PMID: 9564378

Issn Print: 0002-0443

Publication Date: 1998/04/01


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Reformulating Nursing in Greater Kansas City

Nancy M. Mills; Barbara E. Langner

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Excerpt

The Kansas City Colleagues in Caring (KC-CIC) project has the unique distinction of being a bistate project. It encompasses four counties in Kansas (Douglas, Johnson, Leavenworth, and Wyandotte) and eight counties in Missouri (Buchanan, Cass, Clay, Jackson, Johnson, Lafayette, Platte, and Ray). Ten of the project counties are metropolitan and two are rural. Although agriculture continues to be an important industry in the Kansas City metropolitan area, telecommunications and transportation industries recently have become significant employers.
The counties that compose the greater Kansas City metropolis(Fig. 1) occupy 5,000 square miles, contain more that 100 municipalities, and have 1,788,716 residents. The ethnic background of these residents is predominantly European American (85%), but other ethnic groups also are represented-African-American (12%), Native American (1%), Asian Pacific Islander (1%), and other (1%).
The healthcare workplace in Kansas City is diverse, with 34 acute care institutions, more than 300 long-term care facilities, 34 community health centers, and 90 home health agencies. Currently, there is a very turbulent environment, with the rapid rise of managed care, the prevalence of mergers and acquisitions, and the emergence of new risk-sharing relationships among providers.
In the project area, there are 23 educational institutions offering a variety of formal nursing education programs ranging from licensed practical nurse (LPN) to doctoral-level preparation. Seventeen of these educational institutions are located in Missouri, and six are in Kansas. A typical annual enrollment in these various programs is 300 LPN students (4 programs), 1,100 associate degree students (4 programs), 1,400 baccalaureate (BSN) students(10 programs), 400 registered nurse (RN)-BSN students (9 programs), 450 masters of science in nursing (MSN) students (4 programs), and 51 doctorate students (2 programs).
Education and employment occurs across state boundaries throughout the Kansas City metropolitan area. A significant number of nursing professionals from Missouri work in Kansas, and those from Kansas work in Missouri. In addition, these professionals seek both formal and continuing education opportunities across the state line.
The KC-CIC project is broad in scope and complicated by challenges of the multijurisdictional region.
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