Health/Physical Status- Indicate if/how student's health or physical status is impacting his/her educational performance. The school nurse is often involved in collecting information for this section of the report, if listed on the evaluation plan.
Medical history that could impact educational performance includes:
Ear infections
PE Tubes
Vision Issues
Head injury
Excessive Absenteeism
Medically diagnosed conditions that the school is aware of that have educational relevance.
OHD Criteria: The Evaluation Report should contain specific information including: the medical diagnosis, the date of diagnosis, and the doctors name (for both initial and reevaluations). On an initial evaluation, the diagnosis must be within 12 months.
For Initial Evaluations: If a health/physical assessment is not needed, vision/hearing screening info must be reviewed under the Background Information section.
SLD, ASD, SLI, & DHH: A health/physical assessment by a School Nurse is not required unless the student has suspected health-related educational needs. If, however, the School Nurse is the only team member appropriate to constitute a multi-disciplinary team, then they could be invited to participate in the initial evaluation and complete a review/administration of a health/physical assessment. For initial SLD evaluations, if a health/physical assessment is not needed, vision/hearing screening information must be reviewed under the Background Information section of the evaluation report.
EBD, OHD, DCD, TBI, & PI: A health/physical assessment by a School Nurse is required because, in order to determine initial eligibility, criteria for these categories requires that the evaluation rule out contributing and exclusionary health-related factors. In the case of OHD, criteria specifically requires that the evaluation includes verification of a diagnosis/disability.
Developmental Delay:
If health screening was completed during early childhood screening, is available to the team, and indicates no concerns, then a health/physical assessment by a nurse would not be required. However, the screening information should be included in the ESR.
If there was not a health assessment at screening, or if there are concerns about health, then the nurse would need to be involved in the ESR.
If, however, the School Nurse is the only team member appropriate to constitute a multi-disciplinary team, then they could be invited to participate in the initial evaluation and complete a review/administration of the health/physical assessment.
For all categories, health/physical assessments are not required for re-evaluations, and it is the case manager and evaluation team's decision regarding whether a health/physical assessment by a School Nurse is appropriate. Two circumstances would warrant its inclusion in the evaluation plan:
The student has suspected health-related educational needs. This may apply if, for example, the student has a medical diagnosis, the student is prescribed medication, or the student's hearing and/or vision are inadequate.
The School Nurse is the only team member appropriate to constitute a multi-disciplinary team.
Specifically for the categories of OHD, TBI, & PI, if a health/physical assessment is not needed, a summary of the initial health/physical assessment must be included in the Background Information section.