At the request of the respective mediators for both bargaining units, negotiators at The Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai West, and Mount Sinai Morningside agreed to meet with NYSNA negotiators today, with The Mount Sinai Hospital negotiators attending for 11 hours. After little progress was made at either table, the mediators told the parties to break for the evening. No additional meetings are scheduled.  

At The Mount Sinai Hospital session, the parties spent most of the day exchanging proposals on immigration, construction and renovation, and substance abuse treatments, but did not make substantial progress on any issue. 

Mount Sinai West and Mount Sinai Morningside negotiators shared two proposals that had already been agreed to at The Mount Sinai Hospital, one on artificial intelligence (AI) and the other on support for nursing mothers, and the union did not agree to either one. In the case of Mount Sinai’s AI proposal, NYSNA’s negotiators sent back a counter and said they would never agree to elements of the proposal, even though it was identical to what was already settled at Mount Sinai’s other bargaining table.  

January 16, 2025

Friends and colleagues,

The mediators at The Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai West, and Mount Sinai Morningside asked both parties to reconvene at the bargaining table, and our teams on both sides of the park are scheduled to meet today. 

While we continue to work toward a deal, we also continue to make progress toward getting our hospitals operating at full capacity. We have extended our contracts for agency nurses to ensure we have a workforce willing to provide care to our patients. We are onboarding an additional complement of agency nurses focused on specialty areas so that we can rapidly bring our scheduled surgical volumes back to normal.  

I had the privilege of visiting with some of our teams from Finance and Digital and Technology Partners yesterday. I plan to spend some time with our amazing Human Resources team today. These teams have worked incredibly hard to rapidly onboard a large number of new employees over the last few weeks, and although much of their work may not always be visible on the front lines, they are incredibly important to our mission. 

Thank you everyone at the bedside and behind the scenes for the amazing work. Our patients and your colleagues thank you.  

Onward,

Brendan

Brendan G. Carr, MD, MA, MS
Chief Executive Officer
Mount Sinai Health System

January 14, 2026

Friends and colleagues,

As we are now three days into NYSNA’s strike at The Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai Morningside and Mount Sinai West, I again want to share my deepest gratitude to the thousands of people across our system who worked so hard to prepare us for this moment. I’ve spent a lot of time in all three of our affected hospitals over the last few days and am happy to report that our hospitals are running smoothly.  

On Monday, we saw 20 percent of our scheduled NYSNA nurses decide not to participate in NYSNA’s strike, and yesterday we saw similar numbers—hundreds of nurses joining their teams at the bedside. I remain grateful to our nurses who have come to work, to the traveling nurses who came to help us, to nursing leaders who have been working around the clock, and to the many other individuals who are working incredibly hard to make up for their absent colleagues. We have continued to provide extraordinary care at all three hospitals. Yesterday I visited a number of teams across the Health System, and although we aren’t yet at full capacity, you can feel the tempo accelerating.  

Our goal continues to be an agreement that balances the amazing contributions of our nurses with the long-term financial realities. Unfortunately, we’ve made no progress over the last two days. To support ongoing safe operations, we’ve now extended our nonrefundable contract to ensure we have a workforce willing to provide care to our patients. This investment consumes limited resources that I would have preferred to direct to our nurses. Our negotiators are ready when NYSNA is ready to bargain, and will continue to follow the lead of the mediators to help us reach a deal. As I’ve said before, it is my responsibility to reach an agreement that benefits our nurses without limiting our ability to invest in the whole of our workforce or compromising our mission.  

I have been made aware that NYSNA is bullying and intimidating our nurses who have come to work. This is incredibly destructive to the collaborative culture that makes health care special and Mount Sinai great. Our nurses deserve better, and we will continue to provide resources to protect our nurses from this sort of behavior.

I hope we will be back at the negotiating table working towards a resolution soon, and will keep you updated. 

Onward,

Brendan

Brendan G. Carr, MD, MA, MS
Chief Executive Officer
Mount Sinai Health System

January 12, 2026

Friends and colleagues,

I want to start by saying thank you. I heard from so many of you in the hallways, on the front line, and in the command centers today. Your compassion and dedication to our patients—and each other—is remarkable. Onboarding 1,400 qualified and specialized nurses, safely transferring patients, rescheduling appointments, and making sure that we can meet the needs of our communities takes a coordinated effort, and it is incredible what you are doing.

You’ve probably heard by now that 20 percent of our scheduled nurses came to work today to join their teams at the bedside. This showing was a testament to the culture that we’re building, even though it still felt like key members of our teams were missing. I’m grateful that so many of you showed up today to care for our patients, and anyone else who chooses to do so will be welcome here. I commit to all of you that we will work tirelessly to come to an agreement that balances the incredible value you bring to our teams with the financial crisis facing health care today.

The last few updates have been long and difficult, so I’ll keep today short.  You can see a brief update here on our Instagram page. 

Onward,

Brendan

Brendan G. Carr, MD, MA, MS
Chief Executive Officer
Mount Sinai Health System

January 11, 2026

Friends and colleagues,

I’m writing again to provide an update on our negotiations with the New York State Nursing Association (NYSNA) and their plans to strike beginning Monday morning at 6 am. Our negotiating teams from The Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai West, and Mount Sinai Morningside continue to meet, but no substantial economic items have been decided in recent days. In truth, the list of items left to resolve is long. Beyond wages and compensation, NYSNA includes proposals to change vacation/PTO, staffing models, and shift differentials. All have significant costs both operationally and economically, and they will need to be resolved in addition to agreeing on base wage increases.

Preparations on the Health System side are nearing completion. Our Clinical Command Center has been working with clinical and administrative leadership 24/7 to prepare. Significant progress has been made on identifying patients who can safely be discharged. They’ve been helping to transfer patients between Mount Sinai hospitals to better balance the load, reschedule appointments and operations, and review and adjust staffing projections. We are ready to begin running our hospitals with the temporary replacement nurses who have been recruited and onboarded.

We have secured almost 1,400 qualified and specialized agency nurses to join our care teams, many of whom have already been integrated into units across our hospitals. Thank you to those who have come to support Mount Sinai and our patients during a difficult time. And thank you to our incredible care and support teams who are making sure that patients come first every step of the way. The planning and personnel costs required to responsibly run our hospitals for what we anticipate could be a long strike are substantial, but we are prepared to maintain these operations. We have explained to NYSNA that given the extreme financial pressures facing health care, we have a fixed budget that can be used either for nurse wages and benefits or to prepare and operate during a strike. I feel urgency to make progress in our negotiation so that we can spend the remainder of our budgeted funds on our nurses rather than on the strike.

To ensure the health and safety of the population, a State of Emergency has been declared in New York State and the Department of Health has issued guidance to allow hospitals to plan for the staffing disruption. This declaration and the guidance give us greater flexibility to manage during the strike. We are now able to use out-of-state providers and to transfer patients to alleviate the strain on stressed hospitals. These flexibilities will help us to ensure safety during the staffing disruption. There are patients who need our services, and I’m optimistic that after a few days of transition, we will be able to use our alternative staffing solution to fulfill our obligation to our patients to provide quality health care for the duration of any strike.

We will continue to bargain in good faith with NYSNA over the course of the day and through the night as necessary, but from my perspective, a labor disruption continues to appear to be very likely. I thank you all for your ongoing work to keep our patients safe during this incredibly difficult time.

I’ll be back in touch tomorrow and a systemwide broadcast is also being prepared so that we can communicate details and logistics as they emerge during this dynamic situation.

With respect and gratitude,

Brendan

Brendan G. Carr, MD, MA, MS
Chief Executive Officer
Mount Sinai Health System

January 10, 2026

Friends and colleagues,

With just two days before a possible strike by the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) at The Mount Sinai Hospital, Mount Sinai West, and Mount Sinai Morningside, I want to update you on where things stand and how we are preparing as we start the weekend. 

The negotiating teams from both Mount Sinai and NYSNA remain at the bargaining tables and are working hard to try to find a solution. I continue to hope that we will be able to reach agreements on both the East and West Sides, but the reality is that we are still very far apart on terms. As I have tried to do consistently over the last two years, I will communicate regularly with you even if I only have short updates, to ensure you know where things stand and how we are navigating these challenges. There are already a few things circulating that I’ll try to provide clarity on today. 

First, many of you have asked me about the news reports about settlements at other hospitals in the region and why we have not also settled. The truth is that these are tentative agreements being reported at smaller providers (Maimonides, Richmond University Medical Center, Wyckoff Heights Medical Center, One Brooklyn, etc.) that do not contain actual terms. They are essentially an agreement to accept the terms that are set by the larger three academic medical centers (Mount Sinai, NewYork-Presbyterian, and Montefiore). Whatever terms we reach, the rest will follow. 

This is an incredibly important point to understand. The terms we agree to will directly impact these safety-net hospitals, and our agreements will also set a framework that will influence the public hospitals (NYC Health + Hospitals) when their contract negotiations take place. It’s all connected, and if we agree to a deal we cannot afford, it won’t just be Mount Sinai that is affected; it will be virtually all the hospitals in New York. Our terms will impact not only our budget, but the state and city budgets as well, given that these hospitals all require public funds to stay open. The issues of affordability that are top of mind across the city and the looming federal cuts to health care programs are colliding.  

I know there are a lot of perspectives on this issue. I’m also aware that there is a lot of misinformation and negativity circulating in the press and on social media. As things get more complicated over the next few days and weeks, I’d like us all to try to remember that nurses, nonprofit health systems, and unions are not enemies. The separation being created between teams that work together every day is damaging to our organization and to our shared priority of taking care of patients. I will continue to work to align us in the interest of our organizational mission. 

At this point I think it is highly likely that we will not have an agreement before Monday morning. We will, of course, respect the decision of our employees who choose to strike. We will also make accommodations to allow those of you who choose not to strike to continue to work. Everyone needs to make the decision that is right for them and their families. Nurses who want to keep working and not strike should continue to speak to their nurse managers about the process. 

I just signed off from an operational check-in. We have made extensive plans to prepare for any staffing disruptions, including the expense of hiring replacement nurses to ensure continuity of safe patient care. We owe an enormous debt to our operational teams who have been working tirelessly to coordinate discharges, reschedule elective appointments, and coordinate staffing schedules so we can balance our volume and the needs of our patients with our resources. 

I wish I had better news and will keep everyone up to date as things progress.

With respect and gratitude,

Brendan

Brendan G. Carr, MD, MA, MS
Chief Executive Officer
Mount Sinai Health System