DEALING WITH CHRONIC ILLNESSES AT SCHOOL

If your child has a chronic illness, you need to ensure that he receives proper medical care and supervision at school and also participates fully in the educational program. Make certain the school nurse and your child's teacher have enough information to understand how his health problem affects your youngster and how it may influence his school performance.

Talk with school personnel about what steps they should take if your child develops symptoms at school. These guidelines should be written in the form of an individual health plan that the school should follow, based on directions from you and your pediatrician. When the school staff is familiar with this plan and the health problem, they will be better able to make sure your child's activities are not restricted unnecessarily. If your child does experience difficulty, the school staff will be able to provide immediate and appropriate attention. Be certain they have emergency numbers to reach both you and your child's doctor during the day.

When your youngster needs to take medication at school, it should be kept in a locked cabinet. In some schools, inhalers for older children with asthma may be carried and self-administered under well-defined guidelines. Medication should be administered in a private place to avoid any embarrassment your youngster may feel. If this is not happening - for instance, if your child is required to take his medication in a busy school office and feels uncomfortable doing so - you or your child should consult with the school nurse or principal to identify an alternative.

If major changes occur in the status of your child's condition, including modification of his medication schedule, let the school know, particularly if it is relevant to his school functioning and routines. During this time of change, since your child spends so many hours a day at school, the teacher and/or school nurse can often provide you with helpful feedback on how your child seems to be doing.

When you switch schools or if a new illness develops, the nurse may find it helpful to talk directly to your child's doctor. For this conversation to occur, you may have to sign a "release of information" form, which the school nurse will send to the doctor prior to their discussion of your child.

Sometimes, with both the child's and parent's permission, a disease like diabetes can be explained to the youngster's class so that his classmates will become more knowledgeable and supportive of their fellow student in an open and comfortable way. A similar kind of class education about seizure disorders can make the situation less embarrassing for a student with frequent seizures and minimize the disruption if he should have a seizure in class. Elementary-school children are frequently quite accepting and supportive in these circumstances.

Even though your child has a chronic illness, he should still participate in all educational trips and other activities. If special arrangements need to be made to accommodate your child (such as special food, transportation of essential medical equipment, bee-sting kits), you might want to offer to help organize these things for the first trip of every year to ease the transition for the new teacher.

At each parent-teacher conference, make sure that your youngster's educational program is not being adversely affected by his condition.