Accidents & Injuries occur on a daily basis in Child Care programs. Moreover, it is vital that you develop a system that defines who, how and when accidents & injuries are to be reported to parents.
In fact, parents want to know when their children are injured; and when you communicate injuries to parents; they seem to appreciate the fact that you were open and honest with them.
However, if you fail to report injuries to parents; this could lead to parents being skeptical of you and your program. I would like to share Kim’s story with you.
A week before I wrote this post, one of my former high school classmates, called me about an injury that occurred at her child’s daycare. Kim was very upset that she was not notified until 2 days after the incident occurred and she also discovered that her child was questioned by state officials about the injury.
It was obvious to me that Kim knew the program did not handle the reporting of the injury professionally and she simply wanted some advice. As I consulted her, I considered the following two issues:
- The parent was not notified that her child had caused harm to another child 2-days after the incident
- This incident has affected how Kim feels about her child’s Child Care program.
- Kim was also concerned about staff to child ratio in the classroom at the time of the incident
After listening to Kim’s complaint about the Child Care Program; I was inspired to share Kim’s story with you, to inspire you to think about How you report injuries to parents.
Also I thought I would share helpful tips with you on How to Effectively Report Accidents/Injuries to parents:
- Assess all injuries and administer First Aid if needed
- Document all injuries right away
- Find out why the incident happened and what you can do to prevent the incident from occurring again
- Notify the parent right away; if a head injury, bleeding, bruising or fracture occurred. If the injury is minor, be sure to call the parent before pick-up time; so that you are not approaching parents with bad news at pick-up time.
- Require that the parent & staff member sign the incident report and be sure to give the parent a copy.
What do you think about Kim’s story? Also, feel free to share your procedures for reporting injuries to parents.
Shiketa
The Child Care Business Owner Institute 
Comments on: "How to Effectively Report Accidents/Injuries To Parents" (1)
[…] How to Effectively Report Accidents/Injuries To Parents […]
LikeLike