naveiak

I called and spoke w/ her Dr and he stated it is fine as long as there is subcutaneous tissue there. I feel better. :) Although, throughout my day i've continued seeking out info and have read to not give in the inner thigh due to high amt of blood vessels and nerves (Tips for Injecting Insulin | Joslin Diabetes Center). YiKeS!

Have any of you heard of giving insulin in the upper area of the inner thigh?? I have a student who recently switched sites from the abdomen to this area. I have never heard of it but I did find a study published in 2016 where it seemed feasible. Thoughts please? Can the upper inner side of the thigh become a new option for insulin injection? - PubMed - NCBI

Thank you so much!! How very kind of you. Yes, shelter is the most important thing for people right now. It's been 3 weeks... 88 human remains found, 196 still missing over 15,000 homes gone. Still over 50,000 people displaced. :-( We do have a state school nurses association. I've reached out to them. I've also reached out to Santa Rosa schools and made contact with one of their district nurses today. They had a bad fire last year so I figured it would be helpful to contact those nurses to get guidance. THANK YOU EVERYONE! Students come back to school December 3rd.

How nice of you. I really have no idea though. Today I am going to be a 'train the trainers' training put on by our County's Crisis Response team. It is going to help us help support students and staff when we return. I am really glad my district is doing this. I also found a self-paced online training called Psychological First Aid. I plan on doing that this week. Next week students come back to school. I have no idea what it is going to look like. Now nearly 14,000 homes are destroyed and over 50,000 are still displaced. :-( I can't imagine how kids are supposed to go back to school when they still don't have basic needs met (shelter!!!).

Thank you to each of you for taking time to help me and encourage me. I've reached out to the California School Nurse Organization for advice as many of you encouraged me to do and i'm also brushing up on my therapeutic communication. My district is also bringing staff back to work next week (1 week before the students) and providing trainings on the impact of trauma on students and staff and how to appropriately respond w/ emotional support. This makes me very happy. So many of our own staff members lost homes (and pets) in this fire. It's just awful.

There are literally thousands of stories like this. My nephew who is 7 and has autism was stuck in a parking lot with his bus driver, special needs teacher and dozens of others while the fire burned all around them. He was stuck up there all day... my brother and his wife didn't get him back until 6pm... the fire happened in the morning.

Thank you for your advice!! It is devastating for sure! I actually have my brother, his wife and their two special needs children staying in our home because they lost everything in the fire. It's been very difficult. We are doing ok... THANK YOU for asking! So many people are homeless and camping in parking lots in the surrounding towns. I have no words. When I was in nursing school I precepted with an amazing school nurse who is the reason I decided to become a school nurse. I call her for advice every day. She lost her home in the fire as well. I'm not sure if she'll be going back to work. I'll be lost without her!!

Hi there. I don't have a nursing supervisor... it's literally just me and 1400+ (soon to be more) students. Love your advice about reaching out to local peds offices! Thank you so much!

Hi all, I live in Butte County, California which as you probably have heard in the news we have been absolutely devastated by the Camp Fire. It literally has wiped our town of Paradise off the map. Over 70 dead, still over 1000 missing... 10,000+ homes destroyed, 400+ businesses... when I say the town is wiped out I mean it is literally gone. Of course this also means the school district has lost its schools. The fire still threatens structures and we are literally being suffocated by the smoke (we've had hazardous smoke conditions for so many days now). School has been cancelled in our entire county until December 3rd. I am thinking about when I return to school. I am a brand new school nurse (and nurse) and I know we will be having some new enrolling students to my schools from the town of Paradise. I want to be as helpful as possible and mindful of what they are going through. I need advice as I try to anticipate what this may be like. For those with meds to be given at school -I'll still need a med order but how are they supposed to get that since their doctors are displaced and the medical facilities burned down?? What other issues may arise from this that I can't anticipate right now? I want to be as prepared as possible. Thank you for any help you can give!!

Thank you everyone!!! I appreciate your feedback. :)

That sounds amazing!! I'll check it out!

I can't find any district policies specific to this but from what I could google I gathered that it was part of the educational record and therefore not a problem for me to give. This morning I had a principal state not to give it to the parent but I already had. I said there was no reason not to but wanted to be sure by asking the experts on here.

In Calif., do parents have the right to have copies of school medical records. Specifically, i'm referring to logs kept in health office for a diabetic student. I can't see any reason why the parent couldn't have copies but am unable to find code that addresses this specifically.

I'd love to see a copy of the passes you created... would you mind sharing? Thank you!

Holy smokes! I'm so glad I read this... What are your suggestions for parents who want us to give Benadryl and sign med forms stating to do so???

Holy smokes! I'm so glad I read this... What are your suggestions for parents who want us to give Benadryl and sign med forms stating to do so???

Thank you so much for your advice! I really love the kids and would never turn them away as I feel it's important for me to build a relationship with them so they feel safe in the health office and with me. Good idea to talk to the teachers and then if that doesn't do the trick meet w/ my administrators to discuss the importance of being in class. I did meet w/ all of the 6th graders at one school to discuss use of health office since they were now in middle school and need to take charge of their health as young adults, etc. I plan on meeting with my boss to discuss what I am seeing/feeling/experiencing. They hired me just a couple months ago and I don't want to seem like I am complaining.

I recently attended a vision testing training and was told the eye screeners (plus optix for example) do not measure acuity and cannot replace the wall charts. Question... do you have to screen 4 year olds?? In Calif. we do Kinder/2nd/5th/8th. I was recently asked to screen pre-schoolers in our district but I am so swamped already and most likely won't be able to find the time for them and figure since i'll do them next year in kindergarten what's the harm?

Wow!! I'm brand new to school nursing and just waiting for the day I may have to be brave and cool-headed like you! Reading about your experience will certainly help me when the time comes! Thanks for sharing!

THANK YOU ALL for your comments, thoughts, suggestions, etc! Such valuable insight for me! I haven't even had a chance to come back to this thread as I am so swamped at work I can hardly tread water. I am new and don't know what i'm doing and i'm trying to do things correctly and it is so hard. Today I saw kids all day long because the HA was out. I don't mind seeing kids but I feel that is all I seem to be doing these days and i'm wondering when i'll have time to do all the other stuff I am supposed to be doing (like get help for this kid, vision/hearing screenings, health and developmentals for IEPS....). I don't think they hired an RN to be a HA???

Thank you for your reply! Frustrating for sure! I did also ask our school psychologist if she had recommendations but she's swamped so I doubt it. With regards to the neglect issue... i'm learning that my standards aren't necessarily the standards that should be applied in each case. Sad as it is kids can be in some pretty terrible situations before CPS cares to do anything. I do have a couple concerns in this case but not sure if they rise to the level of neglect. Am I allowed to share on here details of the concerns? I don't want to break confidentiality rules...

What can I do as the school nurse if I think a child maybe is autistic or has some sort of sensory disorder but the mom states the student doesn't have any issues but she has self-dx said w/ Sensory Processing Disorder... is that the end of the story? He has no IEP or 504 in place and she isn't asking for anything. Do I just let it go?

Thank you! I haven't ever heard of it so I did a little reading before calling mom. She was very grateful that I did that. She stated it would be helpful if we encouraged bathroom visits but doesn't want the student dinged for not being in class. Also, the student has lots of medical appts coming up that she will miss school for. Does a 504 sound reasonable in this case?

NEW school nurse here. Spoke with a mom and found out her child has Currarino Triad w/ many ongoing medical issues. Seems to me the student could benefit from a 504 plan but i've never written one. Guidance please... :)

Thank you so much for taking the time to post your informative response!! The resources you provided are very helpful and will remain bookmarked on my laptop! I would love to take a look at your presentations and do agree that an in-person training is best when training on med admin. I will be working to schedule times to meet with the health aides to do this (in all my 'spare' time... lol). I'm so confused on the delegation issue. I see conflicting information between nurse practice act and state ed codes that say I can delegate to non-licensed staff as long as they have training.