Prime RNs and health care workers also set to strike on Sept. 3 for safe staffing at four hospitals in three states

In gross violation of national labor laws, Prime Healthcare over the past week has retaliated against registered nurses for speaking up and fighting for their patients at two of its Chicago-area hospitals, suspending six nurses at Olympia Fields Hospital in Olympia Fields, Ill. and one nurse at Saint Francis Hospital in Chicago, Ill., announced National Nurses Organizing Committee (NNOC), an affiliate of National Nurses United (NNU), the largest union of registered nurses in the nation. Nurses are demanding the immediate reinstatement of their colleagues.

The nurses were legally joining in on union activities to have a stronger voice in patient care. Workers’ rights to participate in activities to form a union are federally protected under the National Labor Relations Act. 

“Given the conditions that led nurses to organize our union at Olympia Fields, like short staffing, lack of supplies, nurses’ concerns not being acknowledged, it is particularly egregious of Prime to illegally discipline nurses in retaliation for speaking up for our patients and engaging in legally protected activities,” said Jen Peterson, RN in the outpatient surgery unit. “By disciplining these patient advocates, Prime is sending a message to the community that their concerns are not valid.” 

Nurses, who seek to unionize with NNOC, will hold a protest at Olympia Fields on Sept. 3 against Prime’s union busting. RNs at Olympia Fields and Saint Francis and another Prime facility, Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, Maine, filed petitions on Aug. 24 with the National Labor Relations Board to hold union elections to join NNOC. 

Prime has a track record of union busting and retaliating against organizing RN leaders. The corporation fired six nurses this spring at Saint Mary of Nazareth Hospital in Chicago, Ill. for speaking up and fighting for their patients  and earlier this year, two nurses at Saint Mary’s Regional Medical Center in Reno, Nev. for similar reasons. The Chicago nurses responded by striking and then overwhelmingly voting by 96 percent to unionize just days later. 

The suspensions are just one aspect of Prime’s shoddy treatment of its workers. Some 2,200 nurses and health care workers at four Prime hospitals in three states — West Anaheim Medical Center in Anaheim, Calif.; Saint Mary’s Regional Medical Center in Reno, Nev.; Saint Mary of Nazareth Hospital in Chicago, Ill.; and nurses and health care workers at Shasta Regional Medical Center in Redding, Calif. — are striking the system for one day on Sept. 3 over the administration’s refusal to address during contract negotiations their deep concerns about patient care and safe staffing.

Learn more about Prime’s crimes at crimehealthcare.com.

The four strikes follow nearly unanimous strike authorization votes. The nurses and health care workers gave at least 10 days of advance notice to the hospital to allow for alternative plans to be made for patient care. 

Nurses and health care workers at the California and Nevada hospitals have been working without a contract since last year, making recruitment and retention difficult and directly hurting patient care. Employees are demanding that management invest in nursing and health care staff and agree to a contract that provides:

• Incentive for nurses and health care workers to stay at the bedside
• Staffing that meets the patients’ needs
• RNs’ right to advocate for their patients without fear of retaliation

These demands echo the concerns of registered nurses at three other Prime facilities who are organizing to join NNOC. The RNs are part of a national union movement to fight for safe staffing and optimal patient care throughout the entire Prime Healthcare system. 

***Nurses’ schedule of events for Chicago***

Strike details
Who: Registered nurses at Saint Mary of Nazareth Hospital (Chicago)
What: One-day strike to address patient care concerns and to protest retaliation against nurse advocates
When: Thursday, Sept. 3, 7 a.m. CT to Friday, Sept. 4, 6:59 a.m. CT | Rally at 10 a.m.
Where: Saint Mary of Nazareth Hospital, 2233 W Division Street, Chicago, IL, 60622

Olympia Fields protest
Who: Registered nurses at Olympia Fields Hospital and community members
What: Action to protest suspension of six Olympia Fields RNs and one St. Francis RN
When: Thursday, Sept. 3, 2 p.m. CT
Where: Olympia Fields Hospital, 20201 South Crawford Ave. Olympia Fields, Ill.

RNs at Chicago’s Saint Mary of Nazareth Hospital, who just unionized in June, will be striking to win a fair first contract. Since their election, management has prevented and threatened nurses on the negotiating team from discussing matters of patient care and staffing with colleagues. Nurses at Saint Mary held a one-day strike in June to protest the illegal firing of six nurses.

“Nurses have become overwhelmed with the number of patients we are assigned — to the point where we cannot safely assess or attend to all of the patients’ needs,” said Vanessa Moreno, RN in the telemetry unit at Saint Mary of Nazareth Hospital. “We have been demanding meetings with the hospital attorneys on these patient care concerns, but they keep saying they are too busy or ignore us altogether.”

California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee represents over 1,800 nurses and health care workers at Prime facilities in California and Nevada and about 400 nurses in Illinois. CNA/NNOC is an affiliate of National Nurses United, the largest union of registered nurses in the nation.

Prime’s Profiteering

The conditions driving Prime nurses to take unprecedented collective action at their hospitals are part of a broader pattern of Prime negligence and cutting services despite its profits. In 2024, Prime Healthcare made an estimated $4.4 billion in revenue according to credit reports, and Prime’s nonprofit system, Prime Healthcare Foundation, reported another $1.4 billion in revenue in their audited report. 

• Prime has a history of acquiring hospitals and then cutting services after it promised to maintain them. 
  • After it acquired St. Mary’s Hospital in Kankakee, Ill., in 2025, Prime shut down the hospital’s obstetrics, gynecology, childbirth and delivery services and voluntarily gave up its Trauma Level II designation, resulting in an injunction filed by the Kankakee County State’s Attorney, claiming that Prime was dishonest about keeping services open. 
  • Prime cut services in 2025 at St. Joseph Medical Center in Joliet, Ill. and at Mercy Medical Center in Aurora, Ill., soon after acquisition, leading to a letter to Prime CEO Prem Reddy from Senators Tammy Duckworth and Dick Durbin accusing the company of violating its commitments to maintain services to meet community needs. 
  • On Sept. 1, 2026, Prime announced that it would cut obstetric services at Saint Joseph Medical Center in Joliet, Mercy Medical Center in Aurora and Resurrection Medical Center in Chicago and consolidate them at Saint Mary of Nazareth in Chicago and Olympia Fields Hospital in Olympia Fields.
• In 2024, Prime Healthcare Foundation, which includes Saint Francis Hospital in Illinois and Central Maine Medical Center, claimed more than $78 million in debts they tried to collect from patients who qualify for charity care, according to their own policies. 
• Prime’s nonprofit hospitals made more than $104 million in payments to firms owned by Prime CEO Prem Reddy — Prime Healthcare Services Inc., the main for-profit company owning all the for-profit hospitals, Prime Healthcare Management, and Bio-Med Services, Inc., a medical equipment and consulting company. Prime only gave $3.5 million in uncompensated charity care, roughly 0.4 percent of the foundation’s expenses.

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.