Help! - Daycare Emergency Plan

[clspreschool]

Hi I am the sole provider at my family home daycare. What happens if I am the only person home and one of the kids need to be transported to the hospital and I can not get in contact with the parents/guardians. They already signed the emergency medical treatment form but doesn't an adult have to get in the ambulance with the child. I still have 7 other children in my care. What am I suppose to do?

[Michael]

You do the best you can under the situation. If you need to revise your emergency plan with your parents, do so. You set up the scenario that they need to agree to. Take care of your concerns with them now.

[Sunshine69]

It is in my policy that should a child require emergency care, 911 will be called, the child will be taken to the hospital by the ambulance. Then the parents will be called to meet the child at the hospital. If I am unable to reach a parent, I will begin contacting the next person on the child’s emergency contact list.

Parents agree to abide by my policy when they sign my contract.

There is no requirement that I know of that an adult has to accompany the child. Best to stay out of the way and let the professionals in the ambulance do their jobs anyway.

[Cat Herder]

You don't have to ride with the child. We take them on implied consent, the hospital has staff for this, patient advocacy. If you can keep an extra copy of the emergency medical form, insurance information and any pertinent medical history to hand off to the medic, that would be amazing and make their entire day.

[Second Home]

Our regulations say that we can't transport a child to the hospital alone , we must have 2 adults to transport . We must call an ambulance to transport the child .

I also have this information in my handbook and go over it during interviews.

[Cat Herder]

Originally Posted by Second Home

Our regulations say that we can't transport a child to the hospital alone , we must have 2 adults to transport . We must call an ambulance to transport the child .

I also have this information in my handbook and go over it during interviews.

I should have clarified. When I said we I did not mean in my capacity as a childcare provider. I have simply been on this forum so long I assume everyone knows what I mean, which is irresponsible and I apologise.

In my capacity as an EMS provider, we do not require childcare providers to accompany us.

I would go a step further and say to never transport a child to the hospital yourself (unless mass casualty has shut down your system). Always have the parent, emergency contact or an ambulance take them. Always.

[rosieteddy]

I always had a neighbor on standby in an emergency situation.Even if just to help with calming the children down.

[LittleExplorers]

We are supposed to have an emergency back up for this reason per licensing. While I have two people to call on, who knows if they would happen to be home at the time. My other thought is how am I supposed to call them to get here while I am on the phone with 911?

[Cat Herder]

Originally Posted by LittleExplorers

We are supposed to have an emergency back up for this reason per licensing. While I have two people to call on, who knows if they would happen to be home at the time. My other thought is how am I supposed to call them to get here while I am on the phone with 911?

Call 911 from your landline so they can find you faster (instant routing to the truck is awesome), use cell to call parents.

Even if the phone is not connected, you can make an emergency call from any jack hooked to electricity.

[284878]

Originally Posted by Cat Herder

Call 911 from your landline so they can find you faster (instant routing to the truck is awesome), use cell to call parents.

Even if the phone is not connected, you can make an emergency call from any jack hooked to electricity.

Interesting, I knew old cells call 911 but I didn't know turned off landline would. I don't even think that I have a landline phone in my home to do this.

[Cat Herder]

Originally Posted by 284878

Interesting, I knew old cells call 911 but I didn't know turned off landline would. I don't even think that I have a landline phone in my home to do this.

I cut off my home phone forever ago, but keep an old Trimline phone I can plug into the jack. It is required for inspections, here, because we are rural and cell tower locations are unreliable.

[Ariana]

My policy is to call 911 first then the parents. It is the parents responsibility to meet the ambulance at the hospital or come to my home to meet the ambulance. I do not go with the kid in the ambulance.

[Blackcat31]

Originally Posted by LittleExplorers

We are supposed to have an emergency back up for this reason per licensing. While I have two people to call on, who knows if they would happen to be home at the time. My other thought is how am I supposed to call them to get here while I am on the phone with 911?

My understanding is that our emergency back up isn’t so we can accompany the child to the hospital it sin case we have an emergency ourselves needing immediate care.

I’ve never been instructed or told we must accompany the child in the ambulance. Something to ask my licensor as I wouldn’t have done that IF faced with that situation.

[LittleExplorers]

Originally Posted by Cat Herder

Call 911 from your landline so they can find you faster (instant routing to the truck is awesome), use cell to call parents.

Even if the phone is not connected, you can make an emergency call from any jack hooked to electricity.

That's awesome! I didn't know it would work. Unfortunately we haven't had a landline for years and actually had all the lines cut because 911 got 200 calls from our home once in the middle of the night and we didn't even own a land line phone. It turned out to be some sort of glitch but it was a crazy experience.

[LittleExplorers]

Originally Posted by Blackcat31

My understanding is that our emergency back up isn’t so we can accompany the child to the hospital it sin case we have an emergency ourselves needing immediate care.

I’ve never been instructed or told we must accompany the child in the ambulance. Something to ask my licensor as I wouldn’t have done that IF faced with that situation.

I will have to double check. I thought we could not send a child alone. Maybe I misunderstood.

[LittleExplorers]

Originally Posted by Blackcat31

My understanding is that our emergency back up isn’t so we can accompany the child to the hospital it sin case we have an emergency ourselves needing immediate care.

I’ve never been instructed or told we must accompany the child in the ambulance. Something to ask my licensor as I wouldn’t have done that IF faced with that situation.

Thanks! I verified and you are correct. This makes way more sense!