Overzealous school nurse is killing my budget

[ajk912]

Omg, I hate to say I hate people.. but... the school nurse at my kids' school REALLY pushes my buttons. I have had her tell me at LEAST 10 times this year that my kid needs to go to the doctor for this and that, and most of the time I ignore her. Well, today she insisted that my daughter could not return to school till she had her eye drainage checked out. I JUST took her to the doctor TWO weeks ago for her allergies, I TOLD her that, and she insisted it was pinkeye and she can't come to school. omg. I KNOWWWW it isn't pinkeye. I am not even experienced in this, and I know. SHE should know, you know? So I took her to the doc. Guess what? It's allergies. I wasted $20 to find out what I ALREADY know to make the overzealous, bored school nurse happy. Why does the parents word mean NOTHING? I hate how they have the authority to say that the child cannot come back to school till they have a doctor's note. Seriously. I even told her, I can't afford to take her to the doctor for every single sneeze, it's crazy. She says it's policy. Anyone wonder why (part of the reason) why health care costs are so high? My kids' doc says she hears it at least once a day..the school says my kid can't come back til ___ is checked out. BTW, if this was an isolated incident that would be fine, but there were 3 other inicidents this year the school nurse wouldn't back down, and I had to take my kids to the doc for no reason. Ugh.

 

[ceecee]

Call the doctor's office, have them write a letter to the school nurse with the diagnosis of allergies since she was just in, they should do this without a problem. I would think pink eye is pretty easy for the nurse to diagnose. Sometimes at first it is just a watery eye and gets red later or sometimes not at all.
Try to understand, some parents insist on sending their kids to school with fevers, throwing up, etc. and avoid Dr. at all costs. We had a kid throw up on his way to the office at 9:15 (school starts at 9:10) the mom said "oh, he was up all night sick, but I thought he was over it"!

 

[fakereadhed]

Tell her to buzz off. Tell her you want to talk to the principal. Then the superintendent. As a mom, you have rights to what the school can really force you to do.

I feel your pain. My DS's bus driver was hassling me for sending him to school with a cough. He had it for 3 weeks and I was not going to keep him home. She kept telling me to get him tested for strep because all the kids on the bus had gotten it. Finally, against my better judgement, I took him in. NO STREP, but I was out another $20 copay. Now I just ignore her.

 

[shortbun]

Devil's advocate here. She's trying to protect all the other kiddies. Get a letter from your daughter's doc that lets the nurse off the hook. Then everyone will be happy. Are they prescribing anything for your daughter's eyes? My son is using Patanol with great success. Every spring it was the same thing....pollen = swollen eyes and eye goop. Good luck. Poor kid, can you imagine having sore itchy, oozing eyes all the time?

 

[NMW]

I have that beat. The school surse in our elementry school has sent my middle child with mild asthma home several times (insisting I come pick him up because she's just going to keep him in the nurses office for the rest of the day). She claims that because he still has a cough his inhaler is "not working" and that he needs to stay home until it's gone. Well, he also has allergies that cause him to cough.

I have picked him up several time this year, taken him to the allergist/asthma doctor (at Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia-I'm sure they know what their doing) and he's completely fine. Passes all his breathing tests with flying colors and they tell me it's just mild allergies. They say he's fine to go to school. On my third trip this year the doctor was reading a note from the nurse suggesting I supply a nebulizer machine so he can get breathing treatments from her during the school day, and I heard him mumble "Is this woman serious?" He offered to call her himself to let her know that my son could absolutely return to school and did not require a nebulizer machine at school or at home.

My older son wears glasses and started contacts in 4th grade. This same nurse failed him in a vision test (wearing his glsses or contacts) every year he was in elem. school I always got a form I had to get signed by an eye doctor, which required an extra eye exam visit. Guess what? He passed the eye exam in their office every time and they were stumped as to why she kept failing him.

 

[RobinFabulous]

:-( We had this problem before too. My youngest dd went to the special needs daycare with my ds, and the nurse totally picked on her. They kept insisting that she had ringworm, they'd cover her in band-aids. swore she had pinkeye, etc.

Our solution was to finally complain enough to the doctor that he personally wrote her a note explaining that she had allergies, and how they would manifest themselves.

This nurse even took it so far as to call the doctors office and ask if she had actually been seen.

I just tried to remember that they had other sicker children there and she was looking out for everyone

 

[StillPinballFamily]

If you guys go to the superintendent (I would in these cases, and skip right over the principal/s), be ready to hear that he/she can't do much because of the school nurse union. Honestly! We had a chillingly ugly incident with the elementary school nurse screaming at me and my child with autism in front of dozens of other kids and parents one morning last year. Obviously, I headed straight for the superintendent's office and we had a "big" meeting a few days later and her union reps "she only had his safety in mind...she was only yelling so you would hear her..." were there left and right. Sigh.

I suppose even if the school district can't or won't do anything, at least they'll have a file/record of parent complaints. Can you imagine how these actions would affect a family with higher $ co-pays or little or no health insurance?

 

[BeckyScott]

Been there!

We had the same pink eye/ allergies go-round with a school nurse, too.

At our third appointment the dr wrote a note saying DS had hayfever and that his eyes would be red and itchy and that he did not have pink eye.

My husband was the one that took DS back to school with the note. There is a reason my husband doesn't go up to the office. He told the nurse she didn't know her (bleep) from a hole in the ground, and the next time she sent us to the doctor for no good reason, he was going to the school board with our bill.

The next day, we were anonymously hotlined to Child Protective Services.

Coincidence?

I think not.

But I never got another phone call.

I'm sure we're on some secret Bad Parent list that the schools share.

 

[PrincessAbby'sMom]

I am on the otherside of this one - our school nurse does NOTHING! We had a few suspected cases last year of Whooping Cough, but they didn't want to alarm any parents ("you knew some parents get carried away") - and they were only suspected cases, not confirmed cases.

And of course the family that was the "suspected" cases were not immunized and 1 was in my daughters class. (of course)

She was sick for weeks - our doctor didn't think it was Whooping Cough - she was immunized for that, she can't get that. Until reports starting coming in, etc. from the State that it is a different strain & maybe 7th & 8th graders need a booster now. Then he believed us & tested her. But he did a blood test, not the nose swab. Now the normal levels were to be (I don't remember exactly, but you get the idea) between 40-60, her test came back around 250-300. Even though both doctors completely freaked & immediately said yes, she is positive - the Infectious Disease Control Center said that it only showed that she was immunized (which doesn't make since to me, but?????)

Anyway I pulled up a site to listen to a child that had a diagnosed case of whooping cough & my husband ran in the room & thought our daughter was having one of her coughing fits again. That is how sure that I am that she had it.

But anyway - the principal (that I demanded to meet with since we weren't notified) didn't think it was their job since it wasn't confirmed cases. I explained how much time off of work, 2 doctors we saw, tests that were run, fever for 3 weeks, etc. But since the doctor didn't know of any "suspected" cases, he sent her to school w/ a fever as long as it stayed under 101 (which it did), and infected how many others. I layed into our school for that one.

They send home notes when lice is in school, but when its an infections, highly contagious disease - lets not panic the parents.????? That was their words!

 

[Va-bear]

Call the doctor's office, have them write a letter to the school nurse with the diagnosis of allergies since she was just in, they should do this without a problem. I would think pink eye is pretty easy for the nurse to diagnose. Sometimes at first it is just a watery eye and gets red later or sometimes not at all.
Try to understand, some parents insist on sending their kids to school with fevers, throwing up, etc. and avoid Dr. at all costs. We had a kid throw up on his way to the office at 9:15 (school starts at 9:10) the mom said "oh, he was up all night sick, but I thought he was over it"!

This is what our doctor did - I think he was more upset than I that the nurse kept sending the child home w/ "pink eye." AND KEEP A COPY!!!! It worked for one year and then the next year the nurse started sending him home again... , so I sent in a copy of the note and she then 'remembered' the problem...

Good luck!

 

[McKelly]

And strangely enough...........I kept my DD home from school one day because I thought she had pink eye, took her to the doctor and Yes, she had it, but the doctor old me she could GO TO SCHOOL because when they get older (3rd grade) they don't touch each other anymore and there wouldn't be any risk of passing it on. It sure would be nice if everybody, meaning school nurses, doctors, etc., were on the same page! Geez!!

 

[Mono~rail]

Ah, yes, the school nurse. I'm new to dealing with them since my dd3 started special needs preschool at the beginning of March. They are really nice at my dd's school, but I did have a few difficulties with them. My dd has a feeding tube, and they wanted to syringe feed her using a syringe and gravity. My dd can't tolerate that, and she MUST be fed using her pump running at a slow rate. I had the hardest time making them understand that her pump is the smallest and most user friendly on the market. Finally, I had to tell them the syringe feedings weren't going to happen and get over it. Luckily, she has her own aid who handles her feedings, and she wasn't intimidated by the pump at all. She actually raves about how nice it is.

Week before last I had to go pick her up early because the school nurse thought she was having a seizure. She's very sensitive to her feeding tube port being bumped - it sets off a really terrible gagging and retching. She can't throw up because a portion of her stomach is wrapped around her esophagus to prevent reflux and vomiting. Her aid accidentally tugged on her button when she was unhooking her and it initiated her gagging and retching which they thought was a seizure. Clearly they never read the orders that her pedi wrote because there were orders specifically for her gagging and retching. Thankfully, they took my word that she has been tested for seizures and she doesn't have them. The school is just around the corner, but when I got there I could tell they were finally calming down. I thought it best for me to go on and bring her home.

 

[Free4Life11]

I can see why that would be annoying, but is $20 really killing your budget?

 

[Va-bear]

I can see why that would be annoying, but is $20 really killing your budget?

Doesn't necessarily kill ones budget but getting time off work, rushing around town, trying to accomadate other children's schedules, etc. etc. does get old REALLY fast... life is already stressful enough.... Plus, 20.00 over and over does add up.

 

[ajk912]

I can see why that would be annoying, but is $20 really killing your budget?

Um, yeah. I have a $150 a week food/household budget, and that's pretty tight- that has to include all food, car, household, and medical & dental maintenance & copays. With a family of 5, $150 doesn't go far at all. I do have a savings backup for EMERGENCIES, but I don't consider an overzealous nurse to be an emergency. TMI, I know.

Thanks everyone for the support, it is kind of nice (well, not really, but you know what I mean!) to hear the other stories- it makes me feel better that I am not alone.

 

[Mono~rail]

You are far from alone.

I have a good friend who is a single mother of two, and both of her kids inherited her eye muscle problems from her. Both of her kids are seen regularly by a pediatric opthamologist, but the school nurse sends her letters home saying they need their eyes checked.

 

[Mkgaapril]

I can beat that. I had letters from my sons doctors that stated he could not have a required shot for medical reasons (his heart problem can't have the shot and could kill him) I took in 5 letters and the nurse kept kicking him out. The last time I went I gave the doctor the letter and he said to sit down we would be a while. He got on the speaker phone called her ask her to hold and called the school board and told them if they continued to do this he would take action and he was sick of it and I should be repaid all the copays I have had to put out because the school nurse was trying to force me to go against medical advice. Bottom line I got back all my money and she was canned.

 

[ajk912]

I can beat that. I had letters from my sons doctors that stated he could not have a required shot for medical reasons (his heart problem can't have the shot and could kill him) I took in 5 letters and the nurse kept kicking him out. The last time I went I gave the doctor the letter and he said to sit down we would be a while. He got on the speaker phone called her ask her to hold and called the school board and told them if they continued to do this he would take action and he was sick of it and I should be repaid all the copays I have had to put out because the school nurse was trying to force me to go against medical advice. Bottom line I got back all my money and she was canned.

omg, I am so sorry for you! That is awful! A mom who didn't know any better might take the kid to the health department and get the shot..omg. That is horrible.

 

[hollieplus2]

wow, I must have a great nurse because she almost never calls. One time my DS wasn't feeling well, said his stomach was upset and threw up after lunch. She called and said look, he ate lunch about an hour it's probably bad food or too much recess afterwards, I'll give him some tums, let him lie down for 10 minutes and send him back to class. I'll call you if that doesn't work. I never heard from her again and he was good to go when I picked him up.

I know if she calls, he needs to come home.

 

[cruisnfamily]

wow, I must have a great nurse because she almost never calls. One time my DS wasn't feeling well, said his stomach was upset and threw up after lunch. She called and said look, he ate lunch about an hour it's probably bad food or too much recess afterwards, I'll give him some tums, let him lie down for 10 minutes and send him back to class. I'll call you if that doesn't work. I never heard from her again and he was good to go when I picked him up.

I know if she calls, he needs to come home.

Wow! they gave him tums? Our school won't give the kids anythign other than ice or bandaids without a drs note.