News | 18 June 2024
IES student health team wins prestigious award at school nurse congress
The student health team at Internationella Engelska Skolan has for some time been working on a quality and development project regarding work on overweight and obesity. At the national school nurse congress in Stockholm, the project was presented in a poster exhibition and IES won the prize for best poster in an open class on development and quality work.
The poster is an educational approach to a very difficult subject and the purpose of the award at the congress was, among other things, to draw attention to local quality or development projects carried out by school nurses, student health teams or non-profit organisations.
Malin Vesström, project manager and quality coordinator at IES said:
"It describes in a good way the preventive and health-promoting work that we carry out within IES. It's nice when it's appreciated and also rewarded with first prize! We believe that the new way of working will create a safer existence for the school nurses, but also for the children/young people and their families. The new way of working provides support and structure in the conversation with the students and also guides the school nurses through assessment and follow-up”.
The number of children and young people with overweight and obesity has increased sharply over several decades, and thus the risk of developing chronic diseases and mental illness linked to this has increased. If early measures are taken, the development can change, which means that school nurses have a very important role.
Malin Vesström said:
“This is a very important issue, but we have noted how difficult it is to bring up this topic up, both for the students, but also for us in the student health team".
IES has therefore developed a model for health conversations and based on this, a new support material has been developed. The poster is part of this work.
"It has been very important to develop a uniform way of working that works, and we had to be very ambitious to succeed with this.”
Malin Vesström and the poster.
The school nurses across IES schools have been involved in the development of the new way of working by identifying needs and participating in workshops. A pilot group of school nurses has then tested the new way of working and the new material in conversations with students.
Helena Lüning, Director of Central Student Health at IES said:
“This poster was developed by quality coordinator Malin Vesström and designed by Jessie Pollack at IES, summarises everything we want to do and is an important part of the holistic approach we want to work with”.
One of IES' most important sustainability goals is to work actively to improve the health and well-being of students. As part of this, the health initiative "#movewithIES" was launched. Through that initiative, IES works to give all students the opportunity for an active and healthy school life.
Andjela Dimitrijevic, Health Initiative Manager said:
“Children are our future, and for every child who does not get a healthy start in life, the chances of good future public health deteriorate. Today's challenging economic situation may mean that fewer people can afford activities. This is another factor that makes schools an extra important arena when it comes to spreading knowledge, influencing and bringing change".
In 2024, all IES school nurses will participate in competence-enhancing activities and participate in further development of the new way of working, and workshops and lectures will be organised.
Helena Lüning concluded:
“Thanks to the new and unique, health-promoting and preventive approach, we hope to be able to create a safer existence for both the student health, the students, guardians and all other staff at the school”.
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About obesity
Obesity is a complex, chronic disease that, in itself and together with associated morbidity, poses a serious threat to the health of the individual and the population. The BMI definition is the most appropriate for obesity. In children and adolescents, the term iso-BMI is used instead, which is the "adult BMI" that the child's BMI corresponds to. For children and adolescents with a high iso-BMI, the risk of permanent obesity is very high and increases with the child's age. It is therefore important that all students with obesity are referred to the health care system for further investigation and treatment.