So the role of a school nurse is very varied, no one day is ever the same. We cover a wide
range of different health issues, which include safeguarding, immunisations, doing school nurse
drop in clinics at school and also looking after the health and well being of young
people and their families. School nurses have an important role in
the health and well being of young people, often as a first port of call. People will come to them
when they need support and then we can help direct them as to which is the best
NHS provision for them. Young people go to their
school nurses for help on drugs advice, particularly if a young person is having
issues at home. There could be a young person that is in fear of pregnancy so they visit their
school nurses for a range of different things. I moved into school nursing having been working
in oncology because I found I wanted to be there for young people, through their school journey
and helping prevent all the issues that may come up health wise for them, so it was very much for
me being at the preventative stage, public health.
As part of the drop in we see children for a variety of different reasons,
including sexual health, healthy eating, emotional health and well-being. Really what we are there to
do is to make an assessment of how that child presenting and to offer support and advice if
necessary. Ideally it
is somebody else you can talk to, ideally a third party who doesn’t have anything to do
with the problems that I was facing, and I think it was really helpful for me because I could
go and see her anytime that I wanted and she helped me in any way that she could.
Guidance about if you are concerned about your weight, if you are concerned about your smoking,
if you are concerned about anything. We do a holistic assessment which
means we don’t just focus on the one thing that comes in, we also incorporate other aspects. So
for example if somebody comes in wanting to know about drugs and alcohol we can discuss
that and will signpost and refer to another agency if needed for specialist support.
So as a school nurse there’s lots of opportunities for lifelong learning and for career progression.
Now you could decide to specialise in child protection because obviously as a school nurse
we do lots of that so you could decide that’s the particular interest you have
and you want to stay in that field. You could also maybe look to go into specialist nurse
roles such as asthma, diabetes or epilepsy again given the opportunity to work with young people
and their families in those sort of roles. School nursing as a career is excellent when
you work within the NHS. It’s very flexible. I have colleagues who come from all walks of life
and we all find that school nursing gives us what we need in terms of
flexibility and in terms of career progression. As a school nurse you will progress through the
pay bands which means that as a school nurse you start at band five and you can progress up to band
eight which means there is more financial gain for yourself if that’s what you want.
There are very good opportunities for training and development when you are actually working
in practice. There are opportunities to go on courses if you are particularly interested in
a specific area of school nursing. It’s such a broad remit school nursing that there are very
many areas that people may become specialised in. It’s also lovely to be part of the NHS
and be under the NHS umbrella, you are first and foremost a nurse within the NHS and you
never lose that really so I think that’s a very important factor about school nursing.
School nurses are playing a significant role in addressing and meeting the needs of children
of families in schools. We are one of the few practitioners that are working very closely with
the schools and with families and children. I often leave work feeling a sense of
fulfilment and a sense that I’ve been able to help a young person and their families.