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Emory Nursing Dean Marla Salmon To Deliver Fifth Annual Mary Lynn
Morgan Lecture About the Silent Crisis of the Nursing Shortage
Marla Salmon, RN, ScD, FAAN, dean of Emory University’s Nell Hodgson
Woodruff School of Nursing, will present "The Crisis in Caring: Nursing
and the Failing Demographic Equation" at the Mary Lynn Morgan Annual
Lectureship on Women in the Health Professions. The event will take
place on Wednesday, October 8 at 7:30 p.m. in the Michael C. Carlos
Museum Reception Hall on the Emory University campus. Parking is available
in the Fishburne Parking Deck.
"Our national shortage of nurses reflects failures in public policy,
health systems, health care leadership and emerging demographic and
social trends that spell disaster for the future of health care in this
country," Dean Salmon says. "Most of us assume that when we need nursing
care, someone will be there to provide it. We derive a certain amount
of comfort from knowing that when we’re at our most vulnerable - sick,
dependent, dying or anxious about our health - a trusted, caring nurse
will be there for us. The assumption that nurses will be there when
we need them is simply no longer true. For the first time ever, this
country is facing a shortage of nurses that threatens the health of
each of us. And unless urgent measures are taken, this shortage will
become increasingly more severe over the next 15 years."
Dean Salmon says, "In many ways, this is a silent crisis. The patient
and his or her family have very little control over their care experiences
and their voices are seldom heard beyond the health care system. Health
care institutions, as well, are reluctant to advertise a lack of nursing
care or the poor patient outcomes that are associated with it. Unless
this crisis becomes the concern of society at large, the needed remedies
will not occur."
Dean Salmon’s lecture will focus on the seriousness of the nursing shortage
crisis, its actual causes and what everyday people can do to make a
difference. Understanding what is happening now and what lies ahead,
she says, are critical to addressing the forces that have created this
shortage and to developing solutions that hold promise for the near
and long term future.
Dr. Marla Salmon is dean of the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing,
a professor of nursing and public health at Emory, and founding director
of the Lillian Carter Center for International Nursing. Her areas of
teaching, research and publication include health policy and administration,
public health nursing and health workforce development.
Recognized by the National Black Nurses’ Foundation for enhancing the
ethnic and racial diversity of the nation’s nursing workforce, Dr. Salmon
has served with the World Health Organization and the White House Task
Force on Health Care Reform and helped develop initiatives to boost
diversity in nursing and meet the needs of underserved populations.
For more information about the lecture, call the Emory Women’s Center
at (404) 727-2000. The Mary Lynn Morgan Annual Lectureship on Women
in the Health Professions honors one of Emory’s most beloved and respected
citizens. Mary Lynn Morgan graduated from Emory University School of
Dentistry in 1943. She was elected to the Emory Board of Trustees in
1974, and was the second woman to serve. Named as a trustee emerita
in 1991, Dr. Morgan continues to serve on the Board’s Academic Affairs
Committee.
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