NY Times 12/3/23: Why Doctors and Pharmacists Are in Revolt
The reasons for the recent labor actions appear straightforward. Doctors, nurses and pharmacists said they were being asked to do more as staffing dwindles, leading to exhaustion and anxiety about putting patients at risk…the explanation runs deeper: A longer-term consolidation of health care companies has left workers feeling powerless in big bureaucracies. They say the trend has left them with little room to exercise their professional judgment…
Professionals in a variety of fields have protested similar developments in recent years. Schoolteachers, college instructors and journalists have gone on strike or unionized amid declining budgets and the rise of performance metrics that they feel are more suited to sales representatives than to guardians of certain norms and best practices.
But the trend is particularly pronounced in health care…Over time, however, consolidation and the rise of ever-larger health care corporations left workers with less influence…
Many health systems had increased tensions with doctors and nurses by failing to involve them more in developing and putting in place the system of metrics on which they are judged…
The breaking point came when the height of the pandemic passed, but conditions barely improved, according to many workers…
During an interview in October, while Dr. Smith [a pharmacist] and his colleagues were still awaiting the company’s response, he made clear that his patience had run out. “I’ve been asking and asking and asking for improvements for years,” he said. “Now we’re not asking any more — we’re demanding it.”
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