On our cover this month, Head Start nursing supervisor Travia Williams weighs a student in the program's classroom at Cocoa High School in Brevard County, Florida. Williams and her colleagues travel to the county's Head Start program sites to provide screening, physicals, and other health care services to the children enrolled in these school readiness programs.
The role of the school nurse has seen many changes in recent years. Budget cuts have reduced the number of school nurses, causing many to have to move between several assigned schools. According to the National Association of School Nurses (NASN), a third of all school districts in the United States have reduced nursing staff and a quarter don't have any nurses at all. In those districts, medical emergencies are typically handled by a school's front office staff-and there is the potential for more emergencies now than ever.
School nurses are treating increasingly complex medical conditions and chronic illnesses. "Professional responsibilities have not changed overall," said Carolyn Duff, president of the NASN, in an October 24, 2013, article in USA Today. "What has changed is the increasing number of students with chronic health conditions, including asthma, diabetes, and severe allergies. All of these conditions have the potential for life-threatening emergencies." For more on the important role school nurses play in handling these health emergencies, see this month's In Our Community article, "Emergency Anaphylaxis at School."-Michael Fergenson, senior editorial coordinator