Phone call from school; they’re ’not medically trained’ ?!

[mommalaulau]

Dd1 (13) went to school this morning as normal. All fine.

Phone call around 11 from the first aider to say she had “spots on her left cheek and they’re itchy”. I asked if it was hives, they said no. They wanted me to go up, get her, take her to the chemist to “get her checked and give her some antihistamine” and then bring her back to school.

I got there just expecting her to have literally a spot or two and her being over dramatic, she’s a teenager! But she has a cheek of hives and it’s also behind her ears, bottom of her neck and on her forehead. I immediately said to the first aider that it was hives, and she just gave me a smug look as if to say “you’re not trained what do you know”.
I took her straight to the chemist and he said it was definitely hives, for her to take some antihistamine immediately (which he actually went out and got and dosed and gave her) and to keep and eye on her for the rest of the day as she doesn’t know what caused it. He also said it is very concerning the school first aider couldn’t recognise hives and I should question that.

I called school when we returned home to let them know she wasn’t going back in for the afternoon as I was going to be keeping an eye on her, and whoever answered the phone said “yes of course that’s completely understandable”.
I then mentioned I was concerned that I was told it wasn’t hives. I said if a child with a known allergy presented with hives as their first reaction before anaphylaxis and a first aider didn’t recognise it that’s extremely worrying. I was told that they’re “not medically trained” but they’ll pass the message on. When they told me this I said surely, for allergy reasons, they must know how hives present? And I just kept getting that they’re “not medically trained”.

Does anybody think I need to take this any further or should I just leave it at this with whoever I spoke with? My DD is luckily ok and her itching has gone down but the hives are still slightly up, we have no idea what’s caused it.

They can’t diagnose and so signposted you. They did their job.

I would bloody hate to be a teacher.

Sounds like the first aider's response was spot on. They thought it warranted a call home and for your child to be seen by a pharmacist and treated with anti-histamines. Which is exactly what you did.

I feel like perhaps you have beef with the school? You firstly assumed that you didn't even need to be called. Then you jumped to a conclusion about someone looking at you smugly. You were treated politely by the person who answered the phone to your, frankly, unreasonable complaint but you're not happy with that either.

@AirFryerCrumpet you are totally right, when the OP said a child with an allergy I thought she meant her child, not a hypothetical child! I retract the lot 😂

OP the heart of your concern here is the safety of children, I can see that.

It’s been said a lot, first aiders are not medical professionals so can give top line signpost advice, so no point saying it again.

I do believe though that you are being very unreasonable with your expectations of the first aiders.

Im glad that you are on it on behalf of kids, you are not doing any harm asking a question, however I do hope though that you haven’t impacted the confidence of the first aider who after all will be doing it voluntarily probably not n top of their day job.

I've been doing regular first aid courses since I was a teenager (I'm 60 now). Hives has never once been mentioned.

Also I might not have recognised it as when I get hives it presents as welts.

Hope your daughter feels better soon.

I dont see how it is an inappropriate response.
If I had seen this rash, even knowing that the child had a penicillin alergy, I would have called the parent to say that spots had appeared, which, in my opinion, didnt look like hives and that she might want to get her child checked out.
I'm more surprised by the pharmacists saying it's definitely hives!
At school we only have antihistamine in the medical kits of the children with a medical care plan, or if a parent sends it in with a medical form for hayfever/allergies.
I am first aid trained (1 day paediatric), epipen trained and have an epipen myself (as does one of my children)

I think you’re right OP! They should be allergy aware and give antihistamine asap. Hopefully she had a medical plan and meds at school?

Op
You're being ridiculous.
A work first aider can't diagnose or prescribe. Are you really expecting that someone who did a short course would make a unilateral decision and then give medication? Can you not appreciate how badly that could go wrong? For a person who is likely to be woefully poorly paid?

What do you mean by 'allergy aware'?
Schools can't give out antihistamine without a medical form or a care plan (I can't imagine a care plan would be in place with a penicillin allergy). A child may have had antihistamine before coming into school, and they wouldn't know.

Pretty sure I recognise your data. Please get the thread deleted

Daughter!!

I think the school dealt with it fine and you are overreacting.

TBH I wouldn’t have said that was hives as the hives I’ve seen are much worse than that, (more red, more blotchy and quite angry looking, I personally would have thought it was an allergic reaction to something.

It is not up to a first aider to diagnose though. They are trained to keep the patient safe until help arrives, be that an ambulance if there is an accident or acute medical conditional or a parent/carer to take the pupil to seek medical help or go home. If your dd has allergies is there a formal plan to administer antihistamines or for her to do so herself?

Meds for what?

Kids with allergies will have meds at school, ie antihistamine and EpiPens

Seems like a whole lot of education is still needed around this.

As a teacher (primary) I had a 4 hour First Aid course nearly 3 years ago. They are VERY basic!! Nothing about rashes at all…advice here is to ALWAYS defer this to parents. Our course covered minor cuts and abrasions, ‘ankle twist’ type injuries, choking and vomiting, then we had ‘a go’ resuscitating the doll thing and using a pretend de-fibrillation machine.

In the intervening 3 years I’ve dealt with wobbly teeth, nose bleeds, diarrhoea, cuts and grazes (including bumped heads) and been thrown up on 🤢

On the odd occasion I’ve been presented with any kind of rash, parents have been called. The results have varied from: heat rash, chicken pox, ‘viral’ (🤷‍♀️), slap cheek, scarlet fever, hand, foot and mouth!

The only one of those I was very confident identifying was chicken pox.

It was correct that you were called OP.

If a child has allergies that require an epipen, they will have a care plan and meds at school (this will be specific and relevant to their plan). There will be adults in the school who have had anaphylaxis training.
If a child has allergies that require antihistamine (eg hayfever) they may have meds in school that require a phone call before administering (because they may have had some before coming in to school) and a medical form signed by the parent/carer, that gives permission to administer the medicine.
The above applies to other conditions such as asthma, diabetes and epilepsy and all schools will have a policy around medical conditions and a first aid policy that is available to parents

Seems like a whole lot of education is still needed around this.
I'd be interested to know what further education you feel would be helpful.

Except children who have EpiPens also have antihistamines in case of hives, so it’s pretty important whoever is in charge of the medical plans acts fast on identifying hives (then calling the parents like what happened here) and be ready to act if it’s a precursor to anaphylaxis

I get hives from sun allergy and this looks completely different to what I call hives.
A first aider has no medical training whatseover, just a day course in how to do recovery positions, put a bandage on and what not, not diognosing skin conditions and allergies.
There is no reason why a first aider would know how to assess if a skin condition is hives.
I understand you would be worried. But they did away with school nurses years ago.

Here you go (if genuine and not being facetious)

www.bsaci.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Model-Policy-for-allergy-management-at-school-v318.01.pdf

As I say, the school will have meds... and the child's care plan will have specifics of how the allergic reaction presents on that child. Adults will 100% err on the side of caution with regards to antihistamines/inhalers alongside calling parents.
However in the case of the OP, they did not have an epipen, and I assume no care plan ... so calling the parents to alert them of the rash was the appropriate thing to do

That doesn't apply in this case though, does it?

But it doesn’t sound like OPs daughter has an EpiPen nor needs to keep antihistamines on her, so they wouldn’t have meds for her?

As a 'first aider', if a child with known allergies, an epi-pen and care plan came up in itchy spots I would err on the side of caution and give them their antihistamine while calling the parent.

If any other child came up in itchy spots I would call the parent to collect and get checked out.
If the parent asked if it was hives, I could say in my opinion it just looks like spots but as I'm not medically trained they should ask a pharmacist.