Babysitter information sheet: what to put on it

A babysitter sheet is one printed page: allergies in a box at the top, medicines with the dose and how often, two people to call, the doctor's number, your home address, and a few lines on bedtime and comforts. Put it where the sitter will look before you leave, usually the fridge.

This is for parents handing a child to a sitter, a grandparent or a neighbor. It can't tell you what care your child needs, and it isn't medical advice. The 911 line is for the US.

Example: the moment the sheet earns its place

Say a sitter is on her first night with an eight-year-old, and at 7:40 the child says her throat feels funny after a snack. The sitter has your cell number and no idea whether anything in that snack is a problem. Below is a filled sheet for an invented child. If it's on the fridge, the first thing she reads is the allergy box, not a text thread. Everything here is made up.

A filled sheet (example, invented child)

Notice "as labeled" on the medicine row. The sheet should never be the only source for a dose, and the bottle in the cupboard is the source. The sheet just tells the sitter which bottles to look for.

What a printed health sheet covers, and what you add by hand

Family Health Binder's Caregiver sheet covers the left side. The right side is yours, in pen, on the same page.

Set it up in this order

The house half comes from State Farm's babysitter checklist, which lists address and cross streets, safety equipment locations, screen time and food rules. The health half is yours.

1. Write the allergies first and put them in a box. Say what happens in your own words: "peanuts, hives" is clearer than "nut allergy."
2. Copy the medicine line from the label, not from memory: name, dose, how often. If a medicine is only given some days, say which. The medication list guide shows the layout.
3. Add two numbers for you and a second adult, and say which to call first. A second name helps when your phone is in a movie theater.
4. Write the address and the nearest cross street. A sitter shouldn't have to read the mailbox in a hurry, and a caller to 911 needs it.
5. Add the doctor's name and number, and a poison control number. The National Capital Poison Center's site lists 1-800-222-1222 as a free, expert and confidential line.
6. Write the small things: bedtime, the cup, the night light, what worries them. These lines are the ones a sitter uses most often, so keep them plain and specific.
7. Add where things are: first aid kit, flashlight, spare key. Say what you expect on screens and snacks.
8. Print it, put it on the fridge, and walk the sitter through the top box out loud before you go.

What to say when you hand it over

For grandparents, and for anyone who knows the child well

A grandparent can know your child better than any sitter and still not know this month's medicine, this term's bedtime, or what the school has asked you to watch for. The page isn't a sign of distrust. It's how the current version reaches someone who wasn't there when it changed. Give a grandparent the same sheet a sitter gets, and add the one thing a stranger doesn't need: anything that has recently changed.

What can go wrong

The page gets old. A list that was right in March is a guess in September, so re-read it before each new sitter and date it. The page also stays where visitors can see it: a fridge is a public wall, and it can show your address and your child's allergies to anyone who comes in. Leave off insurance numbers and a full vaccine record, which a sitter has no use for. What to leave off a health page you hand over has a table for that. And a printed page isn't a plan. If a clinician has given your child a written allergy or asthma plan, keep a copy where the sitter can find it and show them.

Questions parents ask

Where the Family Health Binder fits

Family Health Binder prints a Caregiver sheet titled with the child's name, such as All about Amina. It has the allergies in a large box, what's taken now, who to call, and your own notes on bedtime, comforts and fears. Those notes print on that sheet and nowhere else, and the sheet says in an emergency to call 911. Medicines with a stop date and records you marked private are left off. It doesn't have your address, a second contact or your house rules, so write those in by hand, and it doesn't send the page: you print it and hand it over. For the details a camp or school asks for, see camp and school health forms.