I don't think I've written about where I spend most of my day. I am the school nurse at a elementary school. I have been a nurse for 38 years and a school nurse for 19 years! That really dates me! I love my job, because I love the kids and feel I really make a difference each and every day. I will write about a few of the kids I saw today.
There is the 7th grade special ed student who because of a genetic disease has been constipated for years. He is finally no longer constipated, but was having accidents several times each day. He and I worked out a reward system which he can choose a reward at school each day he is accident free (help me in my office at recess and eat lunch there, help his teacher or the school psychologist, get to come to my office at the end of the day for a healthy snack, etc). It's like a light bulb turned on in his brain. He is finally excited about and wants to be accident free. He is also talking a lot more. The past 2 weeks he has been accident free for 9 out of 10 days!
I always talk to kids about the importance of healthy diet with lots of fruits and vegetables and lots of exercise to maintain a healthy weight. Usually I give them information on a web site where the whole family can keep track of their exercise. I gave one 5th grader who is quite overweight a journal to write about her meals and her exercise because she has no computer at home. I suggested that she write in the journal and bring it back to me in a week. She brought it back without me even calling her and was quite proud of her progress. She started out setting an exercise goal: to be able to run a mile each day. She ran 1/2 mile each day this week and kept track of her vegetable intake! She wrote about other forms of exercise she wants to do!
A Mom called me saying they would be homeless by the end of December. They are moving back to the reservation, but have no where to stay there. I wrote her a letter introducing the family to agencies up there so they can find reasonably priced place to stay. The counselor suggested we give them a food box to take with them to tide them over for a week after they leave Phoenix. We will have that ready for them next week.
I am busy non stop all day every day and really try to teach kids healthy body things they can use their whole life. For example many students come in with headaches. Most headaches are caused by stress or dehydration. I always have them drink water and lie down and relax with a cold magic towel on their head and eyes. 9 times out of 10 this works and they are surprised. We talk about why this simple treatment often works, no drugs required! Many kids come in with stomachaches. Most of these kids haven't eaten breakfast. I have them figure out how many hours between dinner last night and lunch today (it is usually about 18 hours!) when they don't eat lunch. We talk about the importance of feeding and watering your body and I feed them.
Once again School Nurse's in Madison have to fight for our kids and our jobs. Our jobs are on the chopping block and the kids will be the one's to loose their caregivers and advocates for their health. They want to replace all RN's and LPN's with untrained aides. They want to keep one RN who will have a school of her own and have to train and supervise 7 aides at the other schools. It is impossible to safely supervise someone you don't work with. As an RN that nurse's license is on the line if any of the aides make a mistake. We will see, things are very bad financially, we are in the lowest possible cut (3.1million), they also have a budget for 3.4 million cuts and 3.8million in cuts. 
