With the valley's emergency rooms overflowing most days, the four hospitals on Southern Nevada's drawing boards are a remedy that can't be administered too soon.
But where will they get the nurses?
"That's the $10,000 question," said Helen Moore, president of the Southern Nevada Black Nurses Association, an 8-year-old local chapter of the National Black Nurses Association.
A dozen black nurses founded the national group in 1971 after receiving the cold shoulder at an American Nurses Association convention, Moore said.
The two groups now work together on such issues as the ongoing shortage of nurses. That topic takes center stage Oct. 25 during the Southern Nevada chapter's conference, "Nurses Under Pressure: Strategies for Change, Solutions for Coping."
"Just visit a friend in the hospital and see how long they wait for someone to respond to a (call-button) light or see what is skipped because there's not enough time or enough bodies to go around," Moore said.
Did that. A friend admitted to the emergency room of a valley hospital at 11 a.m. Tuesday waited until nearly 10 p.m. for a real bed and until 7:30 p.m. Wednesday for an actual room.
He was not alone. Beds and gurneys filled every emergency room bay and were pushed against every available inch of wall space. The few nurses on duty ran a marathon in 15-foot increments.
"I work in all of the hospitals, and it's like this at every one of them," one of them said. "It's been like this all summer. We haven't had a break."
Such horror stories scare away potential nurses, Moore said.
"Nursing has not been portrayed as a very attractive profession. We've emphasized the negative," she said. "The work is physically and mentally demanding."
The association's members visit schools for career days and literacy programs to encourage children to consider becoming nurses when they grow up. But it's a hard sell.
"We haven't raised a generation of dummies. They know they can work a 9-to-5 job in computers, or what have you, and they can go home at night," Moore said.
With 43 years under her cap, the 64-year-old Moore could avoid the toughest nursing jobs. Many veterans do. But she works for an agency and still takes the grueling 12-hour shifts in emergency rooms and intensive care units, in addition to taking home health-care cases.
"I love it," Moore said.
And she figures there is a lot of job security. A nurse is someone who can't be replaced by a computer. Computers can measure medicine and monitor many physiological reactions.
But a computer can't help much when it comes to putting the needle in someone's arm, helping someone get to the bathroom or tucking an extra blanket around a patient's shoulders.
"It takes a hand," Moore said.
The nurse's conference is open to the public and will be conducted at the Suncoast in Summerlin. Registration opens at 7 a.m., and workshops begin at 8 a.m. Fees are $25 for the general public and seniors 62 and older. Licensed nurses pay $50. Conference tickets are available in advance or at the door.
The event ends with a banquet at 7 p.m. Tickets are $75 per person and must be purchased by Oct. 22. To purchase advance tickets call Moore at 683-0120.
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