This vent is pretty common but I am wondering if anyone else has had this experience with the teachers or other staff at their school.
I am a new school nurse this year and I am also relatively young-- in my late 20's. I'm not married and I don't have any children. I noticed pretty quickly that a lot of the teachers who ARE parents tend to undermine my judgment when it comes to the calls I make and the care I provide. A few examples:
1) A third grade student came to my office c/o nausea. No fever, ate breakfast. I let her rest for a few minutes and she said she was feeling better. Off she went, through the main office to the cafeteria because it was faster that way. Well, one of the secretaries comes in and says "you can't just let sick kids parade through the office. I don't want to get sick." or something to that effect. I explained to her that the student wasn't sick, afebrile, etc and her response was "I'm a mom. I can tell when a kid is sick and that kid had no business walking around the office."
I had NO idea having a child automatically made you an RN! I could have saved a lot of money by skipping college and just getting pregnant!
2) A second grader with a previously sustained broken arm was c/o pain. I administered Tylenol as per our standing medicine orders and gave her an ice pack. I also called mom and she was satisfied with my treatment. About an hour later, her teacher came bursting into my office like the Kool-Aid man demanding to know "what else could be done" about the pain the student was complaining about because "whatever I did earlier wasn't helping." I explained to the teacher that I gave the student a PRN dose of Tylenol and an ice pack. I called mom and other than that, there really wasn't much else to be done. The teacher then asked if she could have a second dose of Tylenol and I said no. She said "Well, if it was my child I would just give her another dose. The first one didn't work."
I fear for her child's liver.
I don't get it! I understand that having a child is great experience with all the illness and booboos that come with childhood. What I don't understand is why these teachers are acting like their parenting skills somehow overpower my 4 years of college, bachelor's degree, national licensure and almost 4 years of experience. Maybe it's because I am a little younger than the previous nurse at my school (like 35 years younger...) or maybe they just assume I am inexperienced with ALL nursing because I am new to the school. Whatever. All I do know is if I busted into their classroom (OH YEAH) and started telling them how to teach multiplication or run the front office, I would be escorted off the premises faster than you can say "Acute hepatic failure r/t acetaminophen overdose"
I'm done now. The school day is over and I have my childless house to get to...
The other thing is when we get treated like we're supposed to be walking talking medical encyclopedias. Now in the day and age of the interwebs, i know that people can google whatever malady they want - yet at least once a week or so someone will walk in and say "What you you know about (fill in the name of the obscure condition)?" I'll say not too much, have you looked it up? when they say yes, i'll say to them "Well, I guess you know more than me about that one"
Yes! This! If a teacher starts asking me about cardiology I'll tell them that I'm not a cardiological nurse, just like a science teacher might not be an expert on our math textbooks. Someone once got snippy with me about not knowing some nutritional info off the top of my head and I said "I'm a nurse. What you're looking for is a nutritionist"
Yes, a lot of what I do is just plain common sense stuff. I busted out laughing when TXStyle said a nurse brought her band-aids to put on her arm. Come on!! The majority of my kids, even kindergarteners, want me to give them the Band-Aid so they can put it on themselves. Some of our teachers believe it takes years of nursing school to apply a knee brace that any layperson can buy off the shelf at your local CVS. It's both hysterical and sad all at once.
This is killing me!! Try having the copy machine for one whole end of the building in your office. I just helped a teacher figure out how to make 2 sided copies :). Well, it was a little extra difficult, because she was trying to make them using the book, not copies of the pages she needs to be 2 sided. I really do love being a team player!!
NanaPoo- Did you also take the how to be a copy-machine-queen class? I must have. I answered the question anyway. Happy teacher :).
Wow. My day just keeps getting more fun.
Another one from last night. I am walking into the gym to watch a Jr. High basketball game. A staff member stops me and asks the fingernails-scratching-on-the-chalkboard question- "You want to look at something?????". Of course, we all know what I wanted to say-- UmmmmmNOOOOooooooooo.. But, me being the good nurse. Looked at "it". She had a small itchy rash on her elbow area. I tell her I think it looks like she is allergic to something, who knows to what. She keeps pressing for me to pin down exactly what she is allergic to. REEALLY!!!??? She says again, "what do you think"????...I again say... I think you are allergic to something, (but who on God's green earth knows.)
I think I am going to start wearing my new T-shirt. On the front it says-- "Yes, I am a nurse". On the back it says-- "NO, I DO NOT WANT TO LOOK AT IT!" Dang.....too bad I didn't get in in our school colors!!
I tell her I think it looks like she is allergic to something, who knows to what. She keeps pressing for me to pin down exactly what she is allergic to. REEALLY!!!??? She says again, "what do you think"????...I again say... I think you are allergic to something, (but who on God's green earth knows.)
Annoying! I usually ask "Have you come into contact with anything unusual?" then I imply it was something disgusting and walk away.
These types of questions about crazy health concerns and diagnoses, beg me to ask the teacher a question about such in-depth subjects as Physics, Calculus, Greek Mythology or French Poetry....after all..."they are teachers".??!!
These types of questions about crazy health concerns and diagnoses, beg me to ask the teacher a question about such in-depth subjects as Physics, Calculus, Greek Mythology or French Poetry....after all..."they are teachers".??!!
I like this approach. Maybe you could look up some really obscure fact re Einstein's Theory of Relativity (reheorifice it really well so you sound so pseudo knowledgeable). Then when they ask you for your dx you could ask them to verify your Einsteinism (or a Krebs cycle-ism, a fav).
I've said it before, I don't do kiddos; I'm LTC (the other end of the life cycle). But I used to get hit up for the medical dx du jour by visiting families. Just never thought of this type of approach to zing back. Then of course, you could come up with some bizarre foreign disease.
I used to work elementary, now I am (thankfully!) in a high school. There is a huge difference between elementary and high school teachers. They are all fairly helpless, but elementary are waaaay more needy! Oh lordy, are they needy! Common sense is absolutely checked at the door...
I like what someone mentioned in a previous post. What would these people do in a workplace that didn't have a nurse onsite?? Would they be calling 911 every other week for themselves??
Give me my high school teachers any day! Elementary teachers act like elementary children. It amazes me how a teacher who has taught for 20 years and raised her own children will freak out over ringworm, lice, pink eye. It comes around every year and no one has died yet. I would LOVE to be just in the high school and not have to travel no multiple buildings.
Aw. One of the guy teachers just came in with high BP, after working out, just doesn't feel right. On a slew of BP meds, PERRLA, neuro intact, BP 140/90, Pulse 100, diaphoretic.
I sent him packing and he actually listened to me. Rut roh.
Aw. One of the guy teachers just came in with high BP, after working out, just doesn't feel right. On a slew of BP meds, PERRLA, neuro intact, BP 140/90, Pulse 100, diaphoretic.
I sent him packing and he actually listened to me. Rut roh.
Oh, my! Is he on his way to the ER? Had he already taken his AM meds?
ETA- This is kind of what happened to my dad. He was a teacher and it was the day of the Junior High graduation. He was supposed to give a speech so he was still around after school. He wasn't feeling good- thought he ate too much spicy food (he worked in a heavily hispanic district and they all brought in food on the last day- it was 1996) and also thought he had been swinging the golf club too hard. Anyway, he took aspirin and tums and decided he would have to skip graduation. As he went to tell his principal, he changed his mind and decided he should go to the hospital. Double by-pass surgery that night. Cardiac arrest a few minutes after arriving to ER, had to be defibrillated. If he had driven home, he would have been on the expressway when he went into cardiac arrest. He lived another 19 years- just passed away in June. We assume it was another heart attack. I miss him.
kidzcare
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Yes! This! If a teacher starts asking me about cardiology I'll tell them that I'm not a cardiological nurse, just like a science teacher might not be an expert on our math textbooks. Someone once got snippy with me about not knowing some nutritional info off the top of my head and I said "I'm a nurse. What you're looking for is a nutritionist"