HEAD START®

Caring for Children with
Chronic Conditions

Training Guides for the Head Start Learning Community

Table of Contents | Preface | Introduction | Module 1 | Module 2 | Module 3
| Continuing Professional Development | Resources

Module 1: Activity 4 - How Are We Doing? Module 1 | Activity 1 | Activity 2 | Activity 3 | Activity 4 | Next StepsPurpose: This activity helps assess how well the program is caring for children with chronic conditions, and determine what policies, protocols, training, and planning might be needed to improve the care. This activity is helpful as both a needs assessment and action plan–beginning the school year or opening a training, and ending the school year or concluding a training.

For this activity you will need:

• Handout H: How Are We Doing?
  
  
• Flip chart paper and marker
  

Step 1: Set up a meeting of the management team to develop a plan to assess how well the program is caring for children with chronic conditions and how their care can be improved. Briefly discuss some of the children with chronic conditions in the program:

• What chronic conditions do the children have?
  
  
• What are the children's care needs in Head Start?
  
  
• What do you think the program does well to care for and support these children and their families?
  
  
• What are your concerns and what could the program do better to care for and support these children and families?

Step 2: Develop a plan to do a more detailed assessment of the program's care for children with chronic conditions:

• What are the questions that we need to ask to find out how we're doing and what we need to do better to care for children with chronic conditions?

Review Handout H: How Are We Doing? Add any other questions that you may have.

• What are the sources of information to assess how we're doing and what we need to do better to care for children with chronic conditions?

Make a plan for who to interview (e.g., staff, parents, children, service providers) and what records to review (e.g., child health records, family assessments, IEPs, and IFSPs).

• Who will be responsible for which interviews and record reviews?
  
  
• What is our timeframe for completing our assessment?

Step 3: Complete the interviews and record reviews according to the plan.

Step 4: Set up another meeting of the management team to review the information gathered:

• What are the children's care needs in Head Start?
  
  
• What is the program doing well to care for and support these children and their families?

List on flip chart paper under the title, "Successes." Next, ask the team:

• What could the program do better to care for and support these children and their families?

List on flip chart paper under the title, "Needs." Ask:

• Did you discover anything in the needs assessment that you were not previously aware of? If so, how could we increase our awareness of these things in the future?

Step 5: Congratulate yourselves on the program's successes in caring for children with chronic conditions. Then focus on the needs for improvement. For every need, discuss and write down which of the following might be needed:

• Improved Communication among Staff, Families, and Service Providers
  
  
• Policies, Protocols, and Procedures
  
  
• Staffing
  
  
• Curriculum and Activities
  
  
• Training
  
  
• Technical Assistance
  
  
• Supplies and Equipment
  
  
• Facilities
  

Be as specific as possible (e.g., Training for the classroom teacher, aide, and bus driver to administer Hayley's inhaled medication for asthma). Step 6: Present the needs assessment to the Health Services Advisory Committee. Discuss the priorities and work together to develop a more detailed action plan. Identify resources in the training guides, local community, and Head Start training and technical assistance providers to help address the needs. Step 7: Repeat the needs assessment within the year to evaluate progress toward the goals and revise the plan for improvement.

Points to Consider:

• Caring for children with chronic conditions often requires accommodations in many areas including communication, policies, staffing, training, technical assistance, supplies, and facilities.
  
  
• Improving the care of children with chronic conditions in Head Start requires an ongoing process of assessing the needs, planning actions, following through on actions, re-assessing the needs, and revising plans.
  
  
• General training for staff about caring children with chronic conditions is helpful, but it can never replace individualized planning for the health care of a specific child in Head Start.