In recent decades, education has made great improvements in the policies regarding inclusion. As the movement has progressed, there have been new discussions about the various considerations that need to be made when providing children with severe disabilities a free, appropriate, public education in a public school. One of the most difficult and controversial topics of these discussions is in regard to Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) orders. Do Not Resuscitate orders relate to whether or not CPR should be provided in an emergency or life-threatening situation. One reason that this is a difficult issue to discuss is that there is no federal decision regarding compliance of DNR orders by school staff, which has left many states to issue their own decisions regarding the topic. Understandably, this has frustrated many schools and parents. Another reason that DNR order compliance is difficult to address is that most schools have a policy regarding the requirement of care that …show more content…
The first being “that denial hampers the free exercise of choice (parents and/or child) to limit the medical interventions that will be pursued in the case of emergency. It also “encourages parents to keep their child out of the schools or community settings because the order would not be implemented in those settings”. It “prevents nursing staff from acting in their clients’ (students’ and/or parents’) best interests”. Finally, it is contrary to the strong congressional directive to pay particular attention to the needs of the family in early intervention programming when developing the IFSP.” There is also the argument that there is enough structure built into the current system because acquiring a DNR order is not a simple thing to do and there a multiple ways for committees, courts, or other third-parties to interfere if they truly believe the child’s best interest is not being thought