The Relentless School Nurse: Door Dashing for Diabetic Students

 

Meeting the readers of The Relentless School Nurse in person is always a cherished experience. This past weekend, I had the privilege of connecting with Molly Boyd, one of my readers, at the Missouri Association of School Nurses Spring Conference. After my presentation, Molly approached me, to say hello and capture this fun selfie.

 

I was delighted to meet Molly, and even more so when she wrote to me after the conference about contributing a guest blog post. Despite her self-professed inexperience in writing, Molly believed she had an important story to share. And she was right – her story is about advocating for her students, but also for herself!

 

Molly’s journey of finding the courage to speak up about her own needs, and the positive impact it had on her work-life balance and ability to serve her students, is a powerful testament to the importance of self-advocacy. As school nurses, we often prioritize the well-being of others, but Molly’s experience reminds us that we must also take care of ourselves to be truly effective in our roles. As you will read in Molly’s message, tracking the data helped her support the solution to a difficult workload.

 

I am grateful that Molly was willing to share her story, and I am confident that her words will resonate with readers and inspire you to follow her lead in advocating for your needs as well as your students. The Relentless School Nurse community is enriched by the diverse perspectives and experiences of nurses like Molly, and I am honored to provide a platform for all voices to be heard. As I shared with Molly, the sweet spot for blog posts is about 500 words, include pictures and a brief bio and I will take care of the rest! Email me at: relentlessschoolnurse@gmail.com.

 

         Here is Molly’s story: Door Dashing for Diabetic Students

This is my second year as a school nurse and I went from having no diabetics to four diabetics! At the beginning of the school year, I was so overwhelmed with just the thought of having a single diabetic student. It was completely different treating a diabetic student in a school setting than it was a DKA patient in the ED, which is what I was used to. The fear of the unknown was paralyzing. 

I was by myself in the health room. I had over 500 students and over 60 staff members. So many days, I felt like I was on a roller coaster ride of blood glucose numbers. I’m not sure if anyone else has noticed this, but my diabetic’s blood glucose numbers seem to sync up like menstrual cycles. If one is going to go low, others will too. There were several days when two or three would go low simultaneously. I would have them lined up at the counter with their CGMs, carbs, and a post-it note to document what I was doing with each. Yet, that didn’t stop other students from coming down for other issues too. It was extremely overwhelming.

After one too many “close calls,” I ran the numbers. I ran reports for that semester to see the census and health room visit numbers for every school in our district. Then I also included if they had more than one health services staff member and which schools had special programs. The numbers didn’t lie. I was seeing a significant amount more visits than my counterparts with one person in the health room. I promptly set up a meeting with my administrator and superintendent that is over health services. Within 30 minutes of discussing my reports, they agreed to post one of our float health clerks at my school every day and agreed she would be the last to be pulled. I am so thankful I asked, so thankful they agreed, and so thankful for the opportunity to have someone I trust to work with each day.

Since she has been working in my health room, I’m able to proactively treat my students with diabetes by taking carbs to their classrooms before they get to that low threshold. Then, I can stay outside of their classroom until their numbers and arrows are heading in the right direction. I have found that this is keeping them in the classroom and out of the health room. I have also found that they aren’t having the extreme lows like they were previously. I lovingly call it “Door Dashing for Diabetics”. Without prompting, three of the four families have reported that their student’s hemoglobin A1Cs have come down this year. What more of a reward could you ask for?

My lessons learned: Look at the data then advocate for your needs and the needs of your students.

Bio: Molly Boyd, BSN, RN, has been a nurse for 21 years. While mostly working in emergency departments and informatics, she has embraced her new adventure in elementary school nursing.