Health care in Missouri is in a state of crisis, according to one expert who leads a project to study the state's public health care system.
Toni Sullivan, dean of the School of Nursing at the University of Missouri-Columbia, will be in Cape Girardeau Wednesday to discuss problems in state health care and what a group of nursing professionals are doing to improve it.
"The state of health care in Missouri leaves much to be desired," Sullivan said. "We are getting to the point where there is an increased awareness of the crisis."
Sullivan predicts major changes in the state and national health care system before the end of the decade.
She said Missourians are demanding a better health care sy~stem for themselves and their families.
Sullivan said studies reveal:
Over one million people in Missouri lack adequate health insurance coverage, and 20 percent of those have no health insurance.
Missouri ranks 47th among all states in medical coverage.
There are 38 Missouri counties with no hospital. Many rural hospitals still in existence are in danger of closing.
Only one in four Missouri counties has an adequate number of physicians.
Missouri's infant mortality rate ranks 31st in the U.S.
At least 18 percent of Missouri women receive no prenatal care.
Sullivan added that the statistics for counties and communities in the Bootheel are "appalling.
"The problems are very severe," she said.
Sullivan said a study that she and other nursing professionals are working on will point out the need for better health care to the state's legislators.
"There are several national health care reform proposals on the table," she said. "Who knows which of them or what combination is going to be enacted. But I think there is going to be some kind of federally mandated floor of services. And there will be increased federal and state support to guarantee those services."
Sullivan is part of a group of 25 nursing professionals and 25 others serving on a panel to conduct the study, called Missouri Nursing 2000.
Karen Hendrickson, assistant administrator for patient care at Southeast Missouri Hospital in Cape Girardeau. is serving on the study panel.
Hendrickson said the study is an attempt to "look at where nursing is in Missouri ... and predict the future."
The study began in June 1990 and will be concluded next spring, she said.
Some of the obstacles facing the state's nurses are scarce educational resources, a general shortage of nurses in the state and a need for more nurse practitioners, Sullivan said.
Another important concern is breaking down economic and political barriers "that keep nurses from fully practicing," Sullivan said. These barriers include the state's not allowing nurse practitioners to write prescriptions.
Nurse practitioners have authority to write prescriptions in 37 states, but not in Missouri, she said.
Sullivan, who is also a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing, will present information about the study at Wednesday's lecture, which is open to the public. It will be held at Southeast Missouri Hospital in the Harrison Room at 3:30 p.m.
Other area nurses on the panel are Susan Sulser and Jeanette Fadler of Cape Girardeau, Mary Mitchell of Sikeston, and Shirley Stoll of Poplar Bluff.
The study is a collaborative project of the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Nursing, the University of Missouri-Columbia Hospital and Clinics, the Missouri Nurses Association and the Missouri Organization of Nurse Executives. It is being funded by the MU School of Nursing Potter Endowment, the Mizzou Nursing Alumni Association, the MU Hospitals and Clinics, the Missouri Nurses Association, the Missouri Organization of Nurse Executives, the Columbia Regional Hospital of Columbia, Southeast Missouri Hospital and St. Louis Children's Hospital.
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