Flu - Missing Class

[Phlebotomist21]

I am currently in nursing school and have never had the flu or flu vaccine. My school only allows students to miss 1 clinical day. If you get sick and miss 2 or more days you are removed from the program and must reapply as a new student in one year. My state declared a state of emergency today due to the flu outbreak, nearly everyone in my family has it and I'm terrified I'm going to get kicked out of school. Can a school really remove a student from a program because they got sick and missed 2 days of class?

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

In general, missing clinical is not acceptable. In all my years of nursing school, I only missed one clinical day- because my grandfather had died and I was home for his funeral. Stay away from your sick relatives and wash, wash, wash your hands.

[jodispamodi]

So I'm not sure I understand: Do you actually have the flu? If you do a doctors letter may help your cause but basically the schools rules are the schools rules. In other words: no other entity or agency can change the schools policy, so if it says you can only miss two days thats it. Bad as sounds many people in my program went to clinicals sick and let the clinical instructor send them home because technically it wasn't a missed clinical. Whether or not to get a flu shot is a personal decision but you might be faced with wearing a mask, etc.

[NurseSpeedy, ADN, LPN, RN]

Get the vaccine ASAP. This will help decrease your risk of getting the flu, although it's not foolproof. In the past eight seasons, I've tested positive five times and this year is not over yet.

While in clinical, you will be exposed to a lot of crap. Do not think that the exacerbation of COPD patient does not have the flu (or some other contagious URI creepy crud). The rapid flu tests can have false negative results. I had three or so patients last year with that diagnosis that I found a script for tamiflu in their chart for discharge. Now, they've been hospitalized for five or so days, have a roommate that came in for a fall but now has a fever and persistent cough with body aches, and has not been on isolation (obviously) or tamiflu (a red flag that MAYBE they need to be isolated) the entire time they have been there. Now everyone has been exposed and that lovely tamiflu script is completely useless this far into the timeline.

I had my shot like every year. Four days later I develop a bad cough. I think it's my asthma flaring up since there's no other symptoms-yet. It gets worse over the course of my 12 hour shift. I begin wheezing bad and in the back of my mind I'm thinking about that patient with the useless tamiflu script. I'm having my doc call in steroids so that I can make it through the night at home and the next day I tested positive. I had a fever for six days. Luckily I was off that weekend so I only had to miss two days of work due to when my upcoming shifts were scheduled. Flu vaccine or not, occupational exposure and most likely source of infection-don't matter. We get no more than six sick days per 12 months...hopefully it's that long before the next season outbreak...absentee policies may stink but they exist-and long after you graduate.