PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — About 3,000 doctors at four of Philadelphia’s top hospitals are planning to unionize.
In front of the former Hahnemann University Hospital, which was shuttered in 2019, resident physicians and fellows at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Einstein Healthcare Network, Jefferson Health, and Temple Health announced on Thursday their intent to unionize under the Committee of Interns and Residents (CIR), a local of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
The move follows in the footsteps of Penn Medicine physicians, who secured their own contract in September.
“We are unionizing because we love caring for children,” said Dr. Natalie Laboosier, a pediatric resident at CHOP. “We also deserve to have a say in our working conditions. We deserve safer staffing ratios to prioritize tasks that enhance our learning.”
“We all just want what’s best for the patients, and I think part of that is also what’s best for the residents,” added Dr. Matthew Nguyen, a third-year internal medicine resident at Einstein. “We’re not trying to hurt anybody by trying to do this. We just want to fight for what we think is right and what we think is important.
“We are fighting for a say in our working conditions, for reasonable work hours and patient ratios, for the equipment we need to treat patients, and, for some, fighting for our lives and our futures.”
Dr. Taylor Walker, SEIU president, said the physicians plan to file for the union and call for a vote in the next few weeks.
KYW Newsradio reached out to the health care networks. Jefferson Health, in a statement, said, “Our residency program provides competitive wages and benefits, and fosters an environment of exceptional medical training. While we respect our residents’ right to explore unionization, we believe that a direct working relationship between our health system’s team members and our leaders results in the most empowered and productive teams.”