Mental health care workers at Kaiser Permanente returned to the picket lines this week at multiple Southern California medical centers, including one in San Diego, as their dispute with management continues.
The Kaiser Permanente mental health workers’ strike in Southern California began on October 23, 2024, and continues without a set end date. The strike includes over 2,400 union members, such as therapists, psychologists, and social workers.
Why Are Mental Health Workers Striking?
The workers say they are overwhelmed by a system that doesn’t allow them to prioritize themselves or patient care. They say they face heavy workloads, too much paperwork with too little time to do it, and disparities in pay and benefits compared to what staff in Northern California are paid. The practitioners describe the situation as untenable, saying it leads to burnout and negatively impacting patient care.
This action follows a 2022 strike in Northern California that successfully secured better staffing and work conditions for mental health professionals, but those improvements were not extended to Southern California. The union’s demands aim to address this imbalance and improve the system overall.
What Specific Complaints Do Mental Health Workers Want Addressed?
There is more than one issue at hand when it comes to working. Like many healthcare workers, people in the mental health space have been pressed for time. They juggle tasks, do more paperwork than ever, and see many patients.
Insufficient Time for Critical Patient Care Duties
Patient safety is tied to having time to do things correctly and double-check your work. However, mental health workers say Kaiser is unwilling to provide Southern California mental health professionals the same amount of time for patient care-related tasks (e.g., documentation, follow-ups) as Northern California employees.
Accuracy helps provide a high level of care, but these duties are performed outside of actual appointments. Doctors and other workers may end up working extra hours, unpaid, to complete this work.
Disparities in Pay and Benefits
Health insurance companies must legally pay mental health workers the same amount for doctor appointments as any other field. This parity, however, doesn’t apply to wages in the healthcare field.
In fact, according to the union, there is a disparity between the pay of Southern California mental health workers and Northern California workers. The union also states that Southern California workers are not receiving compensation and benefits comparable to their counterparts in similar roles within Kaiser’s system.
Kaiser disagrees with the characterization. They say reducing non-clinical care time would reduce appointment availability, affecting patient care. The company also states its employees earn wages significantly above market rates and has made substantial investments to improve mental health services.
Workforce Strain and Access Challenges
The strike highlights the difficulty of balancing mental health workers’ needs with patient care demands. Workers do not work in a vacuum, and having pressing financial needs can create toxic stress during off-hours.
Limited staffing and the lack of adequate time for care-related tasks may compromise the quality and accessibility of mental health services. This leads to burnout among nurses and other highly skilled professionals and high turnover rates, which, too, affect and often disrupt patient care.
Systemic Inequities
The disparity in wages, benefits, and workload between regions illustrates broader inequities within the mental health care system, where resources and support for workers are inconsistent.
Mental Healthcare Workers Need Self-Care, Too
Burnout among mental health workers is a growing issue, often driven by excessive workloads, inadequate staffing, and emotional strain from supporting patients in crisis.
Burnout symptoms include emotional exhaustion, reduced professional effectiveness, and feelings of detachment or cynicism. Preventing burnout involves fostering a healthy work-life balance, providing adequate resources and support, and ensuring manageable caseloads.
Employers can help by promoting peer support, offering regular training, and creating policies prioritizing mental well-being. This includes flexibility for work-life balance and time to do essential tasks during the workday.
Addressing these factors supports the workers and improves the quality of care they provide to patients.
There’s a Growing Need for Mental Health Services
The labor dispute is occurring as there is increasing demand for mental health care, especially amongst Kaiser’s 4.8 million members. The strike serves as a reminder of how critical yet fragile mental health systems can be.
Kaiser also has had lapses that have affected staff and patient safety in the past. They faced a $50 million settlement over staffing lapses, which may be evidence that they have trouble maintaining compliance with mental health care standards.
While the company claims to have invested heavily to improve services, the strike suggests these measures may not fully address workers’ concerns or patients’ needs.
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