Each day you send your baby to school hoping and praying they will be safe and sound. And they are. But every now and then things happen. When a child is sick or injured at school, the experience can be difficult for the child, who is away from your love and comfort, but also for you guys, who want only to be by your child’s side in their time of need. Thankfully, when these circumstances arise, school nurses are more than prepared to tend to wounds, treat an illness and provide a generous dose of reassurance that soothes both pain and fear.
As health care professionals, these nurses are not only a vital part of a child’s school environment, but an important element of a child’s health care network that extends to family and community. The demands placed on school nurses cover a wide array of health care needs, from the daily treatment of chronic conditions to the role of first responder should an emergency occur. When the need arises, school nurses also put their extensive training to work providing information about health topics and promoting healthy life styles.
In Wylie ISD we are blessed to have a caring, compassionate, professional at every campus! School nurses advance the well-being of students through health promotion in many ways, including:
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Wylie ISD employs Registered Nurses (RN) at every campus. Each RN has experience in the hospital setting so the care your child receives is equal to any doctor’s office or clinic
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In addition to RNs, Wylie ISD staffs Licensed Vocational Nurses (LVN)s at three campuses to assist in the care delivery in our most medically fragile students
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On average, a school nurse in Wylie provides health assessment, intervention and consultation for over 50 students and staff a day
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The school nurse delivers medications and performs specialized nursing procedures including diabetes care, catheterizations, seizure care, and gastric tube feedings. Over 20,000 such skills were performed in just the first semester
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School nurses conduct state mandated screening for vision, hearing, acanthosis nigricans and scoliosis. Over 7,500 students received at least one of these screenings
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Asthma, diabetes, life-threatening allergies, and seizures are a few of the chronic conditions (representing over 10% of our Wylie ISD kids) that school nurses work with families and medical providers to manage in the school setting. Nurses educate students on their disease, foster self-care skills to promote independence, and train staff to assist students when they are at their greatest time of need
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Wylie ISD school nurses are integral members of the campus safety teams. They work with staff to train on emergency procedures including EpiPen use, CPR, First Aid, and the use of an AED. In the past two years, we have had two incidents, one at Draper and one at Wylie East, where the prompt intervention of CPR by the nurse has saved the student’s life
Wylie is also home to the 2017 Region X School Nurse of the Year! Kara Geller has been a nurse with Wylie for the past eight years, serving the district at Birmingham and now Bush Elementary. Last year, Kara worked closely with the Health Department to intervene in a virus that ran its course through the entire school community. She helped her administration communicate with the parents and students, reinforced good hand hygiene practices with the students and staff, and carefully monitored the illness status promote the safety of the entire student body. In addition, she has collaborated with the North Texas Food Bank to provide weekend meals to students and their families.
Governor Abbot has proclaimed today as SCHOOL NURSE DAY and I hope you will join me in saying thank you to all our nurses.
