Going to school with narcolepsy - perceptions of families and teachers of children with narcolepsy

In 2009 and 2010, a large group of Finnish children and adolescents got narcolepsy after the vaccination campaign to prevent swine flu pandemic. A sample of children and adolescents who had gotten narcolepsy after 2009 participated in this study. The purpose of this research was to analyse how narcolepsy that developed from the swine flu vaccination had influenced the school going, school work, and its fluency of six elementary school pupils, and how useful the support provided was perceived. Furthermore, it was studied what kind of a learning environment school provides to children with narcolepsy. The realisation of the operative curriculum was also discussed through the point of view of tripartite support and segregation of learning. According to the results, especially the beginning of the illness, symptoms had been severe among the participants, which had challenged all their activities and environments. All of them had had difficulties at school because of narcolepsy. The possibilities of moulding these children's learning environments are discussed.