Supporting Students With Other Health Impairment (OHI): Teachers' Edition

IDEA's definition of OHI:

Other health impairment means having limited strength, vitality, or alertness, including a heightened alertness to environmental stimuli, that results in limited alertness with respect to the educational environment, that:

1. Is due to chronic or acute health problems such as asthma, attention deficit disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, diabetes, epilepsy, a heart condition, hemophilia, lead poisoning, leukemia, nephritis, rheumatic fever, sickle cell anemia, and Tourette syndrome; and 
2. Adversely affects a child’s educational performance

Common OHI Classifications:
1. Asthma
2. Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)
3. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
4. Diabetes
5. Epilepsy
6. Heart Conditions
7. Hemophilia
8. Cancer
9. Human Immunodeficiency Virus HIV

Note: Unless modifications are made, these health conditions typically impair a student's ability to perform successfully.

Characteristics:
1. Sometimes misses school
2. Sometimes have physical restrictions
3. Are sometimes inattentive
4. Sometimes have side effects to medications

How This Impacts Students:
1. Students may be unable to function physically and/or academically with other same-age and grade level peers

What Students Need:
1. Provision of specialized instructional services
2. Modifications in order to participate in school-based programs

Students With Asthma:
Symptoms:
1. Shortness of breath
2. Tightness in chest
3. Wheezing
Note: Symptoms can be mild, moderate, or severe. They vary from person to person and from one episode to the next.
What Teachers Can Do To Help:
1. Manage asthma epsiodes
2. Keep the student calm
3. Follow the student's action plan

Students With Attention Deficit Have Difficulties In:
1. Sitting still
2. Controlling behavior
3. Paying attention

Students With Diabetes:
Diabetes occurs when the body does not have enough insulin
How Teachers Can Help:
1. Monitor symptops for both hyper- and hypoglycemia
2. Know first aid processes

Students With Epilepsy:
1. Often have seizures
2. Seizures are provoked by acute events
Types Of Seizures:
1. Petit Mal Seziure (Absence Seizure)
A. Student appears to be daydreaming
B. Student either: stares blankly, blinks eyes, or rolls eyes backwards
C. Can occur many times in a day
D. Can be brought on by hyperventilation
E. The student has no idea they just had a seizure when it ends
2. Generalized Toni-clonic Seizures (Grand Mal)
A. Before the seizure begins, the student has an aura
B. The student can fall unconscious
C. The student's eyes can roll back and body stiffen
D. Irrgularly breathing typically occurs
E. Sometimes the child may drool and/or lose bladder control
F. Usually lasts between 10-30 seconds, but could last for a longer period of time
G. During the clonic phase: there is jerking of muscles and they are usually sleepy or dioriented and tend to have a headache
How Teachers Can Help:
1. Identify and eliminate environmental factors that trigger seizures (ex: poor lighting, flashing images, amount of time spent on computers, and anything with a lot of fast flashing).
2. Provide classmates with factual information about seizures and how they can help
3. Keep the student calm

Students With Heart Conditions:
1. Can be developed over time or congenital (present at birth)

Students With Cancer:
1. A Child's strength is weaken
How Teachers Can Help:
1. Include student in activities with their peers as much as possible
2. Ensure that the student can succeed without making them feel as if they are being treated differently

Students With Human Immunodeficiency Virus HIV:
1. Have damage to the immune system and sometimes brain damage
2. Sometimes have developmental delays
3. More susceptible to infection
How Teachers Can Help:
1. Keep identity confidential unless it is necessary to share information
2. Take universal precautions to prevent transmission (ex: wearing gloves and protective equipment when working with hazardous materials)
3. Learn how conditions affect learning and behavior

How Teachers Can Help Students With Sickle Cell Anemia:
1. Avoide stressors (ex: heat, cold, poor diet, inadequate liquids etc)
2. Watch students for symptops of pain
3. Consider the emotional aspects of dealing with the pain

Accomodations Teachers Can Make:
1. Flexible time limits
2. Permission to use the bathroom and drinking fountain when necessary
3. Frequent breaks
4. Reduced amount of assignments
5. An alternative grading scale
6. Alternative assignments and assessments

Strategies For Teachers To Utilize:
1. Provide a caring and nurturing classroom environment
2. Teach all students about the various types of health impairment and what they can do to not only help these students, but to make them feel like an equal member of the classroom
3. Use visuals
4. Creating hands-on opportunities for learning
5. Promote cooperative learning (groups)
6. Utilize a buddy system
7. Give short, but concise directions
8. Teach lessons that allow movement
9. Allow for frequent and positive feedback
10. Send work home (to prevent students from falling behind when they miss school for reasons out of their control)
11. Provide names for tutoring
12. Stay after school to help the student

Other Health Impairments Wiki:
http://psychology.wikia.com/wiki/Other_Health_Impairments

Videos:
The video below is a video podcast from a teacher presenting to his class about Other Health Impairments