Employees at Medical Center Hospital will all see raises in their upcoming paychecks.
President and CEO Russell Tippin said the Ector County Hospital District Board of Directors last fall approved a 3 percent across-the-board raise that became effective April 1. Minimum wage also is going up.
“… Our employees will see that in our mid-April paychecks, so that’s already done. One big thing we also did is we are making the minimum wage at Medical Center $14 an hour,” Tippin said in a phone interview Friday.
“Everybody who’s under $14 an hour will get a move up to $14 an hour and that will become the minimum wage at Medical Center Health System,” he added.
Along with nurses, doctors, lab techs and respiratory therapists, Tippin said someone has to prepare the food, lean the rooms and keep the hospital clean.
“These people are feeling the same squeeze that everybody else is. They’re under financial pressure, too. From top to bottom, we wanted to address every position in the hospital …,” Tippin said.
The hope is that it will make a significant difference in these people’s lives and make MCH more attractive when it comes time to fill these spots.
“We think it kind of kills two birds with one stone; that it takes care of two issues,” Tippin said.
Chief Nursing Officer Christin Timmons said there are 72 full-time positions open for registered nurses and eight for respiratory therapists.
Timmons said the increases impact about 525 hospital-based, patient facing staff such as nurses and respiratory therapists. She said that will total approximately $3.25 million in incremental increases to the overall MCH salary budget.
In meeting with the chief financial officer, Tiimmons said they through “where we were on a percentile for nursing and respiratory salaries.
“Nursing includes registered and LVNs, which are the licensed vocational nurses
The total increases come to about $8 million, Trevor Tankersley, director of public relations for Medical Center Health System said in a text message.
Tippin and Timmons said they could never pay the hospital staff enough for what they have gone through during COVID.
“If I could pay these people for what they went through with COVID, it would be pay way more than $14 an hour,” Tippin said. “It is an opportunity for us and the board of directors to tell everybody in this hospital how much we appreciate them and how thankful we are for the work that they have done and the work they’re continuing to do, so it plays a part in it. But we just want to make sure our employees know — and our prospective employees know —that we take care of our staff and they take care of us. We want to make sure that we’re there for them and we try to put more money in their pockets, which is more gas in their tank and more milk in their refrigerator so we just want to be a good employer.”
Tippin said the hospital board provides an annual increase across the board, but it’s been quite some time since the hospital has been able to address its bedside nurses and respiratory therapists.
Currently, Tippin said MCH is filling a lot of those spots with “very, very high-dollar” contract nurses.
“When I say high dollar, you’re talking $180 to $200 an hour. That’s not just in Odessa, Texas, that’s nationwide what it takes to get a contract care provider. … We know that that’s unsustainable. We can’t continue that. Nobody can continue that. That’s why you’re seeing so many hospitals around the United States struggling right now. Our cost has gone up two or three fold, but our reimbursement from the government and big, giant corporations has not moved at all. I mean none. If anything, they’ve gone down so it’s just crazy that it costs hospitals two or three times more for a nurse or a respiratory therapist, but at the same time what Medicare pays us is the exact same. It hasn’t changed,” Tippin said.
He noted that gas is $4 a gallon and haircuts have gone up.
“Everything goes up, except reimbursement from insurance companies or from Medicare and Medicaid,” Tippin added.
Medical Center has about 2,750 employees including part-time and contract personnel. It is the second largest employer behind Ector County ISD, which has 4,200 employees.
If you include doctors, which number about 500 that are credentialed at MCH, Tippin said you could get to 3,000 pretty easily.
“What we’re going to be doing starting on our April 15 paycheck and all new hires as of today (is), if you’re a new graduate you’re going to be offered to come work at Medical Center for $30 an hour,” Timmons said. “Once you are off orientation and you become an independent practicing nurse, or you come to us with experience, you will have a minimum of $31.”
Licensed vocational nurses will start a minimum of $23.05 an hour.
“And of course everything grows depending on your years of licensure,” Timmons said. “It’s very important as a CNO to recognize not just how long you’ve worked in our building, but how long you’ve actually been a nurse.”
“The years behind you come with a wealth of knowledge, so we want to make sure that we’re truly recognizing not just how long they’ve been here in our building, but how long they’ve carried a nursing license,” Timmons added.
Certified respiratory therapists will make $24 an hour and registered respiratory therapists will go up to $26 an hour.
“And again, those are starting points,” Timmons said.
She echoed what Tippin said about never being able to compensate employees for what their hard work during COVID.
“… This is just really a token of recognize you, we recognize your hard work, we appreciate it and we look forward to having you as an employee and remaining with us as we continue on our journey,” Timmons said.
These are retroactive
Asked if they had many people quit because of the vaccine mandate, Timmons said there were only a few.
“… When we came down to the wire, our employees, nursing and non-nursing, really stepped forward and we had many who came through with vaccinations and we had some that qualified under waivers. I don’t think that we lost more than enough to count on one hand, We really had a large group of employees come together to make sure that we were in compliance with that,” Timmons said.
Overall, she hopes that this puts MCH on the map as far as the appreciation it has for the clinical staff that care for patients every day.
“We open our doors to anyone that wants to come and visit with us and we say a special thanks to the people that are already here working for us. They’ve given us a lot of time. They give up a lot of their family activities to be here to take care of patients and we just want to make sure that we appreciate them through all of these pay increases,” Timmons said.
Tippin said he wants to make MCH the hospital and employer of choice when they start recruiting the best employees.
“We owe this to our board of directors. They’ve really empowered us. They know that our employees are our biggest asset. They want to make sure they’re taken care of, so they made some strategic decisions …,” Tippin said.
