Hundreds of Physicians, Other Clinicians at Banner Health File to Unionize

More than 240 physicians and advanced practice providers from dozens of Banner Health locations throughout the Phoenix area have filed to unionize.

The effort comes as clinicians have expressed concerns about patient panel sizes, staffing levels, and scheduling practices, which have gone unaddressed, leaving them “worried about patient safety, continuity of care, and increasing administrative burdens,” the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD) said in announcing the filing.

These concerns were amplified when family medicine physician Syerra Lea, DO, who has been with Banner Health for 15 years, said she was disciplined after flagging a scheduling error that could have led to hundreds of patients arriving for appointments with clinicians who were not scheduled to be on duty, UAPD added.

The alleged incident resulted in the filing of an unfair labor practice (ULP) charge with the National Labor Relations Board, the union announced last month. Should the scheduling error not have been corrected, patients would have “faced delays of rescheduling several months later,” it stated.

“Dr. Lea did exactly what a physician is supposed to do when coming across a mistake,” UAPD President Stuart Bussey, MD, said in a statement at the time. “She identified a problem that would have harmed her patients and brought it to the proper channels to resolve the matter.”

“Banner Health’s response was to monitor her and silence her,” Bussey noted. “This doesn’t affect just Dr. Lea, it sends a message to every clinician at Banner — the largest healthcare system in Arizona — that speaking up and pointing out errors comes with consequences. If a clinician is too afraid to speak up, patients pay the price.”

In an interview with MedPage Today, Lea claimed that following the filing of the ULP charge, she was met in her office and told to go home. She said that she subsequently submitted her resignation, slated for early August, and that she has remained unable to see her 3,000 patients.

She said she is hopeful that filing to unionize will lead to change.

Traditionally in primary care, physicians have owned their own practice, but “it’s just not like that anymore,” Lea noted. The majority of physicians are now employed. When decisions are being made with a main aim of maximizing profits, it can come at the expense of medical ethics, she argued.

The corporatization of medicine has posed significant challenges to physicians and other healthcare professionals, she said. “You can’t take care of patients well because you’re spread so thin.”

Addressing a wave of unionization efforts by physicians across the country — most aimed at having a greater say in decision-making at their organizations — Lea said it has been “very powerful for us to see.”

“We’re not the only ones thinking this is the better way to go,” she said.

In recent months, more than 100 pediatricians at Packard Children’s Health Alliance, part of Stanford Medicine Children’s Health, also filed to unionize with UAPD, and 115 hospitalists at Swedish Medical Group locations across the Seattle area voted to unionize with Northwest Medicine United, AFT Local 6552.

Banner Health said in an emailed statement to MedPage Today that it had received notice of the filing to unionize what it called a “small group of our doctors, nurse practitioners, and physician assistants employed by Banner Medical Group.”

“We have always prioritized listening and working together — without the interference of a third party — and encourage team members to speak up in surveys, in-person meetings, and monthly ‘Ask the CEO’ interactive calls to share ideas and raise concerns,” the statement noted.

“Through this process, it is vitally important that [Banner Medical Group] team members receive complete and accurate information about unions so they can make a fully informed decision,” the statement continued. “We consider it a management responsibility to provide that information.”

Banner Health added that it hopes Banner Medical Group employees “will choose to continue to work directly with Banner to resolve any issues that are of concern,” and that its “focus remains the same: delivering on our mission of providing extraordinary patient care.”

Lea said that unionization will benefit those providing patient care, including future generations of physicians.

For those coming out of medical school, having learned so much information with the goal of helping patients, “it’s important to know that your profession is going to be protected by a union,” Lea said, adding that she views unionization as a “huge benefit to our profession at this point.”