Cal/OSHA CITATIONS

Cal/OSHA finds ​Summit campus of
Alta Bates Summit Medical Center guilty of eight serious violations, cites hospital for $155,250

California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) has fined Sutter Health’s Alta Bates Summit Medical Center $155,250 for numerous, serious Covid-related workplace safety violations following an investigation after the July 2020 death of registered nurse Janine Paiste-Ponder.

“Janine and many other nurses were calling on the hospital to address their many infection control concerns but their pleas for safety went unanswered when Janine ended up being exposed,” said Mike Hill, RN and the chief nurse representative at the facility, where nurses are represented by California Nurses Association (CNA). “It is heartbreaking Janine had to die before these problems were taken seriously enough for a state investigation.”

Cal/OSHA found numerous violations of state infectious disease control standards in its investigation, resulting in eight serious citations. These serious citations include the hospital’s failure to ensure that Covid positive patients were properly and securely isolated and failure to provide N95 respirators to the nurses who worked on Paiste-Ponder’s unit.

“We know that Janine became ill when she ran after two Covid positive patients who were in the hallways because she feared that they would infect other patients or staff,” said Paula Lyn, a longtime Summit RN and a board member of California Nurses Association (CNA). “Because the hospital had locked up N95 respirators, and Janine was wearing only a surgical mask as per hospital policy, she was exposed and became ill. It was the hospital’s disregard for the nurses well-being and the selflessness of Janine’s actions that led to her tragic death.”

Cal/OSHA also cited the hospital for requiring nurses to reuse N95 masks, a policy nurses have repeatedly said was dangerous and could lead to exposure and infection.

Other violations cited include: failure to establish and implement an Aerosol Transmissible Disease Exposure control plan; failure to notify nurses of exposure to Covid-19 in a timely manner; failure to provide testing for asymptomatic exposed nurses and requiring them to continue working; failure to put all Covid-19 positive patients in airborne infection isolation rooms; and failure to provide proper respiratory protection for nurses carrying out high-hazard procedures on Covid-19-positive patients.
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“We are glad that Cal/OSHA corroborated these warnings and complaints that we’ve been raising since the first days of the pandemic, but what’s most important is to organize and ensure Sutter learns something from all this,” said Hill. “We need to protect health care workers and patients from suffering harm in the first place, not after people have already died.”
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Cal/OSHA finds Alta Bates campus of Alta Bates Summit Medical Center guilty of eight violations, cites Sutter for additional $141,750

California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) has issued an additional $141,750 in fines to Sutter Health—along with eight new citations—for failing to notify nurses in two units at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, Alta Bates Campus in Berkeley, Calif. that they had been exposed to Covid-19.
The latest fines come on the heels of $155,250 in fines and eight citations issued last week for serious Covid-related workplace safety violations at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, Summit Campus in Oakland. (Read more about the Summit Campus citations and fines here.) This brings the total of Sutter’s fines to nearly $300,000 and the total citations to 16.
"Sutter Health continues to put patients, nurses and their families at risk by not complying with basic health and safety laws,” said Alta Bates Campus neonatal intensive care unit registered nurse Rochelle Pardue-Okimoto. “When exposed to Covid-19 we need to take the necessary precautions to not spread the disease. Anything less in negligence. My patients, my coworkers and our families deserve to be safe, so we expect Sutter to learn from these fines and make serious changes.”
 
Last week’s fines and citations at the Summit Campus followed the July 2020 death of Summit Campus registered nurse Janine Paiste-Ponder. Nurses say that the additional fines and citations at the Alta Bates Campus show a widespread pattern of negligence on Sutter’s part.
“Now that there are 16 Cal/OSHA citations across both campuses of the medical center, it is abundantly clear that there has been a fundamental breakdown and disregard for the safety of the nurses—including Sutter’s obligation to provide a safe working environment,” said Mike Hill, an RN and chief nurse representative at the Summit Campus. “Although these safety issues had been rejected by Sutter as not requiring action on their part, Cal/OSHA has made it crystal clear that they have an obligation to correct each and every safety issue cited.”
Cal/OSHA found in the most recent citations that Sutter failed to inform nurses in the neonatal intensive care unit and a critical care unit that they had been exposed to Covid, either from a colleague or a patient. Nurses say this lack of clear information on exposure can contribute to the spread of Covid.

​“When we lost Janine, a colleague from our sister campus, it really drove home the total disregard Sutter has shown for whether nurses live or die. RNs spoke up again and again for optimal protections, and when Sutter failed to act, we are proud to have raised our collective voice to CAL/OSHA, where we were finally heard. It’s time for Sutter to do its due diligence and take strong action to protect nurses so that we can protect our patients, our families, and the community.”

Summit Cal/OSHA Citations

Alta Bates Cal/OSHA Citations