The Professional Council Survey
A Tool for Accomplishing Our Vision |
At the 2003 Leadership Conference, we attempted to envision what our union could be by the year 2010 union. The Professional Council survey, one of the tools available to us for the purpose of creating our Vision, has given us the clearest picture yet of what SEIU UHW professionals are thinking and what issues concern them most. The survey for each profession provided a great deal of detail about the issues affecting SEIU professionals. The results provided information we can use to begin the dialogue among professionals. Our survey does not pretend to be a scientific analysis, but rather a tool for us to learn more about ourselves. 
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Issues
As we strive to advance issues that are most important to us, professionals were clear about their priorities. Here are the combined results of those issues most important to all SEIU UHW professional classifications surveyed.
- Pay and Benefits. The consistent emergence of this issue in all SEIU UHW Professional surveys speaks for itself and reemphasizes how much we can achieve in the 2004 Hospital Division Contract Campaign and 2005 Kaiser bargaining.
- Scope of Practice. The specific role that professionals play in patient care, as determined by regulatory bodies and policy-setting committees, is not always a true reflection of what their actual scope of practice intended. The challenge presents itself when management or our co-workers are ill informed or biased about our role in the health care team.
- (Tie) Shortage in the Profession and Training. These two issues reflect the professional worker�ession and to advance the profession itself. Through the creation of joint Labor and Management Training Funds, a key issue for the 2004 contract campaign, we can work with major health systems to provide the training and career advancement opportunities that are clearly so important to SEIU UHW professionals.
- (Tie) Safe Equipment and Workplace Injury.
- Career Ladder
II. Organizations or Entities with a Positive Impact on the Profession
A majority of respondents indicated that SEIU 250 exercises a positive impact on their profession. The following results represent an aggregate of survey results for Respiratory, Nursing and Medical Imaging. Because an error omitted SEIU 250 as a choice in the Pharmacy Survey, the results for the Pharmacy Survey are not included in the results below:
Organizations having a positive impact on our professions |
| Respiratory | Nursing | Imaging | Total |
| SEIU 250 | 72.90% | 67.0% | 73.2% | 70.95% |
| Employer | 53.01% | 42.6% | 45.7% | 46.05% |
Regulatory
Agencies | 29.3% | 36.7% | 26.8% | 30.83% |
State
Legislature | 26.72% | 26.2% | 35.1% | 30.34% |
Federal
Government | 13.90% | 19.5% | 17.2% | 17.46% |
| CNA | 8.9% | 7.7% | 25.2% | 15.51% |
| Governor | 9.56% | 7.5% | 23.5% | 15.15% |
III. More Can Be Done to Enhance Public Awareness
While SEIU UHW Professionals provide invaluable, life saving care every day, there is frustration that the public knows little about who their caregivers are and how we work as part of a patient care team. Of all the professions surveyed it was clear that the vast majority of each sought a greater public awareness for their profession, but none more so than Respiratory Care Practitioners.
| Need for Public Awareness |
| Respiratory Care Practitioner | 93.3% |
| Licensed Vocational Nurse | 83.7% |
| Medical Imaging | 80.9% |
| Pharmacy Technician | 50.1% |
IV. Frequency of Adequate Staffing
For every profession, the results for staffing and workload were distributed in a way where roughly 2/3 of SEIU UHW professionals indicated that they experience adequate staffing on nearly every shift, while roughly 1/3 experience adequate staffing only as the exception to their regular working conditions. Of the professions surveyed, Medical Imaging reported a much higher rate of never having adequate staff than any other profession.
Instances of Adequate Staffing |
| | Imaging | Nursing | Respiratory | Pharmacy | All Professionals |
| Every Day | 6.83% | 5.74% | 5.96% | 14.08% | 8.15% |
| Most Days | 56.28% | 63.59% | 65.51% | 56.61% | 60.50% |
Adequate
Staffing | 63.11% | 69.33% | 71.47% | 70.69% | 68.65% |
| Weekly | 10.93% | 8.73% | 11.23% | 7.47% | 9.59% |
| Monthly | 5.74% | 6.98% | 7.37% | 5.46% | 6.39% |
| Never | 20.22% | 14.96% | 9.82% | 16.38% | 15.35% |
Inadequate
Staffing | 36.89% | 30.67% | 28.42% | 29.31% | 31.32% |
In reviewing the results for each of the professions surveyed, we can begin to learn more about ourselves and about what we will be doing in the coming months and years to achieve the goals we set for ourselves.
