Electronic health forms ?

[k1p1ssk, BSN, RN]

Happy Fall 2025, y'all!

2 years ago, our district decided to stop doing hard-copy beginning of year forms for students, with the exception of the health forms. At the time, our administration was concerned about having these through our online portal because of privacy concerns - the thought being that with them online, everyone with access to that system would be able to see. With the paper version, only the school nurses should have access to the medical paperwork and would disseminate the need to know information at their discretion.

Well, since that is now the only administrative paper that goes through the classrooms at the beginning of the year, it now has increased scrutiny and I am seeing more and more, that staff are peeking at it before it gets returned to my office. 

SO. I'm wondering if any of you have your beginning of the year health forms through an electronic system and if so, is it through the attendance/admin system or a completely separate program like the SNAP portal? I'd love to gather some evidence of what has worked elsewhere so I can bring it to our administration and get them to put it online with everything else. 

Thanks!!

 

[Cattz, ADN]

Thank you for asking this question. There is talk of my District going to all electronic registration in the near future.

I have expressed my need to have paper copies of my Health Enrollment form. I pull out my old fashioned 3 ring binder multiple times a day for information that I need readily at my fingertips. Hoping that I can learn from you all.

[k1p1ssk, BSN, RN]

I'll say that our other big challenge with having the health forms be our only paper form is that the families believe they filled it out online and even when we tell them they couldn't have, they don't believe us! So, if you don't get it back right away, it is unlikely you'll get it back at all. 

My hope is that if we go to an electronic method, it will be easy enough for us to keep that program open to reference the form when we need to... I tend to manually enter the information from the forms into SNAP every year anyway, so I don't often look at the paper forms once that process is done - but I am at a small school with less than 150 kids, so that's a lot easier to do!

[NutmeggeRN, BSN]

We moved to Parent Square a few years ago and I love it! I already have more than half back, and I can quickly send a reminder email to the outstanding ones. I print them in case there is a power issue.

[k1p1ssk, BSN, RN]

NutmeggeRN said:

We moved to Parent Square a few years ago and I love it! I already have more than half back, and I can quickly send a reminder email to the outstanding ones. I print them in case there is a power issue.

Good to know, we also have ParentSquare and I think that's how the eForms are completed. I'll have to see if I have access to our other forms that have been filled- that'll give me another idea of whether or not others will have access or not...

[NutmeggeRN, BSN]

k1p1ssk said:

Good to know, we also have ParentSquare and I think that's how the eForms are completed. I'll have to see if I have access to our other forms that have been filled- that'll give me another idea of whether or not others will have access or not...

And they do field trip forms thru them as well.

[scuba nurse, BSN, MSN, RN]

We have Parent Square as well and the district sent us a big email saying we couldn't do anything medical over it because it's not HIPAA compliant (even though we follow FERPA). So no forms can go thru it, and we are not even supposed to email a parent thru it about giving their kid a band aid or anything. It's so dumb IMO. But parents can send us info thru it because its their child. 

[iggywench, BSN, RN]

All of our annual enrollment has been electronic for several years.  I am supposed to print all of the medical forms (which I can access online), and have them available in binders.  Since I have over 3300 students this year, I only print the forms for students who have listed health conditions.  I'm able to sort that information in Infosnap, our online enrollment software.  The problem is that a lot of my parents don't feel the need to do the annual enrollment every year, since their child is in high school, so I feel like a lot of my information isn't current.  

[NutmeggeRN, BSN]

iggywench said:

All of our annual enrollment has been electronic for several years.  I am supposed to print all of the medical forms (which I can access online), and have them available in binders.  Since I have over 3300 students this year, I only print the forms for students who have listed health conditions.  I'm able to sort that information in Infosnap, our online enrollment software.  The problem is that a lot of my parents don't feel the need to do the annual enrollment every year, since their child is in high school, so I feel like a lot of my information isn't current.  

So frustrating...I am down to 70 forms needed...our update is also the permission form for OTC's (which are allowed in my state). I won't chase the 18 year olds but for those under 18, I also make a parent email me an OK for a one time dose, if their kid wants an OTC, if I don't have the form. State law changed a  few years ago that requires explicit written consent for anything. I cannot accept verbal permission.