Students Get Safety Advice for Summer

With summer vacation from school approaching, students at Winnetka Avenue Elementary School got a lesson Tuesday in dealing with seasonal hazards.

But instead of their teacher giving a lecture, a doctor-in-training delivered some good advice.

“If someone is stung by a bee, people sometimes try to get the stinger out with tweezers, but this will only make things worse,” Dr. Sam Tseng told an attentive group of third-graders in Becky Woo’s class. “Tweezers will inject the poison into the skin. Instead, use a credit card to scrape off the stinger.”

To illustrate the dangers of the great outdoors, Tseng had 9-year-old Guillermo Segura pretend to hike to the beach, during which he was stung by a bee, bitten by mosquitoes, encountered poison ivy and was caught in a riptide in the ocean.

To avoid mosquitoes, Tseng suggested using mosquito repellent and wearing long sleeves and pants.

He warned pupils to watch out for the three-leaf poison ivy and, if touched, wash the area within 20 minutes.

Tseng cautioned the pupils to always swim near a lifeguard and face the ocean, so a big wave doesn’t catch them off guard. If caught in a riptide, he said, stay calm and swim to the side of it.

“We talk about these things, but he went into much more detail,” said Debbie Cohen, whose fourth-grade students also listened to Tseng.

A member of the Family Residency Program at Kaiser Permanente Woodland Hills, Tseng said speaking to kids fulfills the “teacher” inside him.

“It’s about education, prevention and building relationships,” said Tseng, 26, a second-year resident. “I want to build a rapport so when they come in the office, they have a sense of trust.”