Parents should include medical checkups, updated health records and safety training on kids' back-to-school checklists, a group of emergency physicians advises.

"We all know about reading, writing and arithmetic. Let's consider adding a fourth 'R' for parents -- establishing routine healthy behaviors," Dr. Paul Kivela, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP), said in a college news release.

"Now is the perfect time to catch up on doctor visits and update your child's health information. Taking these actions, before an emergency occurs, can help avoid a trip to the ER and possibly save your child's life," he said.

The ACEP says:

Organize your child's health history records and emergency medical contact information, and complete a consent-to-treat form, which authorizes medical treatment. Give copies to the school nurse and day care providers. List prescription medications, medical problems, previous surgeries and family history.

If your child has a health condition, such as asthma or food allergies, work with the school nurse and other care providers to develop action plans.

Take your child for medical and dental check-ups before school starts, or as soon as possible. Also consider vision and hearing tests, and a sports check-up if your child is involved in athletics.

If your child walks to school or to a bus stop, review the route with them and highlight potential hazards.

If your child drives to school, stress the need to obey all laws, wear seat belts, and not to text while driving.

In addition, ACEP says, ensure your child knows how to call for help in an emergency. Teach him or her when to call 911 and to give the operator their name, address and brief description of the emergency. Emergency contact numbers should be posted next to all telephones in the home.

Despite the well-known importance of nutritional health several cultural, social, political, economical and educational factors contribute to malnutrition among children. School going children constitute one-fifth of the total population and are the future of the nation. The health supervision of the school children is necessary and can help identify the magnitude of morbidity and malnourishment in a community. Previous anthropometric profiles reported so far have focused on preschool children. While many studies on school going and adolescent age population are reported recently, majority of these are either single center study or have a small number of subgroup cohort. We conducted a multi-center prospective study to evaluate the nutritional and health status of school going children by physical examination and anthropometric measurements.

A cross-sectional prospective study was designed to enroll all the primary government school children of an urban area of the western part of Ahmedabad city in western India. 5-13 years of school children of 31 primary schools present on the day of examination were selected. Enrolled school children (standard 1-8) present on the examination day were examined by a health team consisting of five qualified medical practitioners from the department of pediatrics of AMC MET Medical College, Ahmedabad. All the findings were recorded in the predesigned and pretested questionnaires by interviewing the children for the case history. Clinical examination of the children was done, and the anthropometric measurements were taken.

Height of the children was measured using standardized steel anthropometric rod with parallel bar (accuracy ±0.1 cm). Weight was measured with the electronic weighing scale (accuracy ±10 g). The subjects were asked to remove their footwear and accessories before measuring their weights. Scales were calibrated after each measurement.

                                                                                      HealthDay