The purpose of this interdisciplinary descriptive study was to examine the perceptions of nurses, school personnel, and parents about school reentry for children with cancer and to determine whether activities and services performed supported school reentry. The study also investigated parents' perception of the impact of cancer on their child's academic performance, cognitive ability, and school attendance. Results of the study showed that few activities and services were performed to facilitate children's school reentry by either nurses or school personnel. Parents reported no significant differences in their children's cognitive ability or academic performance. School attendance was significantly lower after diagnosis and therapy. Conclusions were that communication among nurses, school personnel, and parents was a major barrier to providing effective services to students and their parents. Nurses were unsure of how to help parents navigate the school bureaucracy, school personnel felt they needed more information, and parents felt that their children were not receiving all the school reentry services needed. Individuals in this study recommended that a liaison position be created to coordinate services.

The need for successful nutrition interventions is critical as the prevalence of childhood obesity increases. Thus, this pilot project examines the effect of a nutrition education program, Color My Pyramid, on children's nutrition knowledge, self-care practices, activity levels, and nutrition status. Using a pretest-posttest, quasiexperimental design, 126 fourth- and fifth-grade students from experimental and control schools are compared. The intervention program incorporates an online component www.MyPyramid.gov, Orem's Self-Care Deficit Nursing Theory, and consists of six classes taught over a 3-month period. Results indicated that the program increased nutrition knowledge in the control group. Furthermore, it increased activity time from pretest to posttest and decreased systolic blood pressure for children in both groups; however, there were no significant differences in BMI percentiles. The findings indicate that Color My Pyramid can be successfully employed in school settings and thus support school nursing practice.

No abstract