LOGIC No 3: September 2016 | Page 35

Kiri Ora, Healthy Skin project The Eastern Bay of Plenty Primary Health Alliance (EBPHA) Kiri Ora, Healthy Skin project in Kawerau, Te Teko and Te Mahoe Co-authors Sandra Ball EBPHA RFCL Kate Dooley EBPHA RN was created as an outcome of;     local ASH stats for childhood skin infection highest in EBOP region the same pathogenic bacteria Group A strep (GAS) causing skin and throat infections potential to utilise the excellent relationships that existed between the sore throat swabbing team and the children, school and community potential to utilise the community knowledge held by the sore throat swabbing team apparent that whilst these parents were very interested to learn about how to treat their child’s skin condition they did not have finances available to purchase basic skin care product or to attend their GP. Also attendance at the 2014 Rheumatic Heart Disease conference in Darwin added the understanding that skin infection as well as GAS sore throats could lead to acute rheumatic fever. When Toi te Ora(TTO) identified reducing childhood skin infections as a goal, and were looking at what intervention to action in the community the RF clinical lead was adamant that resources were equally as important as providing education. A strong working relationship came about between the school sore throat programmes and TTO. The programmes had the motivation and relationship, TTO the resources and both had the overarching goal of i mproving child health. Support to set up the Kawerau, programme came from Lizzie Farrell a nurse leader with the original South Auckland Wiri School project this provided an opportunity to review their school based clinic, along with sharing their protocol document. Tarawera Medical Centre senior nurse Jackie Davis helped develop a seamless referral system into general practice (initially tamariki visits were funded however this was no longer required after 2015 July). A total of five primary schools are part of the programme with collectively close to 1000 children enrolled – consenting numbers are close to 90%. The EBPHA EBOP Rheumatic fever clinical lead nurse who also works as a district nurse had found that when she spoke to mums whose tamariki had impetigo and eczema it was September 2016 L.O.G.I.C 33