Last week, Reps. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) laid the first steps toward the Nurse and Health Care Worker Protection Act (H.R. 2381). Direct care nurses have a higher rate of injury than laborers, movers and truck drivers from repositioning, moving and lifting patients, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.This legislation will require that healthcare facilities provide safe patient handling using mechanical lifts and develop injury prevention plans for healthcare workers who move patients.

Nurses advanced on Capitol Hill last week for a National RN Day of Action the same day H.R. 2382 was introduced, lobbying members of Congress for passage of the legislation that would leave nurses better able to tend to the real heavy lifting of nursing - patient care. Read the core provisions of the legislation.