We are the elected nurse leaders representing 1,400 nurses at PeaceHealth Riverbend and University District. We are all bedside nurses, not administrators. Collectively, our group has worked for PeaceHealth for more than 176 years. Like most healthcare workers, the last 18 months have been the most challenging in our careers. We have sacrificed so much, personally and professionally, to continue to care for our community in a manner we feel is needed and deserved. We have isolated ourselves from our families in fear that we could bring home a disease that could potentially harm them and we reused PPE out of a lack of resources.

We were once hailed as “heroes” by our community and our employer, yet now amid the fifth COVID-19 surge, it feels like PeaceHealth has turned their backs on us. We were short staffed prior to the pandemic, but now it is exponentially worse. Instead of supporting local nurses and agreeing to retention incentives or disaster pay, they opted to pay millions of dollars weekly for traveling nurses. This is demoralizing for the loyal PeaceHealth nurses who have worked so hard for our community. There are more nurses leaving our community and the profession than ever. We are desperate to keep our nurses.

Please help us by contacting PeaceHealth Oregon network CEO Todd Salnas (541-222-2004 or tsalnas@peacehealth.org). Ask that the PeaceHealth administration stop dismissing us and work towards a collaborative agreement.

Chris Rompala

Kevyn Paul

and the SHMC Oregon Nurses 

Association Executive Team

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