School Nurses's Management for Schoolchildren with Headache

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: Recurrent headaches are common among Korean students, causing absences from school or learning impediments. However, most school nurses are unable to provide appropriate diagnosis and treatment as they lack accurate information about the clinical aspects or treatment of headaches. The aim of this study was to investigate school nurses's clinical knowledge, assessment, and management of headache and educational needs in headache management. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study targeting 250 school nurses who participated in the training lecture hosted by and were working at elementary, middle, and high schools. Surveys with insufficient data were excluded. RESULTS: Participants were 237 school nurses; 122 elementary school nurses, 62 middle school nurses, and 53 high school nurses, with an average age of 42.4±8.8 years. In all, 58.2% of the school nurses responded that they had received headache education, 68.8% responded that they knew the classifications of a headache, and 38.4% responded that they knew a headache assessment method. Only, 29% had a protocol for headache treatment. The educational needs (0-7 points) of school nurses to manage students with headaches were 5.8 for headache knowledge education, 5.5 for acute pharmacotherapy, 5.0 for preventive pharmacotherapy, 6.0 for lifestyle modification, and 6.0 for complementary remedy. CONCLUSION: School nurses had high educational needs for headache management but, they had insufficient knowledge of headaches and had not a protocol for the headache management in most cases. It suggests that headache knowledge education should be performed and the standardized headache management guideline should be developed to improve the performance of school nurses.