Illness advice from school (well.. NHS)

[WhimsicalMoth]

See attached photo ... Did anybody else get this from their childrens school? It came attached to the weekly newsletter on Friday.
It's supposedly the NHS advice, but it seems ludicrous to me that you would send your child to school with hand foot and mouth... and threadworms ???
I can just about understand tonsillitis if it is under control with antibiotics or glandular fever
If they are taking painkillers etc.
but even head lice, I would be inclined to keep my child off until treated for this.
Would you send your child to school with threadworms or hand foot and mouth disease?
And would you be happy for your child to socialise with other children that do have these without your knowledge, at school??

Send them in with tonsillitis and glandular fever? Really? My niece was in hospital with glandular fever and I used to be really unwell with tonsillitis as a teenager.

Yes you can send them in, once they are not unwell with it. Glandular fever infections for example can last months.

Keeping a child at home for threadworms is non-sensical on many levels. It's so common that there are probably at least a few kids in the class with it at any time, not just the one kid whose parents identified the issue that week. And the infected child has probably been coming in with worms for a while before anyone even cottoned on to the problem ... So it seems silly to randomly keep them at home from the point someone has initiated hygiene measures and started treatment..

My dd is in year 3 and has had threadworms three times and headlice twice. All that happens is there is an email that gets sent home saying "there's been a case of threadworms in year 2". I think a lot of kids have threadworms but no symptoms so it is always being spread round. My dd is a finger chewer so I think that's how she gets it. I think that guidance sounds pretty sensible. I'm a teacher myself. Imagine if I took all that time off to stay at home with my perfectly well child!

Again, in my opinion it's not about whether they are "perfectly well" or not. It's about not spreading such things to other children which then inconveniences more families.

You're never going to eliminate the likes of headlice or threadworms though so all you'd be doing is depriving your child of their education.

Problem is, not everyone would follow that. Maybe even most people wouldn’t. There was a boy in my dd’s class who threw up everywhere and said he’d been sick at home that morning. Parents lie. Yes, the sickness bug did slowly go round the class.

The point is you can send them in if they're not unwell with it, not that you always must send them in even if they're really ill.

In contrast to chicken pox for example, where even if they're totally fine, you must keep them off.

Whenever myself and my children get tonsillitis it always floors us, not a chance id send them in whilst feeling that unwell- they wouldn’t learn a thing so utterly pointless apart from meeting attendance guidelines. I’d send them in if they
had thread work or nits as I’d already have treated them the night before. HFM I’ve no personal experience of, but if my children are genuinely feeling ill they would be kept at home.

Months of isolation and home schooling didn't stop threadworms or nits so keeping them off to be treated now won't make a difference. The children could have been infected for days, if not weeks before anyone notices!

Yes, we got this a few weeks ago from one of our schools.

It goes some way to explaining the absolute plague of threadworms and nits the junior school are currently experiencing.

With threadworms and headlice by the time you know your child has it at least half the class has it 💁

I'd keep a child with headlice off until we had treated it.

I'd expect therefore for them to be coming in at most 2 hours late, time to go to pharmacy, get treatment, get home, treat, and go in.

I believe the rash is the last symptom and once the appears it's no longer contagious. Prior to that symptoms would be that of a cold so people probably send their children in.

I have never really thought about worms and lice as my kids are so young, I would definitely keep them off to treat them but once they are treated I would send them in, but this is because I don’t think they would still be contagious, I could be wrong on that though! I definitely wouldn’t send them in actively sick though but I’m a position to stay off to mind them and I do understand that some others don’t have that luxury. It’s super annoying though how much sickness comes home in terms of colds ect as we all end up with the germs!

You can catch threadworms anywhere... clubs and sports... church... restaurants... and schools.

If I'd kept DS off every time he had threadworms he'd never have been in school and I'd probs have been fined for poor attendance. Damned if you do damned if you don't.

And by the time you show symptoms of worms you're already about a week late to stop them spreading.

I wish people would adhere to the advice about D&V. My daughter tells me children get sent home if they vomit at school but many return the next day 🙁

The thing is threadworm eggs are everywhere including in soil and on unwashed veg. Many people can have them and by symptomless for ages. By the time your child let's you know their bum is itchy or they are problems sleeping its too late to keep them off to stop it spreading.

You need to be prioritising your child's education more. Why in god's name would you keep your child off with head lice?

Out of interest, what's your kids absence percentage so far this year?

Well that's up to the school to adhere to too. They should be telling parents to pick them up as it's not been 48 hours. I'd complain to head as they're not following their own procedures.

You can treat headlice in the evening. No need for time off school.

Often kids getting glandular fever and tonsillitis are actually getting it because they are very run down …I’ve met loads of adults with CFS /ME whose trigger infection was glandular fever as a young person (mine was a throat infection) so I wouldn’t push my kids to go to school with certain infections unless they’ve have had adequate recovery time. With head lice/ worms I think its worth keeping the treatments in the cupboard…head lice were the bane of our primary so I wouldn’t keep them off but do a treatment the night I found the eggs. I echo pp about people not complying with the 48 hr rule with d&v…why?!

I've never worked in any school which would allow a child back the next day when they visibly saw the child vomit less than 24 hours ago. That's not exactly a common situation and you need to be questioning it.

I echo pp about people not complying with the 48 hr rule with d&v…why?!

Because they're selfish inconsiderate twats. Aside from not caring about spreading it round, it's horrible to make teachers and other school staff deal with your child's vomit.