Helen McKinnon’s Op-ed in the Bangor Daily News of Sept. 24 is inaccurate in many ways. Every nurse that performs direct patient care knows how important it is to have a licensed nurse, not a substitute, at the bedside in order to assure safe, quality patient care.

The Maine State Nurses Association is not denouncing the good work that has been done by interested parties on both sides in revising existing state rules and regulations concerning staffing levels in hospitals. It has been a good start and we want to continue. The real problem is that the hospitals and nurse executives are more concerned with the bottom line.

The nurse executive and the Maine Hospital Association claim they are providing safe nurse-patient ratios. If that is true, why are they so dramatically opposed to putting those staffing levels in writing? Why did they end the negotiations before the area of staffing levels was revised?

Direct care nurses and MSNA are doing what our Nursing Code of Ethics states we should do, “patient advocacy.” It is time to ask the people of Maine, “Who do you want deciding how many nurses are necessary for the safe care of your loved ones; the nurses at their bedside or the nurses who help hospital executives keep their profits?”

Judith E. Brown, RN, RSN, CCRN

Bangor

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