to think school should have noticed that DD had broken her hand?!

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Or to at least tell me that she had hurt it?!

I picked DD (5) up from school today and she was white as a sheet. As we walked out of the gates I went to hold her hand and she winced and burst into tears, I had a look and it was swollen and she said that one of the other kids had rolled a tyre over it. (They have tyres for playing with in the reception garden, we all said it was an accident waiting to happen!)

DD says she told the teacher and was crying but they just put a wet paper towel on it. I wasn't told anything at pick up.

Took her to A&E and it's broken. I am furious. She has Type 1 diabetes too and we've been having a lot of problems with their care of her which I've posted about before, so now with this it makes me think they just don't watch them properly at all. How can I expect them to notice when her blood sugar drops if they can't notice a broken bone?

Send in a written complaint to the head of the school. YANBU.

I hope your daughter is feeling better!

Yes yes, a letter to the school.

That's awful. Definitely complain to the head.

Sometimes a broken bone is hard to spot. Having said that, school should have told you that dd hurt her hand!
Was this logged in the accident book?
Ask the school for their complaints procedure and start complaining. This, on top of poor diabetes management, is not acceptable at all.

Ask to see the accident book - bet they haven't logged it as an incident.

Sometimes a broken bone in the hand is notoriously hard to spot (I work in a school) but the swelling would be an indication that something was wrong, even if tissue damage. I would have expected that ice be applied, a sling put on (just to keep the hand still), and teacher informed to keep an eye on the child, initially. If child still complains of pain after, say, an hour, parent would be informed because this would indicate that damage may have been done (rather than a bruise which usually stops being painful after a time).

However, the diabetes you mention is an added concern though because hands and feet need to be looked after and checked for injuries. We have pupils with diabetes and their health is taken very seriously. Children are growing and developing all the time, hypos and hypers can happen suddenly so a strict testing procedure and monitoring is undertaken and all support staff (and child's teacher) are trained to deal with diabetic children. We have regular visits by the Diabetic Nurse who talks to new staff about procedures and answers questions.

If you have concerns about the way your child's diabetes is being dealt with, contact your diabetic nurse and see if he/she can come to the school to talk to staff about working with diabetic children/parents. Ask who the support staff are who deal with your child's testing and monitoring procedure.

It is in everyone's interest to get this right and prevent unnecessary suffering for the child.

Thanks everybody. It's that it was obviously swollen and she was crying in pain, so clearly something was wrong even if they didn't know it was broken.

Tabby, your school sounds fantastic. DD's nurse is actually going in tomorrow to do some more training as they have been really lax and downright careless at times. And now this. I feel like she isn't even safe there anymore.

:(

Oh dear op

I can imagine you feel worried that she is safe in their care after all this! How is she now?

I do know breaks can be missed for a while but if she was as bad as you say someone shoukd have said something! I would be doing my nut tbh

Sometimes kids cover up the pain they are in and don't break down until they are away from their peers. I teach and a few years ago I (thankfully) saw and heard a child trip when running at speed, do a "ninja roll" and land on head/shoulder. She hardly cried at all! But because I'd seen it, I knew it was a bad fall. And because I knew her, I knew that if she was crying at all, she was hurt. Took her in-no mark, no bump. That alarmed me more as Id heard her head hit the Tarmac! I'm spite of the lack of anything to see her mum was phoned-as that is policy with head bumps. Tears only started again when she saw mum and as she got into car she began to vomit. It turned out she had fractured skull and broken collar none and was in hospital for 5 days. If I hadn't seen and heard it though-and hadn't "known" my kids-she could have been initially fobbed off with the magical healing powers of a wet paper towel too!

If breaks were that easy to spot then there would be no need for x ray machines and often the swelling doesn't begin for hours.

In my sport broken bones are common, and a very reliable indicator is that white-grey pallor and it is worrying that they did not notice that.

Gosh this is difficult: school first aiders don't have X-ray vision to spot broken limbs and they only have four days of training to cover a multitude of diseases/accidents/chronic issues. Don't be too harsh on them please and focus on your daughter getting better. The diabetes issue is far more serious in my opinion and needs a care plan immediately. Good luck and I hope your daughter is ok.

YANBU to be cross that they didn't mention it you. I know broken bones are not always easy to spot, especially in children, but it should have been recorded. I'd ask to see the accident book.

Your poor DD, hope she is feeling better this evening.

I don't plan on going in there all guns blazing. My mum is actually the chair of the governors and she said that I need to ask if they did a risk assessment before letting the children play with actual full sized tyres.

The diabetes issue is obviously more pressing but I can't help feel as though this is representative of their whole attitude towards 'care'. I don't expect that they would have been able to diagnose a broken hand, but I would expect them to have realised it was swollen and that she was in pain. She did tell them, repeatedly, and was just told to keep a paper towel on it.

The thing is, they know that she rarely speaks up when she's feeling bad - this has been a problem with her diabetes, in that she won't tell them even when she's feeling herself going low. So for her to speak up and cry, they should have taken more notice IMO.

Like others say - in a child a broken bone is very easy to miss. Often the swelling doesn't show up until a long while after. And often, at school, children do not tell teachers that it really does hurt - they often mask their pain until they see mummy/daddy.

However, any accident should have been logged and, in EYFS ideally parents told at pick up. Though sometimes the latter can be missed if busy and the child is not complaining of pain. But the log should still be there including what time, what happened, what checks/treatment happened and by whom.

The diabetes thing is different though and school should be taking care. if they have agreed to take care of her treatment then they should be doing just that. Had the school nurse been in to speak to them about it at all?

I worked for nearly a week with a broken hand, before deciding I ought to have it checked out. Also I remember stoically carrying on when seriously ill as an adult, taking myself to hospital appointments... until my mum arrived to stay at my house and then I burst in to tears and lost all oomph to do anything.

As a teacher I've seen many children adamant they are OK, but dissolve into tears at the sight of their mum at home time and that's just with a papercut, grazed knee or bad cough. There is something about seeing mummy that makes all the coping disappear and the need come out, in adults as well as children.

Hi, I can't really comment on the way they handled the incident with the broken hand, but I would like to say that a care plan and risk assessments should be made with regards to the diabetes. You cannot afford to leave it to the professional care of others. A care plan and action protocol is quite important to have on site (in the school) imo, and all relevant staff should be made to sign the front page stating that they have read and absorbed the information in the care plan, and leave it permanently accessible to all of them to check in case of doubt.

I really wish more people would write out care plans for themselves or their children when they have an important health concern. It's no good saying the staff should know their business - it's like purposely crashing your car because you knew you were in the right - you've still got a smashed up car.

I broke a bone in my hand and didn't realize it until 2 weeks later when as it was still hurting I went to A&E when it was X-rayed, and I'm an adult (supposedly!)

I broke the middle bone in my right hand (the one from middle knuckle to wrist) in two places in my late teens / early 20s. Didn't think twice about it (I did know i'd dislocated the finger, but a gentle pull had put it back into its socket, so I hadn't sought help).

Only went to hospital the next day, when my hand was up like a football - but then only after seeing the GP. I did have the sense to take the bus not cycle the few miles to the hospital, though (belated moment of common sense!)