The Role of School Nurses in the School Inclusion of Children with Chronic Health Conditions in Greece

Abstract

School inclusion enables all students to have equal access to the learning process. The current study aims to examine the contribution of School Nurses (SN) to the inclusion of students with Chronic Health conditions (CHC) in the typical school. A qualitative method of data collection was selected. The results were gathered through semi-structured telephone interviews, which consisted of 27 open-ended questions and lasted 40 minutes. The participants were 50 SN (42 women and 8 men) from Greece. The interviews were  analyzed with conventional thematic analysis. One of the most important findings of this study supports that difficulties and obstacles to school inclusion of students with CHC are identified as the lack of collaboration between the principals of the school unit, teachers, parents, students, and the SN. Our research also addresses that the SN has multiple contributions to the creation of a school for all children, and helps students with CHC participate equally in the school process. 

Keywords: school nurse (SN), children with Chronic Health Conditions (CHC), inclusion