Providing Safe Health Care:
The Role of Education Support Professionals

Conclusion
Glossary
Contributors

Conclusion

This handbook has been designed to help ensure the delivery of safe health care to the students who need such services in order to receive a free public education. It is the hope of NEA and the contributors to this handbook that readers will find it helpful and use it regularly. Work to keep your students safe, and, at the same time, protect yourselves.

Glossary

Administration of medications: task of giving student medications.

Cumulative folder: academic record that follows students through school.

Delegation of nursing procedures: licensed health care professional transferring to a competent individual the authority to perform a selected health care procedure in a selected situation. The nurse provides supervision and retains accountability for the delegation.

Documentation: notes and records signed and dated pertaining to a student's health services.

Education for All Handicapped Children Act: the law passed by Congress in 1975 requiring school districts receiving federal funding to provide a free, appropriate education for all students with disabilities. In 1990, the law was renamed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

Educators Employment Liability (EEL) Program: professional liability insurance coverage provided by NEA to members. Administered and underwritten by NEA's EEL insurance carrier, the policy offers coverage, for example, for emergency first aid services and the administration of oral prescription medications (with advance written approval from the parent or guardian). Members should refer to their copy of the EEL Terms and Conditions brochure for all exceptions and exclusions.

ESP: Education Support Professionals.

FAPE (Free Appropriate Public Education): what the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act requires school districts to provide for eligible students with disabilities.

FERPA: Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which guarantees and regulates confidentiality in the schools.

Five rights in administering medications: the right patient, the right medication, the right dose, the right time, and the right route.

Health record: confidential records pertaining to the health of the child.

Health care services: services that can be provided or delegated only by a school nurse or other health care professional and performed under his or her ongoing supervision.

Hold harmless: provision in legislation or a contract whereby a district takes legal responsibilities for services performed by employees as part of their job duties.

IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act): the federal law, passed in 1975, and originally known as the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, requiring school districts receiving federal funding to provide a free, appropriate public education for all students with disabilities.

IEP (Individual Education Plan): a written statement developed for students with disabilities by the IEP team. It includes statements of the student's present level of educational performance, annual goals, and specific special education and related services to be provided to the child. It also includes projected dates for initiation of services and their anticipated duration, evaluation procedures, and the extent to which the child will be able to participate in regular educational programs.

IEP team: the group of people who develop the written IEP (see above) required by federal law for each eligible student with a disability.

IHP (Individual Healthcare Plan): detailed strategy, written by the school nurse, describing health care or services to be delivered to meet the health-related needs of a student. Federal law permits-but does not require-an IHP for students with disabilities who have special health-related needs.

Liability: legal responsibility.

Medical procedures: tasks performed only by physicians.

Medication: any drug, prescription or non-prescription.

Medications policy: local school districts' policy guidelines relating to the administration of medications in schools.

Nurse Practice Act: state law regulating the professional practice of nursing, and describing health care services that can only be provided by nurses (check your own state NPA).

Nursing procedures: tasks performed by nurses and defined by state regulation as being within the scope of practice for a nurse.

Prescribing medications: procedure used by physicians to treat patients with medication.

Primary liability insurance: insurance coverage that may be provided to you by your employer to protect you against personal liability from acts or omissions that occur as a result of your carrying out your educational employment activities on behalf of your employer.

School health services: a type of non-medical service, such as administration of medication or tube feeding. IDEA, the federal law, requires the provision of school health services identified by each child's IEP team as necessary for the child to be able to benefit from special education services.

Students with disabilities: Under IDEA, students evaluated as having mental retardation, hearing impairments including deafness, speech or language impairments, visual impairments including blindness, serious emotional disturbance, orthopedic impairment, autism, traumatic brain injury, other health impairments, specific learning disabilities, deaf-blindness or multiple disabilities, and who because of these impairments need special education and related services.

Subcontracted health services: private health care provider employed by the school district.

Training: advanced knowledge to perform tasks beyond your current skill level; should be student-specific.

Universal precautions: self-protective procedures (for example, wearing latex gloves) that care providers should utilize when dealing with bodily fluids.

Working conditions: the multiple forces affecting educational support workers, including the contract, verbal assignments, and physical environment, in the safe delivery of health care to the student with special health care needs.

Contributors

Written by: Dr. Julie Weiss

The following NEA members and staff identified the need for this handbook, and contributed to bring it to fruition:

NEA-ESP and Safe Health Care Committee

Terri J. Coolidge Marin, Secretary, Poland Community School, Poland, Maine

Nancy Dube, RN, Auburn, Maine

Florine LaPointe, Pediatric Nurse Practitioner, School Nurse, MSAD #71, Kennebunk, Maine

W. Wightman Reilly, Educational Technician III, Auburn Education Association

Susan Rowe, RN, UniServ Director, Maine Education Association

Donna M. Simpson, RN; Lewiston Middle School, Lewiston, Maine

The National Association of School Nurses provided invaluable guidance and support in the creation of this handbook. Thanks to:

Beverly Farquhar, RN, BS, CSN, NASN Executive Director

Carol Coughlin Costante, RN, MA, CSN; Specialist, Office of Health Services, Baltimore County Public Schools; NASN President-Elect

Doris Houck Luckenbill, MS, SNP, CSNP; School nurse; Chair, NASN Special Needs Committee

Janis Hootman, RN, BSN, MST, Supervisor, Schoolhouse Services, Portland, Oregon; NASN Director, State of Oregon

Linda C. Wolfe, RN, BSN, M.Ed.; Chair, NASN Standards and Practice Committee; School nurse, Indian River School District, Roxanna, Delaware

Special thanks to the following staff of the National Education Association:

Roxanne Dove, ESP Program Coordinator

Robert Tate, National Center for Innovation

Michael Simpson, Office of General Counsel

Thanks also to the following National Education Association staff:

Ellen David-Friedman, Vermont-NEA

Lynn Ohman, Legal Services

Rafael Rivera, Health Information Network

Arden Shumaker, Collective Bargaining and Compensation

Diane Shust, Government Relations

Stefanie Weiss, Publishing

Sonia Jasso Yilmaz, Legal Services

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