HARLINGEN — Carrying signs saying “Spend your money on patient care, nurses and supplies” and “Put the Baptist back in Valley Baptist,” a small group of nurses, staff and community members assembled Monday to protest Valley Baptist Health System management.

“We’re trying to (create) awareness of what’s going on,” said Lynn Rox, a pediatric nurse at Valley Baptist Medical Center-Harlingen. “Nurses need to understand if they cannot advocate for themselves and safe practice, how can they pretend to advocate for patients?”

Several present and former Valley Baptist nurses — most of them members of the National Nurses Organizing Committee, a California-based nurses’ union — said they faced problems like staff shortages, “unfair” employee evaluations and “unsafe” nurse-to-patient ratios during their tenure at the facilities.

“If you have all these other responsibilities, and you’re supposed to be taking care of the unit, you can’t possibly be doing that many things in one shot,” said Linda Valdez, who was an intensive care unit nurse at Valley Baptist Medical Center-Brownsville and now works at Harlingen Medical Center.

The National Nurses Organizing Committee’s Texas members have pushed for state-mandated nurse-to-patient ratios, but a 2007 bill didn’t pass the state Legislature. The group hopes to bring back the legislation in 2009.

Valley Baptist did not immediately respond to questions about nurse-to-patient ratios or staff shortages.

Local nurses said they believed high nurse-to-patient ratios are a problem at many hospitals across the Rio Grande Valley and Texas, but they think it could be a more dangerous situation at Valley Baptist.

“We see more (acutely ill) patients than other hospitals,” Rox said. “We’re getting too many patients to care for, and more admissions that we can’t handle.”

In a statement Monday, Valley Baptist officials said they would continue to listen to staff members’ concerns, and that they appreciated “the dedication and professionalism shown by our employees who remained on duty today in the service and care of our patients.”

About 20 people came to Monday’s demonstration — far fewer than some of the participants expected, they said.

“I think a lot of people thought it was canceled because the emergency room doctors stayed,” Rox said.

Last month, a group of 16 emergency medicine doctors submitted their resignation to Valley Baptist-Harlingen. Last week, the health system announced that it had reached an accord with the doctors, and that they would stay with the facility.

Melissa McEver covers health and environment issues for Valley Freedom Newspapers. She is based in Harlingen and you can reach her at (956) 430-6252.