By Doug Cunningham

Thanks to the work of a coalition of unions representing nurses, mandatory overtime for nurses will be banned in New York in July of next year. Mandatory overtime is a big issues for nurses and for their patients, as health care provider corporations squeeze nursing staff to maximize profit. Many nurses face serious hardships on the job when forced to work overtime for extended periods of time. Nurse unions say nurses are often forced to work double shifts with no advance warning. That stresses nurses and patient care also suffers.