Sunday, November 27, 2011

School Health at Gila River


During the last two weeks of our semester, we were able to spend time in school health nursing. For two weeks, we traveled to each of the seven districts on the reservation, which each have their own public school system. We administered influenza vaccinations to students in pre-school through twelfth grade, using the live nasal vaccines and the Bioject needless systems. It was very interesting to use both of these vaccines because neither of us had used them prior to working at Gila River.
I had heard about the live nasal vaccines before, because FPB participated in a flu clinic where they were administered. I had never heard of the Bioject system. It was really interesting to learn how to use the Bioject. It is positioned just as a traditional IM injection is, on the deltoid muscle of the arm. Carbon dioxide is released at a very high speed and is injected into the muscle. Apparently the vaccine is distributed over a wider area of muscle tissue, and the students seemed to be less afraid of a needless system than they were of the traditional IM injections.
I really enjoyed working with the school aged children, and learning to use these new vaccine methods made this part of my capstone entertaining.

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