Sheila,

I am not surprised that your lab manager would be concerned about the equity
of the pay scales for histology tech vs med tech.  I'm fairly sure they'd
howl if they knew histologists got a pay raise and they didn't.  I've worked
in hospital environments for many, many years, and managers tend to look at
things globally.

We know that the market tends to drive up salaries, and this was never
clearer than when the hospitals faced acute nursing and cytotechnologist
shortages quite a number of years ago.  Where they balk at giving the
histologists raises of their own stems from 'our' general lack of formal
education.  It just makes it more difficult to justify.  The phlebotomists
have had this same problem with their salaries, and yet they are the
representatives of the laboratory to the hospital population.  They perform
an important function and yet are usually the lowest paid laboratory staff.

The answer here seems to be a simple one.  The market will provide the
necessary impetus to drive up salaries.  The longer one is unable to fill
open positions, added to the minimum salary demands for those who are
looking, will make it quite clear to the managment what will have to happen.
Unfortunately, this option leads to burn-out of the existing staff.  I hope
it doesn't take something like this, but my experience tells me otherwise.

Food for thought:  When the cytotechnologists' salaries were raised, were
the same concerns addressed?

Teri Johnson
Manager Histology Core Facility
Stowers Institute for Medical Research
1000 E. 50th St.
Kansas City, Missouri  64110
tjj@stowers-institute.org