Safe Staffing May Be In Our Sights

The winds in Harrisburg are definitely shifting. And while the dust from November’s general election hadn’t yet settled as we went to print (three open House seats in Western PA were to be decided in special elections on February 7th), we appear to have a unique opportunity—created by a Democratic majority in the House (those three seats will decide the leadership of the House) along with staunch PASNAP allies in Governor Josh Shapiro and Lieutenant Governor Austin Davis—to push the Patient Safety Act and all it promises for patients across PA farther than we ever have before.

Buckle up, everyone—it’s going to be exciting!

Where we are now: January marked the start of a new year and a new legislative session, which means all proposed legislation that didn’t pass in the previous session has to start over from scratch, collecting Cosponsors anew. The Patient Safety Act is no exception.

By setting minimum safe-staffing guidelines based on patient acuity in all Pennsylvania hospitals, the Patient Safety Act would address the biggest problem we face at work (chronic, dangerous short staffing) and improve patient care in every hospital in the state. In the previous legislative session, the bipartisan bill had an unprecedented 107 cosponsors in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives—that’s a majority of House members as cosponsors. But state Rep. Kathy Rapp, then chair of the House Health Committee, devoted friend of HAP (the Hospital Association of Pennsylvania), and, coincidentally, the representative for Warren General Hospital and our nurses and healthcare pros there, refused to allow the bill a vote, so it remained mired in her committee. This year, that may change: Pending the results of the February 7th special elections, Rep. Rapp and others who have been obstructing the bill may no longer be able to block it from progressing to the House Floor and a vote there.

BONUS: The same beneficial shift in dynamics should help our workplace violence bill, too.

We still have a long journey ahead of us, and it will still take a lot of work to get our safe staffing bill and our workplace violence bill over the finish line in the House and through the Senate. But the potential for both has never been greater. Let’s bring the patented PASNAP fight and capitalize on that!