Mass General Brigham Nurses Withdraw Strike Notice

Mass General Brigham's current labor pause follows months of friction. Early last year, the system cut about 1,500 jobs in what Fierce Healthcare described as the largest layoffs in its history. Contract negotiations with Brigham and Women’s nurses began last November, and the prior agreement expired March 31. In July, nurses and about 450 home care clinicians held a one-day awareness strike. Fierce Healthcare described it as the largest healthcare strike in Massachusetts and Brigham and Women’s first.

Patch reported that employers across Massachusetts filed Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification notices for nearly 1,392 layoffs expected in August; the report did not name Mass General Brigham. The Boston Globe reported that MGB Health Plan would remove Dana-Farber Cancer Institute from its Medicare Advantage network effective Oct. 1, citing financial considerations including limited federal reimbursements. The plan said the choice had no connection to any talks, deals or actions between the two organizations.

Dana-Farber said about 250 plan members were actively receiving cancer treatment and 1,000 had or were slated to have appointments this year. Patients can retain in-network access to Dana-Farber providers for 90 days or for the duration of treatment, which may continue past the start of next year for certain therapies. MGB Health Plan directed members to other in-network options, including its own cancer institute, alongside UMass Memorial Health and Southcoast Health.

On Sept. 25, union members voted 93% to authorize an open-ended strike. The union sought limits on temporary nurses, more affordable health insurance, a cost-of-living wage increase and a differential for nurses who float between units. A network outage began around noon and was not a cyberattack, according to Boston 25 News. Care continued except for some elective outpatient procedures, and staff used paper forms. Sites began bringing systems back online that evening.

On Oct. 13, nurses withdrew the strike notice after late Saturday progress, according to Fierce Healthcare. The union said it agreed to lift the 10-day notice “given the complexity of the agreement and the impact of a potential strike on our nurses and the community”. Members will vote on the proposal; a rejection could trigger a new 10-day notice. The 4,000-member walkout would have been the largest nurses’ strike in Massachusetts history. MGB reported $15 million in operating income, a 0.1% margin, across nine months of the current fiscal year, compared with a $44 million operating loss in the prior period, and a bottom line including nonoperating gains of $1.9 billion. The union has pointed to fiscal 2025 bottom line of nearly $2.4 billion, total assets of $35.8 billion and CEO compensation of almost $9.2 million.