By Brittney Mangum
bmangum@clarkecountytrib.com
“Miss, I don’t feel good,” multiple students inevitably say at some point during the school year. Fortunately for the students in Quitman School District, there are four outstanding nurses who are employed to take care of their medical needs: Nurses Donnis Harris, Robin Kennedy, Lorey McAllister, and Tiffany Abston.
Having a nurse for each school building is a blessing that many school districts aren’t privileged to have. Even more of a blessing is that the school was able to employ all four nurses at no cost to the district. While some of the grants have different time frames, the four grants that made it possible for each building in the different to be staffed with a school nurse are a Title I Grant, School Nurse ESSER I Grant, School Nurse Intervention Grant, and ESSER II funds.
“We have four nurses working in our district, and it doesn’t cost the district anything because they are all funded through grants,” informed Quitman Superintendent Dr. Minnie Dace. “We are blessed to have these nurses at zero expense.”
Students benefit from having a nurse in each building because there are multiple students with specific medical requirements that must be met throughout the day, as well as other reasons.
“It’s very helpful to have a nurse in every building because we’re there to work alongside the counselors,” explained Head Nurse Donnis Harris. “Often we work with them in situations because sometimes the nurse is the first person to see a student with some sort of issue as far as being upset or mad because it will manifest itself as a headache or stomach ache.”
Recently, the State of Mississippi has started a telehealth contract with certain school districts, and Quitman School District was selected as one of the schools to participate in phase one. While the contract with the state is new, telehealth is not new to Quitman School District. They have used telehealth through a different contract for years now, and they understand how to use it to create live online appointments.
“We have been in agreement with UMMC for about six years now. We have been the first school in the state to actually see students for a clinical need. That means that once the nurse determined that the student needed a higher level of care, like a nurse practitioner or a physician, we would schedule an appointment online on the computer,” expressed Nurse Harris. “We would check the student’s vital signs and do their height and weight—the same procedure that you get at a clinic before you see the doctor. Then, the nurse practitioner would come on screen and talk to the student. Everything is face to face in live time. The benefits of our school telehealth is that we have a Bluetooth stethoscope that’s connected, so the nurse practitioner can listen to a student’s heart sounds and lungs in live time. If someone is having an asthma issue, she can actually listen and hear what’s going on in the lungs herself. The school nurse is there as the hands working the equipment. We also have a Bluetooth otoscope to look in ears so the nurse practitioner can see the eardrum and any issues going on with a student’s ears. It actually puts a picture of the eardrum on the screen, so it’s a real teaching moment for the students.”
No appointments are made without parental consent, and appointments are scheduled during elective classes so that the student doesn’t miss time in the core subjects.
The previous experience with telehealth contributed to the district being selected to take part in phase one with the state.
“We were chosen as one of the school districts to be in phase one because we had the equipment previously. We didn’t have to have the training to know how to use the equipment because having Nurse Harris and Nurse Kennedy who have already been through it made it easy to transition to the new program,” declared Dr. Dace. “The equipment and software are maintained by our IT department.”
Telehealth has been beneficial to both students and teachers since it started in the district. It also assists parents by making it possible for them to remain at work during doctor appointments and still know what is going on with their child’s health because of strong communication.
“It really helps keep the students at school and helps keep the parents at work since they don’t have to be present for the appointment. The nurse practitioners at UMMC do reach out to the parent to have a follow up conversation so that the parent is not left out of the loop,” proclaimed Nurse Harris. “We’ve had our teachers use this, and it would allow them to stay at school because they could plan their appointment on their off period so that they won’t miss any class time.”
This year, they have added a new component to the telehealth system.
“We have expanded our telehealth program this year. It is going to also include behavioral health,” stated Nurse Harris. “Students with parental consent and need some extra guidance, counseling, and possibly anger management, will have access to a counselor or therapist on a regular basis.”
The nurses aren’t only familiar with telehealth. They also use the SNAP program to maintain medical records for the students.
“SNAP is an electronic health record and is probably one of the most nationally recognized programs that most school nurses all over the nation use,” proclaimed Harris. “We’re the only school in the state that has had both telehealth and SNAP.”
Quitman is definitely blessed with an outstanding nursing program, and the students and their families benefit from the programs they have in place.
Pictured:
Tiffany Abston, Lorey McAllister, Donnis Harris, Robin Kennedy
