Editor’s note: Below is a transcription from a TikTok video. The nurse pictured speaks about another nurse’s $41 million lawsuit victory against Kaiser. View video: https://www.tiktok.com/@travelingnurse/video/7312560127968611626?_r=1&_t=8iiU8I1gJ5S
‘ICUs are expensive. Kaiser owns both the healthcare facility, the hospitals, and the insurance provider. So . . .they have a vested interest in preventing their patients from accessing expensive forms of healthcare.‘
“A nurse at the Kaiser hospital that I worked at that fired me for speaking up about bullying and unsafe care just sued and won $41 million from Kaiser. Back in 2021, I took my first- ever travel assignment. I was working at Los Angeles Medical Center in Hollywood in Los Angeles, a Kaiser facility.
I had a patient that Kaiser pushed the family to go DNR [Do Not Resuscitate] instead of escalating the care to ICU [Intensive Care Unit] because Kaiser has a vested interest in preventing their patients from accessing expensive healthcare. ICUs are expensive. Kaiser owns both the healthcare facility, the hospitals, and the insurance provider. So they’re reimbursing themselves, so they have a vested interest in preventing their patients from accessing expensive forms of healthcare.
One of the ways that shows up a lot at Kaiser facilities across the nation is evidenced by the thousands of Kaiser employees who commented in a previous video of mine that went viral about Kaiser, confirming they’ve seen the same I did.
Kaiser will push families to go DNR instead of literally just escalating care to the ICU. I took care of an 80-year-old immigrant — key important factor here, an immigrant, who had a septic UTI. It happens way more frequently than you would think. All he needed were pressors [a drug used to make blood vessels constrict or become narrow in people with low blood pressure.] Often, these are people in shock who are unable to get enough blood to their vital organs. He was not fluid responsive. They had ample ICU beds open. In fact, there were so many ICU beds open every day that they floated their ICU nurses almost every shift to lower level of care floors. All he needed were pressors. Instead of giving him pressors, they pushed the immigrant family to go DNR.
I spoke up about it and I got fired. And I got DNR’d from Kaiser. And that’s fine because I would never go work at or let anyone that I love have a Kaiser healthcare system taking care of them ever again in my life.
So when I tell you that seeing this NICU nurse [with specialized skills] who spoke up about Kaiser breaking staffing ratios and unsafe patient care, sued and won $41 million love, love it. Because Kaiser is Disney villain evil.
I need Americans to understand that any healthcare system that allows companies, private companies, to own the insurance provider and the healthcare servicer, will commit negligent patient care in the sake of profits.
Healthcare in this country is a business. Sick patients accessing expensive healthcare is bad for business. We have got to pass legislation to outlaw companies that are operating in the model that Kaiser is operating in.
I am beyond thrilled that this nurse made the money she made, and I hope more people sue, simply put. And yeah, let’s hope that this empire falls soon.”
