Medical residents with Brown University Health, formerly called Lifespan, have formed a doctors’ union at Rhode Island Hospital.
In a small fluorescent-lit room in the Thomas P. O’Neill, Jr. federal building in Boston Tuesday afternoon, National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) employees spent more than 90 minutes opening envelopes and counting ballots.
When it came time to place the hot pink ballots in yes and no piles, organizers and attorneys with the Committee of Residents and Interns Union under the Service Employees International Union, or CIR-SEIU, leaned in to watch.
The yes piles grew to include hundreds of votes, with a final tally of 464 yes votes and 27 no votes out of the 689 employees the NLRB considers eligible. According to the NLRB, there were two void ballots and 196 physicians who did not mail in their ballots.
The union will now represent all Brown University Health residents who are employed by Rhode Island Hospital, whether or not they voted yes. CIR-SEIU says the union believes it is the first doctors’ union in the state.
Fourth year combined internal medicine and pediatrics resident Dr. Laura Schwartz was one of the first people who started the union organizing efforts over three years ago.
“There has been a lot of shrieking,” she said. “Much of it from me. We’re really, really, really happy.”
According to residents on the union chapter’s organizing committee and union officials, the demands the chapter has are for higher wages, a 401-K matching program, parental leave, fertility leave, and specific departmental benefits.
Dr. Ben Raymond-Kolker is also a fourth year resident in combined internal medicine and pediatrics and an original member of the organizing committee. He said the group did not organize with a plan to reduce their number of regular work hours, which can be up to 80 in a single week.
“I describe residency as hard, it’s always hard, and I think that’s important. We work really long hours and we take care of very sick patients, and I think we all are happy to do so,” he said.
In an emailed response, a spokesperson with Brown University Health said “we appreciate all who made their voices heard through this election and look forward to working with CIR in good faith while best serving our patients and communities.” The union went to a vote because Rhode Island Hospital did not voluntarily recognize residents as a union.
Schwartz said increased wages can help increase quality of life during the residents’ time off. First year Brown University Health residents currently make $69,750 annually, while residents who are unionized with CIR-SEIU make $78,098.44 annually at Boston Medical Center, and $79,662 annually at Cambridge Health Alliance.
CIR-SEIU recently won first contracts for organized residents at the University of Pennsylvania, which increased their base pay from $69,869 to $85,061, which includes a living stipend; and at George Washington University, residents’ base pay increased from $66,628.00 to $70,625.68, which includes an annual mental health stipend.
The union says its membership has more than doubled since the pandemic.
Schwartz says during her four years in Providence her rent has gone up, and pending a court decision on President Biden’s federal student loan suspension plan, she may have to begin paying back her medical school loans. Plus, she and other doctors must fund their own board exams. She said it is stressful that she’ll have to spend at least $3,600 on her board exams this year alone.
“There are just a really unbelievable number of costs associated with what we do, and so facing all of those costs and the student loan burden and the hours that we work, you know it’s not like you can pick up a second job or or do some babysitting in your free time,” she said.
The next step for the union is bargaining. The unit will sit down with their employer to negotiate the deals of their first contract, which will last three years. It typically takes over a year to win a first contract, meaning neither Raymond-Kolker nor Schwartz are likely to be around to experience possible benefits firsthand from the contract, though Schwartz said she thought that was likely from the beginning.
“Knowing that it’s something that we could do to help those who’ve come after us and who will continue to come through this program after us, that’s something that I am so incredibly proud of,” said Schwartz.
Next week, on Jan. 15, NLRB employees will count ballots for a union that would represent 229 additional Brown University Health residents employed under Care New England at Butler, Kent and Women and Infants Hospitals.
This story has been updated to include a response from Brown University Health.
