LVN School nurse for diabetic kids, anyone? Pls. share your experiences...

Specialties School

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Hello Fellow nurses,

I just started a new job as a school nurse managing 2 diabetic students. One is a special kid whose blood sugar is always high and the one is a 13 year old in regular class who is non-compliant with her regimen. I am enjoying my new job but I am also afraid because I am the only nurse in the school and the setting is different from what I am used to where RN's are there for support.

The first challenge I faced was when my student went to school with a 442 mg/dl BS with moderate ketones. Everybody panicked including me because this is the first time I ever had anyone with a BS that high. I tried to follow the care plan but when I called the parents, no one was answering. One of the teachers went to the principals office and demanding to call 911 for the kid. I, on the other hand was trying to be calm and bombarding my student with water to flush the ketones out while I spoke to the district nurse. The RN decided to keep the kid in school despite saying in the care plan to send the kid back home. All in all, I was able to bring the BS down to 275 mg/dl after insulin regimen and lots of water. It was messed up and truthfully it lowered my morale. I have 3 years of experience in mental health only and this is by far the worse medical emergency I have ever dealt with.

I hate it when I don't know what to do in situations like this. I try to be calm so I could think but I panic and freeze. I hope there would be no next time but if there is, I hope that it will go well and nothing will happen to the kid that is under my care.

Anyone wanna share? Tips?

Specializes in Critical Care, Med-Surg, Psych, Geri, LTC, Tele,.

I'm a new nurse....

But am wondering did the child have symptoms r/t his hyperglycemia?

What did the care plan say to do if sugar was that high?

I imagine I'd panic too, but I also know that some diabetics routinely let their blood sugars run super high and are asymptomatic with high sugars.

I wonder if your student is non compliant regularly?? ( this would be more the fault of the parents than the kid)

I also know kids with DM are sometimes noncompliant because they want to fit on with their peers.

Tough situation!

Specializes in Critical Care, ED, Cath lab, CTPAC,Trauma.

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