Jill Roaldson, RN, takes an ill student’s temperature in the nurse’s office at the Moorhead Career Academy. (Photo/Nancy Hanson.)

Hafsa Muza, PA, and Tina Knudson-Docken, RN, staff Family HealthCare’s clinic in the Moorhead Career Academy. It’s open whenever school is in session. (Photo/Nancy Hanson)Nancy Edmonds Hanson

So far, says school nurse Jill Roaldson, Moorhead school attendance hasn’t been battered by the towering wave of viral illnesses that’s making headlines across other parts of Minnesota and the nation. “But if it’s happening there,” she says, “there’s a good chance it’s coming.”
Elsewhere, health experts are calling it a “quad-demic” – the quartet of viral diseases infecting young and old this winter: Influenza, RSV, COVID and norovirus, the gastroenteritis most people call “stomach flu.”
If and when it arrives, Moorhead’s public schools are better prepared than ever to identify and aid sick students and their families. Along with the five nurses who already work across the system, a new defense debuted last September, when Family Health Care established a clinic at the Career Academy to care for students, school staff and families. Like other FHC sites, it’s also open to the rest of the community. The care isn’t free; most private insurances and Medicaid are accepted, and uninsured patients are charged on a sliding scale.
The clinic, funded in part by the Minnesota Department of Health, is located in the southwest corner of the Career Academy. There, physician assistant Hafsa Musi and Tina Knudson-Docken, RN, are available during school hours to diagnose common ailments and start them on the road to recovery.
“It’s a great resource,” says Jill, a certified pediatric nurse who has worked at the high school and academy for the past decade. “The district had been talking with Family Health Care for several years before this satellite clinic finally came together last September. The intent is to treat minor illnesses and injuries early and get the kids back in school.”
The clinic is particularly handy for high school students, who can take the school shuttle from Moorhead High to the academy. Parents who have given permission need not accompany their teens on the visit. A parent or guardian does have to bring elementary and middle schoolers, often after a school nurse has asked that the sick child be taken home.
Nurse Jill offers an example. “If a student comes in with a low-grade temperature and a sore throat, I can call over to the clinic and tell them they are hopping on the shuttle bus and will be there in a few minutes.. Hafsa and Tina will be ready to see them. They’ll swab them for strep and other conditions. If the test comes back positive, they can prescribe antibiotics and advise them on when they can come back to school,” usually 12 hours after taking the prescription or 24 hours fever-free hours.
“Students and staff have quick, convenient access. Instead of just encouraging parents to take the child to the doctor – which they may or may not be able to do – or the staff member taking half a day off, they can come here, recover and get back to school that much sooner.”
The school district’s collaboration with Family Health Care follows on the heels of a successful dental program. For the past four years, FHC has been providing dental care to Moorhead students in a mobile van that visits schools on Wednesdays. Originally used for mobile testing during the COVID pandemic, the van was later repurposed. When a school has 12 to 16 potential dental patients ready to go, the dental providers visit for a full day, providing exams, cleanings, x-rays, extractions, fillings and root canal therapy. Like the clinic at the academy, it accepts Medicaid and private insurance.
The Family Health Care clinic is an expansion of the school nurse program that the district has offered for many years. Five nurses see students across the district. In addition to Jill’s work with the high school, career academy and Alternative Learning Center, they include supervisor Natasha Brunell; Amber Whitney-Fish, who works at Robert Asp and Dorothy Dodds schools and the Early Learning Center; Becca Bayliss, S.G. Reinertson and Ellen Hopkins schools; and Michelle Stachowski, Horizons Middle School. Health technicians on each campus also assist in screening students, dispensing prescriptions and other tasks.
The FHC clinic at the Career Academy has opened up other possibilities for supporting students’ health beyond diagnosing and treating infections and minor injuries. “They have hosted an immunization blitz,” she notes. “It worked great – students could be in and out and back to class, only missing a small amount of time.” Information was emailed to hundreds of parents in advance. “We got only 30 students for the first blitz,” she says, “but we hope to reach more as the word gets out.” The biggest need for teens is the second meningitis vaccine. “They should get the first at around 12 and the second after they turn 16. It’s really important, as the ages of 17 to 23 are when they’re most susceptible to infection, and it’s required for college.”
The clinic also offered its first round of sports physicals last fall. Another is planned in coming months. Telehealth appointments are available for behavioral care.
The low response to the vaccine blitz illustrates what Jill calls the biggest challenge facing the new collaboration between the school system and the public health clinic: Awareness.
“We really need to get the word out to our community,” she emphasizes. “This is a really cool asset for everyone. Working parents don’t have to take a day off to bring sick kids to the doctor. When they get a call from school about a sick child, they can stop over here right on their way home … and usually get right in. No sitting for hours in a waiting room full of sick people!”
The Family Health Care clinic is accessed from a separate entrance, Door 4 on the southwest corner of the Career Academy. Its hours are from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. whenever school is in session. Walk-in visits are welcome, but appointments can also be made by calling 701-271-3344.