This is a recent article printed at brainerddispatch as part of the ISD 121 special edition. COMMUNITY SUPPORTS Hearing AND Vision screening Programs By Jodie Tweed If a child is having difficulty seeing what is written on the whiteboard in the front of the classroom or is missing some of the verbal instructions given by a teacher, it can have a serious impact on learning. But a unique partnership forged between Brainerd Public Schools, the Brainerd Area Sertoma Club, Brainerd Lions Club and Central Lakes College’s nursing program is making sure that all students in first- through ninth-grade in the district are screened at least every other year for hearing and vision loss. The school district has around 7,000 students and only two school district nurses, Mary Lastovich and Aimee Jambor, so volunteer support is critical for the nursing staff to conduct the regular fall screening clinics for first-, third-, fifth-, seventh- and ninth-grade classes. They try to hold the clinics as early as possible each fall so they can catch any hearing or vision problems at the beginning of the school year, often mid-September through November. To keep classroom disruptions to a minimum at Forestview Middle School and Brainerd High School South Campus, an entire grade is screened over the course of one school day, or about 500 students. Students are pulled out of class for the screenings, one class at a time, so about 60-70 students are screened within a 50-minute class period. It can make for a busy session as volunteers work quickly and efficiently to ensure students are able to make it to their next class before the bell rings. At the elementary schools, all first- and third-grade students are screened by school on scheduled dates. If a student fails the basic vision test, then his or her parents will receive a letter of referral by the district nursing staff to see an optometrist for further vision testing. If a student fails to hear a couple of the tones during the hearing screening, then the student will be rescreened again in a couple of weeks to make sure he or she didn’t have a cold that could have interfered with the results. Jambor said older students who participate in the fall duck and deer hunting seasons will exhibit temporary hearing loss from firing hunting rifles, which can skew their hearing results. If the student fails a second hearing test, then the parents are notified. Jambor said close to one-third of the approximately 2,500 students screened each fall are sent for a referral, either for new glasses or a prescription adjustment. A smaller number of students are referred for hearing difficulties. The clinics aren’t mandatory, but are recommended by the Minnesota Department of Health. “I think it’s one of the best services that district nursing provides for the students in the district,” said Jambor. “If they can’t see the board, they aren’t able to see what is going on. They’re bored. (Vision loss) definitely affects their learning.” Lastovich said younger students may be unaware they’re having difficulty seeing or hearing well. For more than 20 years, Brainerd Sertomans have volunteered at these clinics to help provide additional stations to screen students, so more students could be seen at the same e time. The club’s mission involves hearing loss, so they take their efforts to the next level. If a student does need a hearing aid or additional hearing assistance and the parents are unable to afford it, the club will help pay for it. Sertomans also have donated many of the audiometers used during the district’s hearing screenings. They have been helping to replace the outdated machines. This year they donated four new machines. “The volunteers all feel good about volunteering,” explained Bob Ehrich, a Brainerd Sertoman who helps coordinate Sertoman volunteers for the clinics. “It’s an easy sell for me to stand up at our meetings and say how many we need.” Brainerd Sertomans also have purchased audio amplification systems for many of the school classrooms in the district, allowing teachers to quietly give instructions to students without having to compete with classroom or hallway noises. Trina and Joe Johnson were so grateful for the financial support they received from the Brainerd Lions Club, which helped pay for their son’s vision therapy, that they became Lions themselves. The Brainerd Lions help families having difficulty paying for eyewear or eye doctor appointments. The district nursing office has applications for families who wish to apply for financial assistance. “The Lions were able to help our family out and we wanted to pay it forward,” Johnson explained. “We wanted to be part of that and help other families in the way we were helped. It’s just an amazing group of people, all of the Lions, to do the things they do and to help the community so much.” The Brainerd Lions are starting a new program this fall that involves vision screenings for preschool children enrolled in the district, said Johnson. For the past four years, Central Lakes College’s nursing program has provided volunteer nursing students to work with district nursing staff to help screen students. The student nurses are able to apply what they’re learning in the classroom into a real world situation, while also earning clinical or community service hours that are applied toward their degrees. “It’s a win-win all-around,” said Connie Frisch, director of nursing at Central Lakes College, both Brainerd and Staples campuses. “The students love it, and they get exposure to all pediatric age groups. It’s important to their learning, talking to a first-grader and a seventh-grader is two very different things.” Frisch said often a nursing instructor will accompany about nine nursing students to the clinics. Because of their efforts, the district can screen larger number of students more efficiently. She said some students enjoy volunteering in the schools so much that they’ll help with head lice checks in the spring and teach hand washing to young students during the rest of the school year. The nursing students help fill out the referral forms for students and learn the paperwork side of being a school nurse. Other area school districts heard about CLC’s partnership with Brainerd Public Schools and now they are helping with hearing and vision clinics at Pierz, Little Falls, Crosby-Ironton, Staples-Motley, and Nah-Ah-Shing School in Onamia. Sacred Heart Catholic School in Staples is in the process of being added as another school partnership. “The students are there, the school nurses are there and the volunteers,” said Frisch. “It really is a neat community effort.”
Posted on: Mon, 04 Nov 2013 19:19:46 +0000
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