Healthcare Professionals, Union Representation and Professional Integrity: Insights from Health Professionals and Allied Employees (HPAE), AFT, AFL-CIO

This presentation will describe the incentives and pressures to compromise professional integrity that face frontline healthcare professionals as well as discuss how union representation defends against these forces. Examples of how the current status of health care fosters these incentives and pressures will be evaluated, including instances in for-profit health care where the goals of the for-profit employer prevent or impede professionals from carrying out their responsibilities. Additionally, ways in which licensure and legal requirements can both protect professionals and make them more vulnerable will be assessed, including misuse of HIPAA laws and examples from New Jersey.

This presentation will also analyze how unions working in the healthcare sector protect staff and the professional standards they hold. This will include a discussion of collective bargaining language and the ability to negotiate specific working conditions and patient care provisions (such as staffing levels) and how the larger collective bargaining process facilitates a healthcare professional's ability to defend oneself or speak out and be protected. The effect that public campaigns, legislation, advocacy, coalition building with citizen groups, and professional associations will also be evaluated, with examples brought from the work of Health Professionals and Allied Employees (HPAE), AFT, AFL-CIO, New Jersey's largest union of Registered Nurses (RNs) and healthcare professionals. This presentation will end with a discussion of what APHA and others can do to protect healthcare professionals from threats to their professional integrity and standards.