At these two Temple hospitals, 2023 was a big year for unionizations

Labor had an active year in Philadelphia, and two Temple Health hospitals were at the heart of the action.

Nearly 900 workers at Temple’s Fox Chase Cancer Center and Chestnut Hill Hospital joined the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals, or PASNAP. Their grievances centered on burnout due to high patient load.

» READ MORE: Nurses, techs decry Temple Hospital decision to move the employee health clinic from its main campus.

Staffing concerns also led to a five-day nurses’ strike at Suburban Community Hospital and Lower Bucks Hospital that began Friday. This marked the first time in three years that nurses in the region have walked out of work. The 240 nurses at Suburban and Lower Bucks returned to work Wednesday without resolution to their contract dispute with hospital owner Prime Healthcare.

Here’s a look at six union votes that workers took at the two Temple hospitals in 2023.

Multiple groups of employees created unions this year at Fox Chase. Staff at the Temple-owned specialty cancer center in Northeast Philadelphia said they were motivated to organize after nurses and techs at Temple’s main hospital secured a three-year union contract in November 2022.

“We can have those things, too!” Christina Suermann, an operating room nurse at Fox Chase, told The Inquirer over the summer.

Here are Fox Chase worker groups who voted to unionize in 2023:

Number of workers: Roughly 125

Election date: June 6

Result: 74% of techs and specialists who cast a ballot voted in favor of the union.

Number of workers: Nearly 350

Election date: June 19

Result: 62% of nurses who cast a ballot voted in favor of the union.

Number of workers: About 20

Election date: Sep. 13

Result: 100% of phone triage nurses who cast a ballot voted in favor of the union.

Number of workers: Nearly 85

Election date: Sep. 13

Result: 83% of research staff who cast a ballot voted in favor of the union.

The acute-care hospital on Germantown Avenue joined Temple Health on Jan. 1, acquired from Tower Health. By year’s end, two large group of workers had unionized. Staff members said that they wanted to have collective bargaining agreements, like many of their new peers across the Temple system, to protect their rights and interests.

“Not having a union, you are at the mercy of hospital management,” Kadena Smith-Fleming, a licensed practical nurse at Chestnut Hill who is part of the techs union, told The Inquirer earlier this month.

Here are the Chestnut Hill worker groups who voted to unionize in 2023:

Number of workers: Roughly 215

Election date: Dec. 12

Result: 73% of the nurses who cast a ballot voted in favor of the union.

» READ MORE: Nurses and techs vote to unionize at Temple’s Chestnut Hill Hospital

Number of workers: Nearly 90

Election date: Dec. 12

Result: 92% of the techs and specialists who cast a ballot voted in favor of the union.