As the school bus rolled to a stop outside her Lake County home, Beth Jones adjusted the bright yellow document protruding from the pouch of her daughter's wheelchair, making sure it was clearly visible. Posted on 12/10/2007 10:11:05 AM PST by Sopater
As the school bus rolled to a stop outside her Lake County home, Beth Jones adjusted the bright yellow document protruding from the pouch of her daughter's wheelchair, making sure it was clearly visible.
In bold letters it warned, "Do Not Resuscitate."
The DNR order goes everywhere with Katie, including her 2nd-grade classroom at Laremont School in Gages Lake. The school is part of the Special Education District of Lake County, where an emotional two-year discussion ended this summer when officials agreed to honor such directives.
Now, district officials find themselves in the unusual position of having planned the steps its staff will, or won't, take to permit a child to die on school grounds. Although DNR orders are common in hospitals and nursing homes, such life-and-death drama rarely plays out in schools, where officials realize how sensitive and traumatic the situation could be for nurses, teachers and students.
Katie's brain was deprived of oxygen before birth. She can't walk, talk or do anything for herself. She is fed through a tube in her stomach and has an increased susceptibility to infection. Violent choking and coughing spasms have signaled a turn for the worse in her condition.
A Do Not Resuscitate order is a doctor's directive, issued with the consent of the family, that cardiopulmonary resuscitation will not be used if the patient suffers from heart or breathing problems. It can also prohibit using such devices as a defibrillator or an intubation tube. 
The new DNR policy puts Katie's school district at the forefront of a growing national debate about severely disabled and chronically ill children whose lives have been extended by medical advances -- and whose parents must face heart-wrenching decisions about the future.
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Why?
I’m with you, I don’t understand why this child is in school, first off she can’t walk, talk, do anything for herself and her brain was deprived of oxygen at birth, what can she possibly be learning, secondly, if my child was this close to death I would not let her/him out of my sight, I’d want to spend every waking moment with my child.
She is in school because schools want the disabled child pie of money. Schools get a lot of money to “educate” the uneducable. So do care givers, drivers etc. We have an economy based on service to others who need help.
I agree that ADD and ADHD is greatly overdiagnosed, and in many cases could be cured with a paddle.
Special ed can cover a wide range of things, and indeed, a special ed finding can mean more funding and lower failure rates on the standardized tests, so schools have an incentive to identify SE kids.
On the other hand, number of folks move to our district because it has one of the best autism programs in the country.
Just ask Michael Schiavo.
I agree about that...That it’s not fair to the other kids.
She’s also incapable of doing anything to disrupt the class unless she turns blue, again. Then she will be swept into arms and removed from class, again.
The point I’m trying to make about ‘tolerance’ is that there are increasingly alarming ‘norms’ in public school, why draw the line here?
So there is no need for Child Protective Services in this world? A man's home is his castle?
Sorry, I don't agree with anyone on this board that this is horrible to have a DNR order. We are not talking about actively killing this little girl. We are talking about, if she collapses, or her heart stops beating, that the parents don't want her to be subjected to resuscitation efforts. I think is the epitome of cruelty to put someone who is terminal through anything like CPR or ACLS. The person is trying to go peacefully. The last thing I would want for myself or my loved ones is to have someone pounding on my chest and shoving a tube down my throat and poking me with needles. There is a big difference between actively killing someone with a lethal injection, and allowing a peaceful death. This isn't the same as Terri Schiavo and purposeful starvation.
You are perfectly entitled to yell. The voices of parents who have faced or are facing this sort of situation need to be heard the loudest, since they are the most knowledgeable and also have the most at stake when government and its agencies start getting involved in decisions like this.
Seems like some would just be happier to put these kids in institutions or camps or hide them away from society so that the regular kids aren't traumatized by their presence.
As far as the parents 'squeezing' Uncle Sam for money for educating someone who is not worthy? How do we know she is not worthy? How do we know that the child who is perfectly normal today will not be in a tragic car accident tomorrow and become just like this young lady. That happened to my friend of my daughter. Horrible accident, now she is learning to swallow, control her arm to feed herself, how to indicate she needs a diaper change - all at a public school.
What a waste. Maybe the paramedics should have left her on the side of the road to die and make it easier for everyone else
Read the article, she is not in a regular school but a center for severe and profound children
God Bless you and your daughter. None of us can appreciate your situation completely, and I am sure this looks entirely differently through your eyes. Thank you for sharing this. We could all learn something.
Well spoken. We may disagee, but assuming these parents are acting out of selfish motives here is wrong. They may very well want to spend every last moment they can with her, and they may be sacrificing those desires because they honestly believe she is happier being around other children.
Again, thoughts and prayers for both this girl and her parents.
Two words:
Federal funding
Allow me to remind you that this is not a disagreement over opinions, but a question of whether a helpless little girl actually lives or actually dies.
If she's dead, it won't be because it is someone's opinion that she is dead - she will actually be dead in fact and not just as a matter of debate.
But I guess since you, in the grand liberal tradition, know better than everyone else you have been given a moral duty to make decisions for others.
In all your grandstanding and constant use of the words "liberal" and "Hillary" you seem to have lost the thread.
If a human being is dying right before my eyes and I have the ability to help her or to deny her my help, I am making a moral decision for myself - not for others.
The little girl's parents do not have any right to make that moral decision for me.
If they want to stand idly by while their child dies, that is on them.
But they have no moral right to compel me to do the same. At that moment I will do what my conscience informs me is the right thing to do, whether her parents or the state or internet blatherers want to give me permission to do the right thing or not.
they do not make decisions for those in who’s care they leave them.
Of course the parent’s decisons must be respected. Happens in hospitals all the time. Do treat, dont treat.
Hi Pam,
I don’t, but I can honestly say that I cannot personnaly honor a DNR order provided by a parent for a child who cannot speak for herself.
That being said, if you have such an order for your child, please don’t leave them in my care, or don’t hold it against me if I do not honor the order.
If presented with such an order, I would feel compelled to make this known to a parent up front.
As well it should have! What about ricochets off the ice???
This isn’t a situation where a perfectly healthy child is injured.
This is a terminally ill child, whose parents and doctors have decided it’s not in her best interests to artificial resuscitate her when her time comes.
You have no right to tell parents they have no right to make a decision for your child because it offends you.
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