"Special needles" primary school children with diabetes

[Copepod]

Article in today's Guardian Education section, online at http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/feb/17/diabetes-children
Covers both problems (featuring Joel Quinn of Combe Down CoE Primary School in Bath, now being home-schooled, but aiming for secondary school) and examples of good practice eg County Durham & Darlington NHS Foundation Trust.

 

[Lizzie]

I was diagnosed at 11, and never expected a teacher, parents or anyone else to inject me or monitor my condition. I never had any help from my school that I can remember, maybe a little support when I was diagnosed but certainly from secondary school onwards I was on my own. It is different for younger children though. I think my school should have been more aware, they were lucky I was sky high all the time and never had a hypo.

 

[Adrienne]

Hi

Joel Quinn's parents, Danni and Joe are good friends of mine. We met through children with diabetes and have known them for a number of years. The article is great but the treatment was a lot worse than it has made out. He was pretty much bullied by teachers and children and yet when he retaliated, he was punished as the bully. He got a reputation for being trouble but only ever fought back. He continuously was high or low, never in between and had no help dealing with it from an extremely young age.

The problem is regimes have changed so much with the introduction of MDI (bolus/basal) and more pumps that there has to be intervention at school and it cannot always be the parents. Most of my friends have had to give up work so that they can go in and inject or be available. It is so very very wrong. If a child is in a wheelchair they get a statement on medical grounds very easily, there are two such children at my daughter's school. They are both fab kids and very bright, it is just physcial. However they are both fully statemented on medical grounds for help. Nothing can happen to them at school. A diabetic child has practically no chance of having a statement on medical grounds yet they need so much intervention, especially at a young age. They need a lot of extra help and attention due to the new regimes but as diabetes is the 'invisible' medical condition, it is not serious and of course nothing can happen to them at school and no-one needs to help!!!! What twaddle! The government need to make laws changing this and they need to do it promptly. There are a group of parents battling in the background with MPs and anyone else to try to get this changed but it is hard. This is the same group of parents who got the Change 4 Life adverts and advertising propoganda changed themselves.

Any parent who wants to meet other parents on the net or in person should go to www.childrenwithdiabetesuk.org and join the mailing list. It is a real lifeline and a very active group all the time. You will learn more and get more help there than from any second rate team.

Adrienne 🙂