands of unrepresented health care workers in 1997, right after three major health care systems in western New York merged to become Kaleida Health.

In the first round of bargaining, management agreed to card check and within a year, more than 2,500 workers joined Local 1168. The local currently represents more than 5,000 workers in both the Kaleida and non-Kaleida hospitals and health care centers.

In 2000, the local negotiated strong ergonomics language which created a joint labor-management safety committee and mandated regular meetings that would focus on creating a safe and healthy workplace.

Photo Credit: Local 1168 won a zero-lift patient policy that protects workers and their patients at facilities throughout New York's Kaleida Health sytem. Pictured in no-lift device is local safety and health director Dana McCarthy, with Paula Pless, Kaleida's Director of Safe Patient Handling, right, Robert Guest, also with Kaleida.