Hear from Workers >> Mary Cavanaugh
Mary Cavanaugh | Southern California Kaiser Permanente -The Riverside Medical Center
United Nurses Association of California/Union of Health Care Professionals-AFSCME |
Dr. Mary Cavanaugh has been a Kaiser optometrist for 25 years. As a practicing clinician, patient care is her highest priority and her life’s work. Worried that the retail end of optometry was overshadowing medical care, Cavanaugh and her colleagues decided to form a union with United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals. While patient care was the primary reason for forming a union, the optometrists at Kaiser also felt they were losing their voices as professionals within Kaiser’s complex system. Cavanaugh explains: “It was clear that the unions who dealt with Kaiser were getting their workers’ needs met. It looked like it was going to be business as usual for the workers who weren’t represented.” The wages and benefits were one reason to form a union, but gaining a voice was every bit as important to the doctors. In 2000, the optometrists began their campaign to form a union at Kaiser under their company’s national neutrality and majority sign-up agreement. Within four months, an overwhelming majority of the optometrists signed up for union representation. The benefits of having a union have been deep and lasting for Cavanaugh and her colleagues. “Five years later I’m thoroughly convinced that it is was the best thing to do. And a majority of my co-workers would agree,” she says. “We have a Labor Management Partnership that helps people understand the workings of the company better, and work together to improve patient care.” The optometrists at Kaiser are now part of the master contract with Kaiser. Cavanaugh reports, “We’ve been able to reduce our patient load and have made huge strides in terms of patient care.” | 
