At Elmhurst Hospital in Queens, resident doctors have announced plans to strike for five days beginning on Monday.
They want Mount Sinai, which oversees their training program and writes their paychecks, to give them the same salary as their Manhattan-based peers. If a deal is not reached by Sunday night, some 170 residents want to strike at 7 a.m. on Monday.
According to a press statement from the union CIRSEIU, the doctors claim they are paid $7,000 less annually than the non-unionized residents at Mount Sinai's main campus in Manhattan.
Although Elmhurst is a public hospital, Mount Sinai runs a residency program for its almost 200 resident doctors.
Picket Party
A "picket party," sponsored by the union CIRSEIU, was held on Sunday in Queens at Frank D. O'Connor Playground. Mount Sinai claims that it has met with the union more than a dozen times and has presented the union with more attractive offers.
One of the resident doctors at Elmhurst Hospital, Tanathun Kajornsakchai, claimed that the strike is noteworthy because many hospitals in New York City have been going through comparable discussions and the pandemic has emphasized the fact that their employers "don't treat us with respect."
Hospital Patients Already Vowed To Strike
Elmhurst Hospital patients have vowed to strike twice already this month. Internal medicine resident Joya Dupre at Elmhurst Hospital stated that discussions for their contracts with Mount Sinai have been ongoing since July 2022 and that they have been working to develop a reasonable proposal with them.
We demand to be dealt with equally. The promotion that our Mount Sinai colleagues received was something that both of us deserved, too.
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