school rules gone mad

Do you know anything about insulin and diabetes, Anya?

Diabetics usually carry around insulin pens which contain enough for about a month's supply, depending on dosage. Therefore it will be unusual for it to run out on school premises. Pens do actually tell you how much there is left in them.
All that's needed is for the child to know exactly where it is kept.
Diabetics keep records themselves of how much and when, as well as blood sugar levels, so that will not be a problem. He just needs to be taught how to do it and what it means.

Whenever any of my grandchildren have needed privacy, they are taken into the teacher's toilet area, with a chair to sit on, etc. Not diabetic, but the principle is the same.
Injections these days can be given through clothing, into the stomach area or top of the leg or buttocks. Don't have to be, but they can.

There is no need these days for schools to be obstructive, whoever is doing the obstruction.
The idea these days is to try and make the diabetic child feel as if he is as normal as possible, not to make him feel unwanted.

My child carried his own insulin around with him and regularly went swimming , played games and went on all the school trips from the age of 10 when he developed Type 1. And when I went to tell the Head my DS had been diagnosed with diabetes, the first thing he said was, 'My staff can't be responsible for looking after him'. He even refused to allow the paediatric diabetes nurse to go into school to talk to the staff. There are lot more children with chronic illnesses in mainstream schools now and I'm glad parents and their children should now get the support they need. And schools get funding for statemented children!

YHAC!!

With the greatest of respect I think you will find that this effective management is the result of careful behind the scenes planning and policy.

I think your rather casual approach Nellie could result in disaster.

I didn't know that steps were already in place regarding my points 1-4 .... have I missed something?

My local village school manages children with severe nut allergies, bee and wasp sting allergies, asthmatic children and no fuss is made at all.

I agree Nelliemoser

Anya I think most schools should be able to manage this with some good proper guidelines and specific first aid training.

H& S seems to be being used as an excuse here. Yes every so often a child will be injured in school because they are kids and do silly things. Staff appear to be able to cope then.
All it needs is that all staff should have some basic first aid training and awareness. All staff could be quickly taught the basics of what to do and what not to do in a health, or accident emergency until a dedicated first aider arrives.
They are expected to be competant at fire drills etc.

I'm still that the little chap's family might have to remove him and his siblings if the school doesn't agree.

It's appalling when steps are already in place to manage his insulin.

Come on, Anya. That has to be done for every child who has an illness or disability. What we are saying is that nowadays it should not be a problem.
There must be quite a few other children in the school who have to have action plans.
Every trip out of school has to have a health and safety assessment, even what would happen if x was run over while crossing the road.
No school would be so remiss that they would allow a diabetic child to go swimming without telling the instructor. In my experience, the teacher stays with the class having swimming lessons anyway.

I'm trying so point out it isn't as straightforward as just having a couple of staff trained and willing.

1) The child cannot carry his own insulin around with him. It will have to be kept stored securely so no other child can get it. There will gave to be a designated cupboard or similar,,and who will hold the key? What happens if that person is ill, off work, etc?
2) There will have to be sufficient in school to cover his needs, so will it be brought in daily or weekly or half-termly? This will have to be agreed with the family, as to how it will be brought to school, by a responsible adult. What is the procedure if the supply is depleted?
3) A record will have to be kept, in a designated book, of amount given, time, and by whom. This is after potentially damgerous medication. Should there be an incident, where blood sugar drops too low, then staff need to show a paper trail they have given the correct dose at the correct time.
4) Where will the insulin be administered? To protect the child's dignity it needs to be a private area where other children or staff are not likely to barge in.
5) What happens at lunch time or break if the child shows sign of hypoglycaemia? Are the welfare staff sufficiently clued up to recognise the signs? Are other children? And if they are do they know what action to take?
6) What about PE lessons? Swimming? Music? These days many schools buy in specialists to take these lessons. Are they aware of the child's condition.
The same applies to out-of-school hours activities.

And so on...All this will have to be written into an individual plan for that child. This is not the same as asking the class teacher to give little Johny his 5ml of antibiotic at lunch time. Incidentally you need to take in a note if you want the teacher to do that nowadays too.

All I'm saying is, cut the school some slack. There are strategies that need to be put in place for the safety of all concerned. Can you imagine the public outcry if, for example, the child had a hypo at the swimming baths and the reaction from the swimming instructor was 'nobody told me'?

This isn't H&S run mad, this is called joined-up thinking.

Sorry for the lecture!

Is this a happy and well-run school in general, or is one department often at odds with another?

The school administration team have a lot on their plates. All the non-teaching things that keep the school running fall to them, and they all happen at once and are urgent (at least to the people most concerned at that moment) But is it going to impinge on them?

Is it the administrators who will have to do the injections? It sounds as though the staff who have had the training are Ok with it, so it is not the administrators themselves who are digging their heels in about adding to their responsibilities.

Is it the teachers? If so, what has it to do with administrators? If members of staff are happy to do it, and the head teacher has passed it, surely it can be done at a set time and not inconvenience the administrators.

Is it the head teacher? If so, why are they described as "administrators"? A head teacher is a head teacher, not an admin bod.

Then it's even less of a problem. The school is probably playing very safe but causing stress in the process.

It's the litigation culture we now live in that causes this sort of problem.

Do not need a fridge, vampire. It's only for storage long term, as in unopened phials, not for the one in use.
My husband's pen was only ever in a drawer.

If they have the staff willing to do it and they've been trained then I don't see the problem. In fact they'll need to have someone who can inject the child in an emergency anyway. If the child is going into shock or coma they can hardly wait for the mum or a paramedic to get there.

During my time working in schools we dealt with several children with diabetes. Some of the younger ones needed to be injected by a staff member whilst others were able to inject themselves. Storage wasn't a problem. I don't see why the staff room fridge couldn't be used. The teachers are all adults and know they shouldn't touch or take someone else's medication. If they really don't want it in the staff room then the parent could provide one of those small fridges that cost £20 or so which could be kept in the school office.

^ Diabetes team have been in to do training and two members of staff are happy to administer but school administrators are being obstructive. Diabetes team say they have never experienced such an awkward school. Moving him is not an option as there are 3 other siblings who would also have to move^
So training and arrangements have been done and school administrators still not satisfied although refusal means uprooting his three siblings too?

Outrageous in my opinion, and yes, totally unreasonable.

Effectively they are being discriminatory against a child on health grounds and surely if all reasonable steps have been taken then they are breaking the law?

annodomini school policies don't usually name individual conditions in their policies for the simple reason that there may be an unusual condition that a child may present with. So policies are usually quite wide in their remit. What this school may not have (possibly because of staff cuts) is a designated person with some medical/health training. The school I worked in had a teaching assistant who fulfilled this role. It meant we were able to take a child with a serious medical condition,who needed daily testing and medication, on a residential trip, as long as the TA came. The TA has recently retired and I am not certain anyone in the school has the necessary training now.

My husband was diabetic from when he was eleven. It's much easier to cope with in schools now, with insulin pens and pumps. There should be no problems.

The school governors need to update their policies to include diabetic children. nanamacatj's grandson is unlikely to be the last one the school has to deal with.

Please don't think the school is being deliberately difficult. They have to make sure every angle is covered both for your DGS safety and the school staff's protection. If it is possible for them to do this I am sure they will. If not can I suggest your DD asks other parents to help. I am sure there will be a number who would be willing to set up a support team that can go into the school and deal with his injections until he is confident enought to do it himself. Good luck hope things work out for him.

My grandson has a friend at school who is eleven, has type 1diabetes and for a while his Mother had to go into school to administer the insulin.after that, he learned how to do it himself.So, there must be quite a few schools who either can't or don't want to do this.

One DGC has a friend who developed diabetes at an early age and now has an insulin pump. When they were at nursery, all the other children knew that if Susie was behaving differently from usual they had to tell an adult straight away, and now that they are in primary 4, they are still looking out for her.

Another DGC (in a different council area) has an Epipen for serious multiple allergies, and the school keeps one on the premises and has several teachers who are trained to use it if necessary.

durhamjen, you are quite right that inclusivity means coping with diabetes, not to mention the increasingly common asthma and allergies.

I read the guidelines. Insulin was mentioned twice, in the same paragraph, and diabetes once.
It does not appear to be seen as a problem.
If schools are supposed to be inclusive they must expect to have diabetics among the pupils.

Mine too and, given the number of times my friend's son had to be rushed to hospital, even when his parents did everything they were supposed to do – diabetes Type1 can be very difficult to manage – the school has my sympathies as well.

If you managed to read through the guidelines you'll see theres multiple issues. A record needs to be kept of the medication given, a plan drawn up for the child, other support staff need to be made aware of, for example, the symptoms of hypoglycemic crisis, and so on.

I'm thinking that, as this is a recent diagnosis, these issues have still to be addressed. The school is taking advice on safeguarding it's staff AND safeguarding this child. This is a life-threatening illness and the family have my sympathy.

If you are using an insulin pen, the phial in use is never stored in a fridge. It's only unopened phials that need that.

It depends on the age of the child, of course, but the diabetic paediatric services usually try to get a child as independent as possible as early and possible. My son had an insulated butter dish which kept the insulin cool enough during the day and carried it in his bag. For some time while he was at school, he had a pen injector which held the insulin. And yes, if the school can't or won't (H&S and legal action is always a good excuse) support the child, a parent or carer has to go to the school and provide it. But schools do get extra funding for statemented children. I don't think children with diabetes, asthma etc have been statemented up till now but that might be the only way forward.