2.16 22-0005 Subject: High Quality Health Services At Children's Hospital
From: Councilmembers Kalb And Fife
Recommendation: Adopt A Resolution In Support Of High Quality, Equitable Health Care Services At UCSF Children's Hospital Oakland
San Francisco limits Oakland nursing jobs so patients have to be seen in San Francisco. Keep care in our area! Our families struggle to have to cross the bay and pay all the tolls and parking. Let us serve our community
The relationship between Children's Oakland and UCSF is a perfect example of structural violence hidden behind a banner of being 'the most diverse, equitable, and inclusive academic medical system in the country'. UCSF is a corporate entity that has entered into relationship with a vulnerable safety-net hospital, and then proceeded to create benchmarks of success that Children's Oakland is simply unable to meet under the purse strings and decision-making power granted by this affiliation.
The terms of the affiliation from its outset have been shrouded in mystery and defended by a multi-million dollar PR department. UCSF now controls the transfer center - they decide which hospital patients, and therefore their insurance reimbursements, get routed to - and refuses to release this information. UCSF controls hiring, and has onboarded senior physicians at Children's Oakland at the level of Junior Faculty based on 'lack of academic work' such as publishing and research - and yet continue to close down our research centers and clinics that might help them to achieve these benchmarks. Though it seems to dictate all major hiring, funding and resource distribution decisions that at the end of the day directly impact patient care, UCSF frequently reminds us all that "this is an academic affiliation and Children's Hospital Oakland remains its own separate financial entity" (per a July 2020 email in the middle of a terrifying pandemic).
UCSF needs to start treating the East Bay equally. They have taken away so many vital services for East Bay residents. Childrens hospital is an essential service for the community not just for the East Bay but for many areas of Northern California. UCSF is more concerned about turning a profit then helping the community that they are supposed to be supporting. The amount of patients that Childrens has turned away recently due to lack of available resources is disappointing and embarrassing. UCSF is also providing more training to the staff at its SF campuses then they are providing to the staff of the East Bay. This is causing a patient safety issue. Healthcare should be centered around patients and not profits. Thanks for considering this issue. From a concerned nurse at CHO
My name is Wendy Bloom. I have been a nurse at Children’s in Oakland for 35 years. I have witnessed an erosion of full services for the patients at our hospital. We have always proudly served the underserved, a racially diverse population and those that can’t afford healthcare with full service high quality care at our hospital. We have seen a shift in programs to SF as programs are closed, with staff leaving and patients being forced to travel to SF for care they used to receive in the East Bay. We are fighting to preserve this treasure for the children that need it on in to the future. Please pass the resolution and hold UCSF accountable for the erosion of our care in the East Bay. The kids and their families deserve better.
My name is Lisa Hale and I am a nurse practitioner in the Anesthesia/Pain Service department at Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have worked as a nurse at Children's Oakland for over 13 years. I am commenting today in support of item 2.16, the resolution for high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. Retention and recruitment of experienced, high-quality nurses--nurse practitioners, nurse clinicians, nurse diabetes educators, and others--has been a major challenge at our hospital. We have seen many seasoned nurses leave Children’s Oakland to take jobs at other Bay Area facilities (such as UCSF Children’s Hospital Mission Bay and Kaiser) because those places provide better worker protections and compensation for nurses. We have had difficulty filling empty nurse positions for those same reasons. The substandard, inequitable treatment of nurses at Children’s Oakland results in substandard care for our Oakland patients due to short staffing, nurse burnout, and frequent provider turnover. Despite our efforts to work with UCSF administration to improve treatment of nurses at Oakland, UCSF continues to inform us that Oakland is a separate and different institution from its West Bay sister and that is justification for the inequitable treatment of Oakland nurses. I urge you to adopt this resolution and help keep Children's Hospital Oakland a full-service Hospital to service the Greater East Bay Communities.
I speak in support of item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have seen that critical services have been neglected or cut since Children Hospital Oakland’s affiliation with UCSF in 2014 and am concerned that the transfer of resources away from Oakland hurts the children who are our patients, puts pressure on families with limited resources, and is resulting in increasing inequity between Oakland and San Francisco.
My name is Kimberly Specht and I am the Clinical Nurse Specialist in the Rehabilitation Department. I have worked at Children's Hospital Oakland for over 8 years on the Rehab Unit. I am commenting today in support of item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have personally seen our patient census decrease due to lack of staffing and lack of referrals since the affiliation with UCSF. I urge you to support this resolution and help keep Children's Hospital Oakland a full-service Hospital to service the Greater East Bay Communities.
I am writing to strongly support this resolution. The children of the East Bay need to have high quality, equitable, and accessible heath care-- and those services need to be in their community-- Oakland-- at UCSF Children's Hospital OAKLAND-- not in a further location, San Francisco, which can be very difficult for people to access, especially without easy transportation, and especially in these difficult and restricted times. I have lived in the East Bay all of my life, have raised my children and now grandchildren here, as well as having taught in the BUSD for decades-- and I care deeply about this community and its children. ALL of our children deserve quality, readily available health care. Thank you.
My name is Kathi Lampkin, I am a Nurse Clinician at Children's Oakland where I have worked for 38 years taking care of the most vulnerable medically fragile infants and their families.
I also grew up in Oakland and our family home is still in Oakland where we are active in our neighborhood.
I support item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable health care services at UCSF Children's Hospital Oakland.
Many services have changed since the affiliation with UCSF in 2014 and these changes have affected our patients.
In December one of my patients' Mom said she had a "5 hour wait for the MRI scan" for her little girl and that this" occurs all the time".
Another of my Moms had to take her little boy to the ER but decided to go to UCSF Mission Bay because they would only have a 1-2 hour wait versus the 4-5 hour wait at Children's Oakland ER.
Finally another Mom shared with me she felt the physicians at UCSF Mission Bay did not seem as stressed and had more time to discuss a plan of care for her medically complicated baby with short gut syndrome. Mom stated she preferred Children's Oakland but staff seemed more stressed and it appeared it was due to short staffing.
All of these situations are families interactions with Children's Hospital Oakland and the many changes that are occurring. Therefore, I highly support adoption of this resolution.
Thank-you,
Kathi Lampkin
I support this measure and keeping high quality, equitable healthcare services available to all children in the East Bay. Children's Hospital in Oakland has been providing care for children in the East Bay and beyond since 1912. In recent years since the affiliation we have seen a change in the number of healthcare specialties available to patients in Oakland and instead sending them further from their homes to San Francisco. I would like to urge the council to support this measure and keep our families access to high quality comprehensive care in their own community.
I have been a nurse at CHO since 2009. I have also grown up in the East Bay and have known CHO to be the best hospital to bring kids for care. Since the affiliation with UCSF myself and other coworkers have noticed a change in some services at CHO. We used to take care of a large population of cystic fibrosis patients, some since they were babies. One day we noticed they were no longer being admitted to us and later learned the pulmonologist who cared for those kids started to work at a different facility taking her patients with her. This resolution would ensure that CHO remains a full service hospital and we can continue to care for all kids in the East Bay.
My name is Susan Segal. In addition to living in Oakland and having raised my family in Oakland, I worked for 31 years as a Neonatal Intensive Care nurse at Children's Hospital in Oakland. When I retired in 2015, we were already starting to feel the negative effects of our "affiliation" with UC, which left us feeling more like a neglected step-child than a valued, equal partner. Since then I have heard stories about the dismantling of services and programs, families being shunted to San Francisco for appointments they were previously able to have in Oakland, equipment failures and lack of updates as resources are funneled to San Francisco, and the increasing frustration of the doctors, nurses and support workers. Considering that percentage wise the pediatric population in the East Bay has continued to grow while San Francisco's has shrunk, this makes no sense. The population served by Oakland's hospital frequently relies on public transportation, and even without considering the current risks due to COVID, forcing those families to travel to San Francisco imposes additional costs they cannot afford, both in terms of money and time. The population served by Oakland for over 100 years, the East Bay and beyond, are ethnically and economically diverse, and deserve to have access to high quality, comprehensive care without having to cross the Bay. I urge you to support this resolution and demand that UC restore full services to Oakland.
My name is Jaleh Niazi, a graduate of UCSF and Children's Hospital and a community pediatrician working in Oakland and Berkeley for the past 25 years.
I speak in support of item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have seen that critical services have been neglected or cut since Children Hospital Oakland’s affiliation with UCSF in 2014 and am concerned that the transfer of resources away from Oakland hurts the children who are our patients, puts pressure on families with limited resources.
As a community physician, I find it harder to refer patients to Oakland, a place which used to be the safety net and a "second home" to our communities. Just Friday we received a denial from Children's asking us to look for specialists elsewhere. It is ironic that UCSF is spending millions for social equity training at the San Francisco campus, while completely undermining the programs which have been created organically at Children's since its inception.
I urge you to support this resolution. UCSF Health must take action now to reverse the loss of services in Oakland and create a healthcare system that corrects the inequities between Oakland and San Francisco. Patients and their families should not have to go across the Bay for the excellent care that we used to be able to provide here. UCSF Health can and should restore comprehensive, high quality tertiary care for all children in Oakland.
My name is Carrie Krupitsky. I was a nurse practitioner at Children's Hospital Oakland for 32 years prior to being terminated on 11/6/2020. The Tuberous Sclerosis Clinic of which I was the co-director for 16 years has subsequently been dismantled. Despite the Hospital's stated intention to continue the same quality of care for patients, 3 days after my termination, patient's families were told they would have to find care elsewhere. Dozens of families were left stranded with vulnerable children. This occurred despite an outpouring of protest regarding my layoff from all of my colleagues (including the current Director of the Neurology department who wrote that, if they proceed with my termination, she is "very concerned for the safety and quality of care for these patients".) The hospital also received dozens of letters from families, asking them to reconsider their decision. The hospital's decision to proceed has not only marred my career which was previously marked by excellence and an unwavering advocacy for the patients of Children's Hospital Oakland, but from what I have been told by families of my former patients, has created animosity and distrust in the community who depended on this hospital to prioritize their families. I urge you to pass this resolution and to demand that UCSF value the families and staff at Children's Hospital Oakland, not just in words and publicity, but in their direct actions.
I support this resolution and hope that UCSF will do better at providing services here in Oakland. Quality healthcare means our young people can be healthy and thrive. Too much focus on numbers and dollars and fancy buildings! It would be nice if UC would listen and treat Oakland equitably. Oakland deserves the same equipment and families shouldn't have to cross the Bay for healthcare we used to be able to get here in the East Bay. I strongly support giving nurses, doctors, and other workers a voice at the table and hope UCSF Healthcare listens and acts accordingly.
San Francisco limits Oakland nursing jobs so patients have to be seen in San Francisco. Keep care in our area! Our families struggle to have to cross the bay and pay all the tolls and parking. Let us serve our community
The relationship between Children's Oakland and UCSF is a perfect example of structural violence hidden behind a banner of being 'the most diverse, equitable, and inclusive academic medical system in the country'. UCSF is a corporate entity that has entered into relationship with a vulnerable safety-net hospital, and then proceeded to create benchmarks of success that Children's Oakland is simply unable to meet under the purse strings and decision-making power granted by this affiliation.
The terms of the affiliation from its outset have been shrouded in mystery and defended by a multi-million dollar PR department. UCSF now controls the transfer center - they decide which hospital patients, and therefore their insurance reimbursements, get routed to - and refuses to release this information. UCSF controls hiring, and has onboarded senior physicians at Children's Oakland at the level of Junior Faculty based on 'lack of academic work' such as publishing and research - and yet continue to close down our research centers and clinics that might help them to achieve these benchmarks. Though it seems to dictate all major hiring, funding and resource distribution decisions that at the end of the day directly impact patient care, UCSF frequently reminds us all that "this is an academic affiliation and Children's Hospital Oakland remains its own separate financial entity" (per a July 2020 email in the middle of a terrifying pandemic).
Profits cannot keep ruling care in the East Bay.
UCSF needs to start treating the East Bay equally. They have taken away so many vital services for East Bay residents. Childrens hospital is an essential service for the community not just for the East Bay but for many areas of Northern California. UCSF is more concerned about turning a profit then helping the community that they are supposed to be supporting. The amount of patients that Childrens has turned away recently due to lack of available resources is disappointing and embarrassing. UCSF is also providing more training to the staff at its SF campuses then they are providing to the staff of the East Bay. This is causing a patient safety issue. Healthcare should be centered around patients and not profits. Thanks for considering this issue. From a concerned nurse at CHO
My name is Wendy Bloom. I have been a nurse at Children’s in Oakland for 35 years. I have witnessed an erosion of full services for the patients at our hospital. We have always proudly served the underserved, a racially diverse population and those that can’t afford healthcare with full service high quality care at our hospital. We have seen a shift in programs to SF as programs are closed, with staff leaving and patients being forced to travel to SF for care they used to receive in the East Bay. We are fighting to preserve this treasure for the children that need it on in to the future. Please pass the resolution and hold UCSF accountable for the erosion of our care in the East Bay. The kids and their families deserve better.
My name is Lisa Hale and I am a nurse practitioner in the Anesthesia/Pain Service department at Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have worked as a nurse at Children's Oakland for over 13 years. I am commenting today in support of item 2.16, the resolution for high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. Retention and recruitment of experienced, high-quality nurses--nurse practitioners, nurse clinicians, nurse diabetes educators, and others--has been a major challenge at our hospital. We have seen many seasoned nurses leave Children’s Oakland to take jobs at other Bay Area facilities (such as UCSF Children’s Hospital Mission Bay and Kaiser) because those places provide better worker protections and compensation for nurses. We have had difficulty filling empty nurse positions for those same reasons. The substandard, inequitable treatment of nurses at Children’s Oakland results in substandard care for our Oakland patients due to short staffing, nurse burnout, and frequent provider turnover. Despite our efforts to work with UCSF administration to improve treatment of nurses at Oakland, UCSF continues to inform us that Oakland is a separate and different institution from its West Bay sister and that is justification for the inequitable treatment of Oakland nurses. I urge you to adopt this resolution and help keep Children's Hospital Oakland a full-service Hospital to service the Greater East Bay Communities.
I speak in support of item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have seen that critical services have been neglected or cut since Children Hospital Oakland’s affiliation with UCSF in 2014 and am concerned that the transfer of resources away from Oakland hurts the children who are our patients, puts pressure on families with limited resources, and is resulting in increasing inequity between Oakland and San Francisco.
My name is Kimberly Specht and I am the Clinical Nurse Specialist in the Rehabilitation Department. I have worked at Children's Hospital Oakland for over 8 years on the Rehab Unit. I am commenting today in support of item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have personally seen our patient census decrease due to lack of staffing and lack of referrals since the affiliation with UCSF. I urge you to support this resolution and help keep Children's Hospital Oakland a full-service Hospital to service the Greater East Bay Communities.
I am writing to strongly support this resolution. The children of the East Bay need to have high quality, equitable, and accessible heath care-- and those services need to be in their community-- Oakland-- at UCSF Children's Hospital OAKLAND-- not in a further location, San Francisco, which can be very difficult for people to access, especially without easy transportation, and especially in these difficult and restricted times. I have lived in the East Bay all of my life, have raised my children and now grandchildren here, as well as having taught in the BUSD for decades-- and I care deeply about this community and its children. ALL of our children deserve quality, readily available health care. Thank you.
My name is Kathi Lampkin, I am a Nurse Clinician at Children's Oakland where I have worked for 38 years taking care of the most vulnerable medically fragile infants and their families.
I also grew up in Oakland and our family home is still in Oakland where we are active in our neighborhood.
I support item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable health care services at UCSF Children's Hospital Oakland.
Many services have changed since the affiliation with UCSF in 2014 and these changes have affected our patients.
In December one of my patients' Mom said she had a "5 hour wait for the MRI scan" for her little girl and that this" occurs all the time".
Another of my Moms had to take her little boy to the ER but decided to go to UCSF Mission Bay because they would only have a 1-2 hour wait versus the 4-5 hour wait at Children's Oakland ER.
Finally another Mom shared with me she felt the physicians at UCSF Mission Bay did not seem as stressed and had more time to discuss a plan of care for her medically complicated baby with short gut syndrome. Mom stated she preferred Children's Oakland but staff seemed more stressed and it appeared it was due to short staffing.
All of these situations are families interactions with Children's Hospital Oakland and the many changes that are occurring. Therefore, I highly support adoption of this resolution.
Thank-you,
Kathi Lampkin
I support this measure and keeping high quality, equitable healthcare services available to all children in the East Bay. Children's Hospital in Oakland has been providing care for children in the East Bay and beyond since 1912. In recent years since the affiliation we have seen a change in the number of healthcare specialties available to patients in Oakland and instead sending them further from their homes to San Francisco. I would like to urge the council to support this measure and keep our families access to high quality comprehensive care in their own community.
I have been a nurse at CHO since 2009. I have also grown up in the East Bay and have known CHO to be the best hospital to bring kids for care. Since the affiliation with UCSF myself and other coworkers have noticed a change in some services at CHO. We used to take care of a large population of cystic fibrosis patients, some since they were babies. One day we noticed they were no longer being admitted to us and later learned the pulmonologist who cared for those kids started to work at a different facility taking her patients with her. This resolution would ensure that CHO remains a full service hospital and we can continue to care for all kids in the East Bay.
My name is Susan Segal. In addition to living in Oakland and having raised my family in Oakland, I worked for 31 years as a Neonatal Intensive Care nurse at Children's Hospital in Oakland. When I retired in 2015, we were already starting to feel the negative effects of our "affiliation" with UC, which left us feeling more like a neglected step-child than a valued, equal partner. Since then I have heard stories about the dismantling of services and programs, families being shunted to San Francisco for appointments they were previously able to have in Oakland, equipment failures and lack of updates as resources are funneled to San Francisco, and the increasing frustration of the doctors, nurses and support workers. Considering that percentage wise the pediatric population in the East Bay has continued to grow while San Francisco's has shrunk, this makes no sense. The population served by Oakland's hospital frequently relies on public transportation, and even without considering the current risks due to COVID, forcing those families to travel to San Francisco imposes additional costs they cannot afford, both in terms of money and time. The population served by Oakland for over 100 years, the East Bay and beyond, are ethnically and economically diverse, and deserve to have access to high quality, comprehensive care without having to cross the Bay. I urge you to support this resolution and demand that UC restore full services to Oakland.
My name is Jaleh Niazi, a graduate of UCSF and Children's Hospital and a community pediatrician working in Oakland and Berkeley for the past 25 years.
I speak in support of item 2.16 in support of high quality, equitable healthcare services at UCSF Children’s Hospital Oakland. I have seen that critical services have been neglected or cut since Children Hospital Oakland’s affiliation with UCSF in 2014 and am concerned that the transfer of resources away from Oakland hurts the children who are our patients, puts pressure on families with limited resources.
As a community physician, I find it harder to refer patients to Oakland, a place which used to be the safety net and a "second home" to our communities. Just Friday we received a denial from Children's asking us to look for specialists elsewhere. It is ironic that UCSF is spending millions for social equity training at the San Francisco campus, while completely undermining the programs which have been created organically at Children's since its inception.
I urge you to support this resolution. UCSF Health must take action now to reverse the loss of services in Oakland and create a healthcare system that corrects the inequities between Oakland and San Francisco. Patients and their families should not have to go across the Bay for the excellent care that we used to be able to provide here. UCSF Health can and should restore comprehensive, high quality tertiary care for all children in Oakland.
My name is Carrie Krupitsky. I was a nurse practitioner at Children's Hospital Oakland for 32 years prior to being terminated on 11/6/2020. The Tuberous Sclerosis Clinic of which I was the co-director for 16 years has subsequently been dismantled. Despite the Hospital's stated intention to continue the same quality of care for patients, 3 days after my termination, patient's families were told they would have to find care elsewhere. Dozens of families were left stranded with vulnerable children. This occurred despite an outpouring of protest regarding my layoff from all of my colleagues (including the current Director of the Neurology department who wrote that, if they proceed with my termination, she is "very concerned for the safety and quality of care for these patients".) The hospital also received dozens of letters from families, asking them to reconsider their decision. The hospital's decision to proceed has not only marred my career which was previously marked by excellence and an unwavering advocacy for the patients of Children's Hospital Oakland, but from what I have been told by families of my former patients, has created animosity and distrust in the community who depended on this hospital to prioritize their families. I urge you to pass this resolution and to demand that UCSF value the families and staff at Children's Hospital Oakland, not just in words and publicity, but in their direct actions.
I support this resolution and hope that UCSF will do better at providing services here in Oakland. Quality healthcare means our young people can be healthy and thrive. Too much focus on numbers and dollars and fancy buildings! It would be nice if UC would listen and treat Oakland equitably. Oakland deserves the same equipment and families shouldn't have to cross the Bay for healthcare we used to be able to get here in the East Bay. I strongly support giving nurses, doctors, and other workers a voice at the table and hope UCSF Healthcare listens and acts accordingly.