Published: 30 January 2007
Amicus in Crunch Talks on Jobs Crisis
Amicus believes that the school nurse crisis in Cornwall is getting worse – despite Health Secretary, Patricia Hewitt branding the workload of one school nurse in the county as ‘horrific.’
Amicus/ The Community Practitioners’ and Health Visitors’ Association (CPHVA) understands - that since the minister’s comment in October - one health visitor who has been covering school nursing is going on leave for six months and will not be replaced.
One qualified school nurse has handed in her notice because she is relocating and her job has not yet been advertised.
Amicus Head of Health, Kevin Coyne and Amicus/CPHVA Professional Officer for School Health are due to have crunch talks with managers at Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Primary Care Trust (PCT) on Thursday, 1 February over the deteriorating situation.
In Cornwall, there are believed to be 15 part-time school nurses and two full timers. Of these, only seven (including the one who has handed in her notice), have the one-year specialist public health qualification. There are a further 15 part-time staff nurses.
There are a total of 31 secondary schools and more than 240 primaries, as well as some special schools for children with disabilities, in Cornwall.
Kevin Coyne said:
“The loss of another school nurse in the trust will be yet another blow to the health of Cornish school children, if that post is not replaced.
The diminishing number of school nurses will affect counselling for such problems as teenage sexual health, the obesity time bomb, mental health and drink and drug problems.
The stress on overworked school nurses will affect their own health for the worse. This situation can't continue”.
One Cornish school nurse revealed at the Amicus/CPHVA conference last October that she had a 9,000 caseload to Patricia Hewitt – a situation that the minister described as ‘horrific’.
Kevin Coyne continued:
“As the staff situation is getting worse rather than better, there is no prospect of improving the service.
How can you meet the government's public health guidelines, if the frontline staff supposed to be carrying out this agenda is being decimated by job cuts and recruitment freezes?”
Further information
CPHVA website
RCN Census Survey of School Nurses
Related article
One and a Half Seconds per Child
Excessive Workloads in the NHS
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