Children's Health Status

[MrsWeasley]

At college today we were talking about HIV and Hepatitis B, and the fact that a parent doesn't have to tell us whether their child has the HIV virus or Hepatitis.

 

Which then started a conversation about whether we should have the right to know?

Not so much for HIV, but Hepatitis B is very contagious, needing

only a tiny amount of blood to transmit the virus because it's so infectious.

Just wondering what you think?

 

 

Mrs Weasley x

[Guest]

Hi I agree that there is a need to know, the only way would you hope that the parent is responsible enough to tell you. If not you really can't do anything. The only thing might be that medication would need to be given which would need permission and for you to know what it is for.

A good one to debate!!!!!

steph

[Shiny]

I can see both sides of the coin.

 

The parent might think their child would be treated differently or even excluded if they shared the information.

 

This is why it is so important for staff to have the correct protection when dealing with an incident.

[MrsWeasley]

I can see both sides of the coin.

 

The parent might think their child would be treated differently or even excluded if they shared the information.

 

This is why it is so important for staff to have the correct protection when dealing with an incident.

 

That's what we said;

If you're told a child has either virus, you're likely to treat them differently, even if you don't realise it.

But with Hepatitis B there's a high chance of catching it. If you have an open wound, and it touches an open wound of the child with the virus, you can catch it. But then we also said that if you've got open wounds uncovered, you're probably not following your policies and procedures, so it'd be your fault if you caught it anyway.

 

Either way you can't win!

[Guest]

I recall having similar discussions during training, the conclusion we came to was the fact that we should be practising hygiene safety, eg: gloves when dealing with blood, reducing cross contamination with bodily fluids etc, plus, as stated we cannot 'make' parents disclose such information, so risk reduction needs to be in place. Staff can be vacinated against hepatitis etc. And we considered the impact of knowing such information, how would it affect our relationship with the child.

 

It's the question of need to know basis, we may think we need to know so that we can advise other health professionals but in reality say in the case of a child requiring medical attention, those responsible for that will ask these questions. So, do we really need to know?

 

Peggy

[Guest]

I once, many moons ago, made (encouraged) my staff to have hepatitis injections to protect the children from possible infection, believing that this was required. A later discussion with my social services inspector (shows how long ago this was) made me realise that this protection was meant for staff, to be protected against possible infection from children, not, as I believed, ensuring the children were protected from possible infection from staff. I misunderstood the advice at that time about getting Hep injections. In other words I was putting the cildrens needs first before the staffs needs of having to undergo such measures as having a course of (painful) injections.

 

I now know that Good hygiene practice eleviates the need for such drastic measures.

 

Peggy

[MrsWeasley]

I wonder how many children have either virus? And how many of the parents have actually told the setting about it?

 

I can't say I've actually thought about it much before today, but I automatically thought that if I had a child with either virus I'd feel that it was a pretty important thing to tell the setting, even if just the manager or health and safety officer or whoever. But obviously I can't say that for definate, as I haven't been in that situation.

 

But someone was saying that she has bad eczema, and consequently often has a lot of open wounds on her arms and neck, which sometimes can't be covered because of the pain it would produce. What if that child cut themselves doing a craft activity, and touched the adult? In this case there's no policies she's not following?

 

 

Mrs Weasley

[Rea]

But what if staff all follow the H&S practice to the letter and a child catches it?

 

Is it notifiable? Could you maybe put leaflets about it on your notice board as a prompt?

[Guest]

What about the parent who doesn't know their child has any of these type of viruses?

 

Peggy