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Show Cooperation of Schools And Teachers Needed In Controlling Diseases By BERYL NAPIER Public Health Nurse The value of the assistance given by alert, informed and cooperative cooper-ative school administrators and teachers in community control of communicable diseases cannot be over-estimated. In her observant contact with pupils, the teacher has an excellent excel-lent opportunity for noting the first signs of illness. For this, she does not need special training; train-ing; she requires only common sense and pudgment. It is her responsibility to see anything out of the ordinary in the child's appearance ap-pearance or behavior and to bring it promptly to the attention of the parents and the health department. depart-ment. She does not diagnose or even guess at a diagnosis and she neither gives nor advises remedies. reme-dies. Only a doctor is qualified to diagnose and treat illness. - Immediate Service The teacher's immediate service serv-ice is to get the sick child away from other children and safely home, and to notify both parents and health department. Her longtime long-time contribution is the building up with pupils of a background of sound information and exper-ences exper-ences that will enable them to handle communicable disease problems intelligently when they are adults. Exclusion from school of any child suspected of having a communicable com-municable disease is required of "superintendents, principals and teachers of all schools and nurses in any way responsible for the health program of the school". Pupils with beginning colds should be sent home for their own good and for the protection of others and should stay at home for at least the first three or four days of their illness. In the modem classroom, a perfect attendance record is no longer stressed at the expense of the health of the pupils. Until the child showing signs of illness can be sent home, he should be separated from the other children, if only in a corner of the room protected by a screen. The teacher should see that he has a way to get home, and she should promptly notify the parents, if possible, making clear the reason for exclusion. When a pupil has been excluded (Continued on page eight) Communicable Diseases (Continued from first page) from school on suspicion of contagion, con-tagion, he should be remedied only with the permission of the health officer. In communities where the health officer is not a physician, often times he authorizes author-izes the schools to accept a certificate certi-ficate from the family physician. Exchange of information on the prevelance of disease in the community com-munity helps both school and health department. Prompt and complete reports from teachers make possible quick action on the part of the health department depart-ment and a timely warning from the health department puts the teachers on the look-out for beginning be-ginning illness. Exclusions, re-admissions and morning inspection can be made excellent learning experience for the pupils, as can any contacts with the health department Children are quickly interested in matters of such immediate concern con-cern to themselves, and they should be given every opportunity to understand and help in plan-ning plan-ning and carrying on immunization immuniz-ation and control activities. |