"Hospital pedagogy is the school in the hospital, but also the playfulness and the care of the families of hospitalized children. Currently, there is no specific training for these professionals, when the demand is very strong". These are the words of Professor Olga Lizasoáin, who presented, together with Belén Ochoa, the European seminar of training in Hospital Pedagogy, which is being held at the University of Navarra from October 4 to 6. During the meeting, the experts will debate on "Psycho-educational maladjustment and family destructuring in the hospitalized chronically ill child".

"The role played by the school in the hospital is compensatory," said Olga Lizasoáin. "It is essential to try to normalize the child's way of life. Hospital pedagogy is socializing, and that is why the recreational activities that can be organized in a hospital are also important, from a painting contest to a floor magazine written by the children," she pointed out.

 

Children are now hospitalized less often

In addition, Professor Olga Lizasoáin said that the future of hospital pedagogy lies in home care. "Children are hospitalized less and less and convalesce more and more at home. They also have the right to Education", he said, and assured that "it is a very complex topic because the teacher enters the intimacy of a family. In addition, a management assistant dependence on a high school is necessary for the programs of study to be officially valid, and it is necessary to work on continuity so that the child does not feel a break between the high school, the classroom of the hospital and his own home".

Because of this complexity, home care, but also hospital pedagogy in general, needs to be regulated. Each European country works with certain criteria, and seminar is conceived as a pooling of objectives. "The legal reference is the European Charter on the Rights of Hospitalized Children, approved by the European Parliament in 1986. After that, each country has developed its own legislation. In the Autonomous Community there is still a long way to go because, for the moment, hospital pedagogy has not been legislated," said Belén Ochoa. This professor at department of Education of the University of Navarra highlighted the role of volunteers and associations such as the Red Cross or Adano (association De financial aid al Niño Oncológico), and pointed out the need to professionalize the work of hospital classrooms. "That is why a law is needed to set guidelines for action".

Belén Ochoa also discussed the possibilities of the new technologies. "They make it possible to connect the patient with his or her high school of origin by videoconference, which means maintaining the relationship with the group. And it offers the advantage that, if one day the child doesn't look well, his classmates don't have to see him; and yet, when he feels well, the connection can be made in both directions," she said.