Representatives from the Massachusetts Nurses Association, nurses from Baystate Franklin Medical Center and their supporters gather outside the hospital in Greenfield awaiting nurses who left at 7 pm as the three day lockout during which temporary nursing staff was brought in began as a result of MNA’s protest strike on June 25, 2017.
Representatives from the Massachusetts Nurses Association, nurses from Baystate Franklin Medical Center and their supporters gather outside the hospital in Greenfield awaiting nurses who left at 7 pm as the three day lockout during which temporary nursing staff was brought in began as a result of MNA’s protest strike on June 25, 2017. Credit: Recorder file photo/Matt Burkhartt

GREENFIELD — While the strike and lockout may have been avoided, it still looms.

The Massachusetts Nurses Association and Baystate Health met Monday morning for a negotiation session that helped to temporarily avert a strike.

After 16 months of negotiations, a strike was on slate for Wednesday, Feb. 28. A lockout was pending to begin Tuesday night.

Instead, the nurses and the hospital met to try to move forward on key issues like staffing and health care insurance plans.

They will meet again Wednesday, union head Donna Stern said.

The union still has the right to call a strike with a 10-day notice.

“We’re going to give them one more chance on Wednesday and we’ll see how it goes but we have not given up our right to strike,” Stern said at a rally for unions in Greenfield on Monday.