RNs say shutdowns for labor and delivery and neonatal intensive care come after years of HCA mismanagement

Nurses at Research Medical Center in Kansas City, Mo., will hold a vigil for patients impacted by planned service shutdowns at their hospital at 6 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 4. The vigil will be on the public sidewalk in front of the hospital, and nurses are planning for a solemn event to spotlight what this means for Kansas City patients and how the hospital’s ownership, HCA Healthcare, has mismanaged and cut resources to these units for years, laying the groundwork to justify their own decision to shutter these services.

“HCA has spent years moving services away from our hospital to neighborhoods with higher rates of private insurance because they only care about cashing in on patients," said Margo Fohey, RN in the neonatal intensive care unit at Research Medical Center, where she’s worked for more than 30 years. “Research is in a part of our city that is primarily Black, and, overall, we see more patients than any other HCA facility in our area. HCA is abandoning these parents and babies because they’re not profitable, not because they don’t need these services.”

Who: Registered nurses from Research Medical Center
What: Vigil for labor and delivery, NICU patients impacted by shutdowns
When: Monday, Aug. 4, 6 p.m.
Where: Research Medical Center, 2316 E. Meyer Blvd., Kansas City, Mo.; on the public sidewalk in front of the facility

Longtime Research nurses say that, since HCA’s takeover of their hospital in 2003, the nation’s largest hospital system has driven away specialized health care providers and moved services to other facilities, all effectively diminishing the capacity of the units now being targeted for shutdowns.

In addition to the specialized care provided in labor and delivery and a level three neonatal intensive care unit that provides critical care, impacted services will include emergency obstetrics care, gynecological consults, emergency cesarean sections, and outpatient clinics for babies. Nurses at Research Medical Center are asking HCA to cancel their plans to shut down these services and to instead invest their considerable financial resources into supporting and enhancing care for the people of Kansas City.

National Nurses Organizing Committee/National Nurses Untied (NNOC/NNU) represents roughly 1,000 nurses in the Kansas City area at Research Medical Center and Menorah Medical Center in Overland Park, Kan. NNU is the largest union of nurses in the United States today.

National Nurses United is the largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses in the United States with more than 225,000 members nationwide. NNU affiliates include California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, DC Nurses Association, Michigan Nurses Association, Minnesota Nurses Association, and New York State Nurses Association.