Wants to know please if they should do anything after this "all's well that ends well" school situation and how to go about it.

Child had bad motor effect while at school. Went down from lesson to school sick room. Child thought it was side effect of medication and said so to adult in charge. Adult in charge had the leaflet in medication box which did say for this type of symptom that person should see a doctor or get to hospital immediately. Adult in charge phoned parent and described the problem. Parent said on phone after couple of clarifications of symptom description please get child to hospital somehow, 111 won't do. Parent phoned couple of times during long drive to school to try urge a trip to close by a and e or a 999 call. Parent told them that was what they would do and school was in loco parentis. Each time was rebuffed - oh it's a bit better now while lying down you can take her to doctor's when you get there, how long will you be etc etc.

Parent got to school having finally managed to obtain other parent and ask them to urge school to get child to hospital. Ambulance not there on parent's arrival. While parent was about to try to get child to car to drive them there (not far from school at all) paramedics turned up. Canula put in, child monitored etc put on blue light run to adult majors. Suspected stroke or seizure etc. Fortunately was not, but unpleasant side effect which needed stopping whilst continuously monitored in adult majors before move over to paediatric a and e for further monitoring.

Parent does not want to create hard feelings at school but feels that school reluctance to make nine nine nine call is worrying. How to tackle it well?

Speaking from experience - a similar type of incident (medically related but slightly different) but not handled well, I wrote to the head (it was primary) outlining what had happened, my concerns and asking for a meeting so that the school could talk me through their protocol on it and whether we could see together if there were any learning opportunities from it. The head was only too pleased to have me in and go through it all and rewrote part of the procedure - the fact that I was not blaming but was coming from a point of view of this probably shouldn't happen again - how can we make sure of that, helped.

In an incident in secondary school (but offsite) where I ended up taking a child to hospital as a in loco parentis (and met the parent there) whilst the member of staff stayed with the other children, everything that happened was written down and risk assessed after the event to make sure that nothing could be improved if a similar situation happened again - this was fed back to both Pastoral head and the head (and everyone concluded that we had done absolutely the right thing on that occasion).

The school person responsible needs to be able to explain why they made the decisions they did and the school need to be given the ooprtunity to change/improve procedures as a result - I'd like to think that no school would deliberately delay medical treatment and it may be that the child, for example, reassured them that she was feeling better etc so best for the parent to get the full story whilst reassurring the school that they are not looking to apportion blame but just improve the position should it occur again.

Unless, of course they are looking to apportion blame!

How old was the child? I totally agree with KCG.

They need to agree a care plan - I know schools have them for some kids - basically it says if X happens then do Y.

Schools also don't need parental consent to call ambulance any more than a doctor needs parental consent to save life or limb.

A child under 16 can and should be able to consent to treatment if they understand but cannot dissent eg if they said they were OK but the care plan etc says "call ambulance"

PS pity they didn't ring 111 - would probably have got the ambulance for them

I would complain, in writing, to Head and governors. This needs addressing. A child could die. I remember with horror the case of an asthmatic child dying at school because the teacher sent him out of the classroom to sit in the corridor.

A calm, rational and utterly devastating account to the Head and Chair of Governors: a report of the background, this specific incident, timeline and consequences: actual and potential. Formal reply requested within 20 school days (the standard time-frame for a reply to an FoI request).

Your friend should ask someone else to proof-read it to take out any excessive waffle, emotion or exaggeration, but also to ensure that the key points come across very clearly.

Thank you everyone. Will pm later.

Agreed; It is very concerning that he adult in charge was reluctant to contact the emergency services. The possible worst case scenario consequences of this need to be spelled out in full and training given.

We have care plans for children at work.
We err on the side of caution and ring ambulance. Have done several times for a child who suffers seizures. The emergency services have never criticised us. The parents should (calmly) ask for a meeting with head and make sure that a care plan is in place and stuck to.

The behaviour of the adult in this case is bizarre in my view. Personally if any child in my care became that ill I would be very glad to get the advice of the emergency services! How could they have felt competent to deal with it when they clearly were not? What might happen in a situation like this makes me shudder and I feel your friend should pursue this right to the wire to ensure that the worst case scenario never happens.