For Immediate Release
Friday, May 28, 1999
L.A. County Doctors Unionize; Cite Discontent Over Patient Care, Working Conditions, Job Security In Hospitals
LOS ANGELES —In the nation's largest election for physicians in 18 years, nearly 800 physicians employed by the Los Angeles County voted overwhelmingly to join the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD), an Oakland-based affiliate of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). With the victory, the UAPD boosted its membership to 6,000 doctors, making it the nation's largest union of post-residency physicians.
The election results were announced today at a news conference outside the Los Angeles County-USC General Hospital in Los Angeles where newly unionized physicians gathered to hear the election results. In the final tally, a total of 540 physicians cast ballots and 65% of them voted for UAPD representation.
"This victory is great news for the millions of Americans who rely on public hospitals for high quality care," stated AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee. "As the bottom line becomes paramount to public hospital management, services are cut back and patient care suffers.
“Even doctors, if they are acting alone, cannot change these kinds of health care compromises," McEntee continued. "Working together, these physicians are significantly stronger. Los Angeles County residents now have powerful advocates for the right treatment, high quality treatment, in a timely manner."
Organizers said the physicians voted to join the UAPD because of their strong discontent regarding patient care issues, lack of job security and deteriorating working conditions. The new union members also maintained there was a real need to improve the care for the indigent and other special populations, such as those ill with HIV. The doctors, in prompting the election, said that they had little input on crucial issues regarding county health policies. During the organizing campaign, the county made ill- conceived proposals to consolidate laboratory services and to allow the contracting out of physician services -- decisions that were strongly opposed by the UAPD.
Dr. Dan Lawlor, a key organizer in the UAPD/AFSCME unionization effort, said, "This election was about maintaining a competent and compassionate public healthcare system for the people of Los Angeles County. Furthermore, it puts the union at the forefront of quality teaching and research -- a vital factor in this nation's great medical tradition."
Lawlor stressed that the Los Angeles County campaign has prompted other physicians nationwide to consider becoming union members. "This impetus is already spilling into the East Coast where, next month, 500 University of Connecticut teaching physicians and scientists will hold an election on affiliating with AFSCME."
The L.A. County election was the culmination of a three-year campaign by the UAPD. The doctors joining the labor union include 550 university teaching physicians and about 240 doctors working in the Los Angeles County's public health clinics, children’s and AIDS services plus the sheriff's and coroner's offices. The physicians are employed by both the county and the area's three medical schools, UCLA, USC and Charles Drew. The medical university teaching physicians are the largest group of its kind ever to vote on joining a physicians union.
"These Los Angeles County physicians knew they needed a highly experienced and powerful union to represent patients’ and doctors' interests to county management. They chose the combination of the UAPD and AFSCME that share the same goals --ensuring the delivery of quality health care,"said Dr. Robert Weinmann, UAPD president and a San Jose neurologist.
"Make no mistake about this, we are going to preserve a doctor's prerogative to prescribe and deliver the best treatments for patients," Weinmann said. "We will preserve the commitment of these physicians to their indigent patients and protect doctors' rights to reasonable working conditions so that their patients get the best possible care. And, we will protect their right to reasonable compensation."
The San Jose neurologist added that "the organizing process has created a new bond among the doctors which will help us represent them and their patients."
The Los Angeles County victory makes AFSCME, with 1.3 million members, the national leader in doctor unionization with more doctor members, excluding residents, than any other AFL-CIO union. The UAPD affiliated with AFSCME in August of 1997.
