I'm on a paediatric placement at the moment which is going pretty well. I feel that i'm learning a lot because we're doing stuff that we either didnt really do at uni or stuff that didnt seem to be a priority at uni. This includes scoliosis reviews, serial casting and full assessments of kids including gross motor skills. I also get to decide what to do with the kids in terms of treatment and as long as its working towards their long term goals and is safe then its generally ok. This therefore includes a lot of basketball, football, throwing and catching.
I havent really had any issues that have come up because everyone i work with seems quite nice and we generally work in a more relaxed environment. However, i have thought of a potential issue that i think may need to be addressed as soon as this week. This issue is about whether i should be left alone with the kids. The reason i think its important is because if any of the kids were to accuse me of anything that i didnt do, then i would want a witness there to verify my story. The witness would also need to be someone other than the kids parent as the kids parent would most likely side with their kid.
I have only been alone with a kid for short periods of time during treatment as my supervisor would sometimes duck in and out of the treatment room. This doesnt really worry me as we are at the kids school and my supervisor is there most of the time. However, my supervisor has told me that i might need to do a home visit on my own and this is of some concern to me. I have been told that even though parents are generally really happy to have a male working with their kid, they dont want their kid to be left alone with a male. I am worried that maybe, if for whatever reason the kid or parent didnt like me at a home visit, they may accuse me of doing something innapropriate to the kid. I know this is a very unlikely situation but i thought i better give it some thought in order to prevent the situation from happening.
I am going to discuss with my supervisor what the normal protocol is for students, in particular males, attending home visits to treat kids. I am also going to ask my supervisor whether i am at risk of being accused of something and how do i make sure this doesnt happen, or how do i manage the situation if it does.
Does anyone have any advice for me? What would you do if you were told you needed to treat a kid in their home on your own? Am i being too paranoid? Any suggestions would be good, especially from the guys as i think its fair to say that the accusations are more likely to be directed at a male student than a female student.
3 comments:
Whilst you haven't had any problems thus far I think its great you're thinking ahead and potentially preventing an awkward situation from occuring. I haven't had a paediatric placement but I did a study where I was collecting data on my own with children. What I found worked best was to inform the parents exactly what their child was going to be doing and also had my working with children check, criminal check and a letter from the Dept of Ed (i know you don't have this but you will be in a uniform which helps!) with me at all times. It also helped by explaining to the child what they were going to be doing with me before I took them out of the classroom - thus infront of the teacher - and asked if they were happy to participate. Perhaps what you could do is explain everything to the parent and child and gain consent beforehand.
As the majority of parents are often involved in their childs treatments if you are worried about a situation occuring you could always treat the child with the parent in the next room or even them watching. Hopefully you won't be exposed to any of these issues in your placement. It's unfortunate that people have negatively used their position when working with children creating the need to think ahead as you have done.
i haven't had a paeds placement yet. but I can understand your concern. For starter, we do have a work with children's check for paediatric placement, which is the legal permit for us to work with kids regardless of gender.
If the parents are anxious, maybe talk through your plan with them prior to home visit and also to see how they are like. if they have doubt and questions, you can solve them beforehand. during the homevisit, maybe leaving the door open during assessment and treatment if appropriate. and encourage parental involvement in the session, maybe will help.
and lastly do write down in notes if anything peculiar happen during the visit, notes are used as a legal documents. and maybe inform the appropriate person about it?
we do home visits to help the children. and most parents are eager for their children to get better and are apprieciative of physio treatments.
just my thoughts =)
oops, i doubled up again >.< ur typing too fast erin hehe
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