Nurses Voice Concerns At Statehouse

COLUMBUS, Ohio—Hundreds of nurses were at the Statehouse Wednesday to make sure lawmakers hear their health-care concerns.

NBC 4’s Tom Brockman GOT ANSWERS on those concerns and WHY IT MATTERS TO YOU.

Some 400 registered nurses and nursing students packed the Statehouse atrium to speak with one voice to one audience – Ohio’s lawmakers.

“We need to educate the legislators. We need to educate them on issues that impact health and the health of Ohioans and impact nursing and nursing practice,“ Barb Nash said.

Nash is the president of the Ohio Nurses Association.

She said issues to be discussed include nurse shortages and access to prevention and chronic-disease management.

“We will be talking about health-care reform, and we will talk about changing our current sickness-care system into a true health-care system and the role that nurses can play in making that happen,“ Nash said.

Officials with the Ohio Nurses Association said one in 50 registered voters is a registered nurse, which they said should give legislators reason to listen to their concerns.“

Deborah Strouse is the president of the Ohio Association of School Nurses.

She said one of the issues they plan to discuss is HB 1, a bill she said will impact health care at schools.

“The plan, as indicated at this point, puts one RN per school district and replaces other RNs with LPNs in other places throughout the district. It actually devastates the current level of school-health services most of our students enjoy,“ Strouse said.

The nurses hoped a strong showing of numbers and loud voices will be enough to influence change.

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