When hospitals limit organizing activity

Since 1974, when the NLRA was extended to cover nonprofit medical institutions, hospitals have been faced with the challenge of accommodating their employees' right to engage in organizing and concerted activities while preventing such activities from disrupting patient care. Some hospitals have sought to protect the interests of patients by prohibiting solicitation and distribution in all areas to which patients and visitors have access. The Board and the courts have generally found such rules overly broad and violative of employee rights under the NLRA. In the following survey of cases involving solicitation/distribution rules, the author points out that the courts have consistently evaluated these rules on the basis of the special nature of the hospital setting. Accordingly, advises the author, hospital administrators who are promulgating distributions and solicitation rules covering a given location must consider the individual characteristics of that location, namely, its physical layout, the type of work performed there, and the availability of alternate space.