In Fleischman v. Albany Medical Center et al., Albany Medical Center, Ellis Hospital, Northeast Health, Seton Health System and St. Peter’s Healthcare Services are accused of under-paying nurses. According to Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld and Toll, the co-lead counsel on, preliminary estimates show that the nurses have on average been underpaid approximately $6,000 per year “Despite years of high vacancy rates, compensation for hospital RNs has remained surprisingly stagnant,” claims the suit. “The few compensation increases in the past severally years have been far too small to substantially decrease the area’s nursing shortage.”
The “defendants have for years conspired among themselves and with other hospitals in the Albany MSA to depress the compensation levels of registered nurses employed at the conspiring hospitals,” says the suit. In addition, they “also agreed to regularly exchange detailed and non-public information about the compensation each is paying or will pay to its RN employees. The agreement to exchange such information [through meetings, telephone conversations and written surveys] has facilitated the formation, implementation and enforcement of [the] wage-fixing conspiracy. [This] has suppressed competition among Albany-area hospitals in the compensation of RN employees, and has depressed the compensation they have paid to such employees.”
Further, says the suit, the conspiracy “has occurred in the context of a national nursing shortage [otherwise] Albany-area hospitals would have responded to the nursing shortage by, among other things, substantially increasing RN compensation in an effort to attract a sufficient number of RNs to their respective hospitals. The history of hospital RN compensation and vacancy rates reveals that [they] are not being compensated at competitive levels.”
Senior District Court Judge Thomas J. McAvoy determined that the class action is valid regarding the questions of whether the hospitals violated antitrust laws and injured the class as a result of that breach. The suit meets the four requirements for certification under Rule 23, which governs class actions:
1. Numerosity. “A class of more than 2,000 nurses employed in the Greater Albany area satisfies the numerosity requirement imposed by the Federal Rules,” writes Judge McAvoy.
2. Commonality. “Nurses practicing in a relatively confined region and alleged to be subject to the same conduct giving rise to the conspiracy satisfy the strictures,” he writes.
3. Typicality. “The Plaintiffs claims in this case arise from the same wage-fixing conspiracy allegedly adopted by the Defendant hospitals in the Albany MSA (who argue that the varied stature and responsibilities characteristic of the nursing profession should preclude Plaintiffs motion for class certification),” writes Judge McAvoy. “Whether or not such collusion is found to exist, the claims currently asserted by Fleischman and Cullen are typical of the class and merit certification as they cite charges against area hospitals for depressing wages among all registered nurses during the given time period.”
4. Adequacy. The “Plaintiffs have expressed no interests contrary to those of the class they aim to represent. This absence of conflict is evident as they share with the unnamed class members an interest in recovering the ‘damages caused by Defendants conspiracy,'” he writes. “Therefore, it may safely be said that the first element of the adequacy requirement is satisfied. Furthermore, Plaintiffs have demonstrated a capacity and willingness to pursue the case fully adequacy is easily presumed.”
Injury-in-fact and damages will be separately determined, as “there exists too much disparity among the proposed class members to proceed under one common trial,” says the opinion.
The suit is one of five class-action suits filed against major hospitals in Albany, Chicago, Detroit, Memphis and San Antonio in 2006. All the suits claim that federal anti-trust laws were breached to keep nurse wages artificially low. The will not be consolidated; they will be litigated separately in each suit’s district court.
