Health Beat - Fall 2017 - 14

IN THE COMMUNITY

KU School of Nursing
OPENS IN SALINA

By John Berggren

I

n an effort to attract and train professional nurses in
rural Kansas, the University of Kansas School of Nursing
and Salina Regional Health Center partnered to open a
new campus in Salina this fall.
The campus offers students the chance to earn a
Bachelor of Science in Nursing if they've already completed
the first two years of their undergraduate education at
any regionally accredited college or university. The school
accepted 12 students in its first class with plans to reach a
capacity of 48 in five years.
For now, nursing students are sharing existing facilities
with the University of Kansas School of Medicine in Salina
and will join medical students at a new campus in downtown Salina when it opens next summer.
The curriculum for the program is identical to the program in Kansas City and taught through a distance education link and on-site faculty in Salina. Student nurses
will have their clinical experiences at Salina Regional
Health Center.
With nursing shortages throughout rural Kansas and
immediate job opportunities available within the region
for nurses who have already earned their baccalaureate degrees, opening a campus in Salina helps fulfill a
great need.
"We can provide a quality
clinical training experience in
a rural setting and instill the
values of living in a smaller community so that one day these
graduate nurses might choose to
enter practice in rural Kansas,"
says Mike Terry, CEO at Salina
Regional Health Center. "We've
already seen promising results
toward rural recruitment with
the University of Kansas School
of Medicine and the Smoky Hill
Family Medicine Residency

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BE A NURSE
To learn about enrolling at the
University of Kansas School of Nursing
campus in Salina, call the school's Office of
Student Affairs at 913-588-1619.

©KU MEDICAL CENTER

Student nurses practice patient
resuscitation at the University
of Kansas Medical Center in
Kansas City. A new campus for
the KU School of Nursing opened
in Salina this fall.

Program here in Salina. This new endeavor has the potential to help alleviate demands for baccalaureate nurses in
Salina, for our partner hospitals in the Sunflower Health
Network in north central Kansas and in rural communities
across the state."
KU Medical Center developed the medical school
and new nursing school in Salina with the intent of
encouraging young healthcare providers to practice in
rural communities.
"There is a great need in western Kansas for BSNprepared nurses," says Sally Maliski, Ph.D., R.N., dean of
the University of Kansas School of Nursing. "We are fortunate to be working with Salina Regional Health Center and
the Salina community to deliver a curriculum that will help
meet the healthcare needs of the area." 1
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Health Beat - Fall 2017
