This article is of particular interest to me.
I spent many hours working with our school district so my child could be safe at school. As I've said before, he's carried an Epi-Pen around his waist since his first day of kindergarten. If the school had denied us this right, it would have been a deal breaker resulting in a search for alternative educational opportunities. Every child and every situation is different, but schools and parents need to have some basic understandings and rights when it comes to food allergies.
I fully support State Rep. Tom Murt in his efforts to require Pennsylvania to develop food allergy guidelines for schools. I'm going to write to him right now and see how I can help.
How is your school handling food allergies?
6 comments:
In our previous school district, kids were not allowed to carry EpiPens on their person until an Illinois state law changed that rule. Now they can statewide and that is a huge battle to have won.
Schools are a constant battle, that's why we need standardized rules for FA. FAAN has a list of all the bills up for review right now--it's worth checking them out.
Bottom line, kids need their EpiPens at all times! A mom's gotta do what a mom's gotta do, so congrats on getting your school to be compliant.
You're right, Jenny- "A mom's gotta do what a mom's gotta do". I went into the meeting with a list of what we needed and school officials were very understanding.
I hear that's not the case everywhere which is why we need the legislation.
Thanks for stopping by my blog. My school's way of handling peanut allergies is to not ban peanut butter from the school. The children are even allowed to bring their own snack even if it contains peanuts or peanut butter.
My daughter's Epi-Pen and Benedryl has to be kept with the school nurse.
Even though the school is not peanut free, I feel fine when she's there and don't worry because I know there is nothing harmful she will eat and at lunch she sits at the same table with kids that are eating peanut butter, but at the other end with other children that have PA. I worry more about her going to places where I don't know what she's going to eat. For instance 2 weeks ago she went on camping trip with her Brownie troop. The leader had the epi-pen with her (Amanda is too young to use it) and I informed everyone, but still, I was freaked and worried the whole time that something might contain peanuts.
My DD is only in PreK. Right now her teachers keep Benadryl and her Twinject in the "to-go" bag in a cabinet in the classroom. It goes wherever the class goes. I'm comfortable with that. DS will be attending that school next year, hopefully, and it will work well for him too.
I've already contacted our local school board, even though DD won't start K for another full school year. Their current policy is that Epis will be kept in the nurse's office, in the child's classroom, and preferably one in each of the "elective" classrooms such as music and gym. That's a LOT of Epis to buy, but as long as all those teachers are trained, I'm more comfortable with that than my DD carrying her own right now. She's just NOT mature enough yet.
The district's policy is that once the child enters middle school/high school self-carry of Epi and asthma medicines are decided based on doctor's recommendation and the ability of the child to show enough knowledge and maturity to self-administer. The only bummer is that if a child IS granted self-carry status, the school assumes no liability to administed for the child if he/she is incapacitated. I am going after that one when we get closer to needing it changed.
I know, Carla, it is so hard when our FA kids are with others who aren't accustomed to dealing with a food allergy. We know how easy it is to make a mistake and we deal with it all the time.
That said, we need to let our kids be kids and experience normal kid things. We still get to be freaked out and worried, though!
Hey Sabrina, it sounds like you'll have your work cut out for you to change school policy for those students who self-carry. Of course we would expect the school to assist a student with a medical need whether they have their medication on them or not!
Maybe by the time you need it, there will be federal laws in place to over-ride the current school policy.
Maybe there will even be a cure by then and none of us will need to talk about any of this!
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