Nurses Call For Faculty Raises

Mississippi is short some 2100 nurses in our hospitals. One reason for that is a shortage of faculty to teach nursing students. Nurses are once again calling on state lawmakers to ease the crisis.

Faculty at the state's six nursing schools got $6,000 pay raises last year. The Mississippi Nurses Association says the raise is working keep some nursing teachers from retiring. "It's also convinced some to go into the teaching profession," says MNA Executive Dir. Ricki Garrett.

MNA is rallying 1400 nurses and nursing students to protect their profession. They're asking lawmakers to fund another $6,000 faculty pay raise this year to combat the shortage.

"There are 70 million baby boomers in this country, so even if we have the same number of nurses now, it will put an increased demand on our healthcare system," says Garrett.

"Public hospitals, private hospitals, clinics... we have a severe nursing shortage in every aspect of healthcare in the state," says Sen. Terry Burton. "The legislature is very much aware of that."

Sen. Burton says lawmakers will seriously consider the raise. But it still wont put salaries in line with those in neighboring states or anywhere near what nurses could make working in the private sector.

Nurses are also turning to state lawmakers to raise the tax on tobacco and put a nurse in every public school in the state. "We're open to suggestions on school nurses," says Burton. "There ought to be a school nurse in every school district, no question about that. Hopefully we can afford to do that."

A school nurse program could be funded with Mississippi's tobacco settlement money. There's also the question of who would oversee it. Some lawmakers say it should be the Dept. of Education. Others say it should be the Department of Health.