Nurses at one of Austin's largest network of hospitals may soon have to cover up their tattoos. Administrators for the Seton family of hospitals will decide on a new dress code this month.

Tattoo coverup?

KVUE's Mari Alvarez reports

> More Local Video

• View larger
• E-mail clip
• More video

Search Video:

> > >

If approved, nurses will have to cover tattoos and take out any piercings that go beyond the earlobe or nose stud.

Paco Sendon has seen his share of tattoos.

As owner of Electric 13 tattoo shop in Central Austin, he says people from all walks of life have come in to get inked.

"We have people coming into the shop with suits -- business guys. When they remove their suits, you can see all these tattoos. This has been hidden from the past. A lot of people have a lot, a lot of tattoos," Sendon said.

Sendon's kind of artwork may soon have to stay under-wraps for nurses working at Seton hospitals.

"The core of this is about a patient care environment that minimizes anxieties for our patients and families," said Yvonne Vandyke, Seton.

Seton administrators are expected to decide on the new dress code by the end of the month. The code could be implemented as early as January.

"We don't want to have anything in the environment that minimizes the confidence and the trust that the patients have in the nurses because we have very competent nurses," said Vandyke.

University of Texas nursing student Caylie Dunnam says a dress code requiring her to cover up her own body art could be enough to reconsider a job.

"With the nursing shortage, I don't see how they can do that. There's really good nurses out there who have tattoos and just because they have tattoos doesn't mean they're bad people or bad nurses," she said.

"It's just ink, you know, it's art," Sendon said. "We're not criminals; they're not bad people, they just love art and they love tattoos."

St. David's -- the other major hospital network in Austin -- already has a similar dress code in place. While St. David's does not address piercings, the code requires nurses to cover tattoos.

A second phase of the proposed Seton dress code would require nurses to wear color-coded scrubs according to the department they work in. That won't be decided on until next year.