BOARDWATCH: Retired clinician details dangers to children from CPS's privatization of nursing and other health services... [one] The child did not want to come to school because she was afraid of the RCM nurse...
Retired school social worker Susan Hickey told the Board of examples of how privatized nursing was hurting children's health care. By the time the Board mendaciously "corrected" the testimony about RCM, the union witnesses had left and the Board's lies came into the record unchallenged. Substance photo by George N. Schmidt.[Editor's Note: As we are reporting at the top of the Substance Home Page this morning, the Board waited until the critics of the privatization of health services all were gone and then called on one of their hacks to proclaim that the critique of privatized nursing services were wrong. It's an old Board trick and why people need to enjoy the entire meeting, despite constraints. Here we present our readers with the remarks that were prepared by Susan Hickey at the February 24, 2016 Board meeting. George N. Schmidt, Editor, Substance].
Good afternoon. I am Susan Hickey, a retired CPS social worker and I work part-time at CTU dealing with clinicians issues.
I was involved with the nurse report that you received from us.
During the discussions with school nurses, I was able to get two parents willing to have me tell their story of their experience with RCM nurses There was a 5-year-old child at Disney who is a Type 1 diabetic. In her IEP she receives full time nursing services who help monitor her condition. The child did not want to come to school because she was afraid of the RCM nurse.
The nurse would also not comply with the doctor and parent's lunch and breakfast menu. The nurse took off one day without notifying anyone at the school, leaving the child without the medical support. Parent requested to have her replaced. She contacted the case manager, principal and finally the RCM supervisor. The RCM supervisor told the parent that there was no one to replace her and that the child needs to get over it.
I intervened and spoke with someone at ODLSS [the name the Board gave at that time to its special education department] and the nurse was replaced last week. The child had to endure that first nurse from September to mid-February.
The other parent had a 7 year old nonverbal. wheelchair-bound student at Christopher. The child had transportation on his IEP with a nurse aide to be on the bus with him. They did not have a nurse until mid-September. The school called that they got a RCM nurse and the boy was transported to school. At the end of the day, he was left in the school office and the nurse left. The boy was there for an hour and a half before, the school contacted the parent who came to the school to take him home. The mother had the IEP changed so that she would take him to school. This is unfortunate as he is entitled to the service!
