With the little ones back to school last week it is safe to say we are already seeing a massive spike in head lice cases!
So we wanted to take this opportunity to explain to you why cases become so extreme in September and more importantly how to deal with head lice if your children catch them and what you can do to prevent catching them in the first place!
As you probably already know head lice are spread by direct head-to-head contact which is why they are so prevalent amongst primary school age children. So now that the children have returned from the 6 week Summer break and are back together in close contact; at their school desks, huddled together playing games in the playground and even just sitting on the carpet listening to story time. All this close contact gives head lice the perfect opportunity to migrate from one head to another and, before you know it, half a class can be infested with head lice!
So what should you do if your child comes home with head lice?
First and foremost before get stuck in to giving you all our top advice we want to stress that head lice may be a nuisance, but they are not dangerous and are not a reflection of bad hygiene or anything like that. Absolutely anyone with hair on their head can catch head lice! They are so unbelievably common amongst school children. Almost all children will catch them at some point in their primary school years. So please don't ever let them make you or your children feel stressed or unhappy.
So firstly it is really important to be doing regular checks on primary school aged children because if you catch them early before they have had a chance to breed and start multiplying they are much easier to deal with! And, despite what a lot of people believe, not everyone feels itchy when head lice are present, in fact less than 50% of people have this reaction. So do not assume that your child does not have head lice just because they are not itchy. Make checking your child for head lice part of your weekly hair routine!
What should you be looking for?
Head lice are small, wingless insects with flattened, elongated bodies and oval heads, they are greyish-brownish in colour and are about the size of a sesame seed. They have six legs with tiny hooks at the end of each leg for clinging onto the hair. Head lice spend their entire 30-35 day lifespan in the hair and tend to stay very close to the scalp. They lay their eggs right at the roots of the hair, very close to the scalp where it is nice and warm so that when the baby lice hatch out they are close to their food source. You will usually find them near the temples, behind the ears, at the crown or at the nape of the neck, so these are the areas where you want to be paying particular attention to when checking. Usually the first sign of head lice will be the eggs, as it will usually start with just one head louse crawling onto your child’s head and then beginning to lay eggs (each head louse can lay up to 8 eggs per day). The eggs then take approximately 7-10 days to hatch. The eggs are tiny teardrop shapes, about the size of a pin head and will be securely glued to the hair shaft. Before they hatch, the 'live' eggs are a brownish colour, making them very difficult to spot in dark hair. Once the eggs hatch, the 'nit' which is the empty egg case, is a white or cream colour. So if you are finding ‘live’ eggs in the hair then there will definitely be at least one live head louse in the hair. If you are finding the empty egg cases in the hair then you will now have multiple live lice in the hair.
What to do if you find live lice or eggs in the hair?
Firstly, the most important thing to remember is if you find head lice on any member of your household, it is really important to thoroughly check each and every member of the household, as it is very likely that it will have already been passed from one family member to another.
When it comes to completely eradicating head lice it is all about breaking the life cycle and ensuring you are removing both the live lice as well as the unhatched eggs, otherwise the unhatched eggs will hatch out 7-10 days later and you will find yourself right back to where you started. Most over the counter liquid treatments only target the live lice and do not kill the eggs, which is why parents find themselves in a repetitive cycle of using treatment after treatment after treatment.
The most effective way to eradicate both the live lice and the eggs is to do exactly what the NHS advises, which is wet combing. Our award-winning Nitty Gritty head lice comb was uniquely engineered for this exact purpose. With special micro-spiral teeth, it not only removes the smallest head lice and nits (the empty egg cases) but also, most importantly, it even removes the unhatched 'live' head louse eggs allowing you to completely break the cycle of repeated infestations.
Our comb is very easy to use, firstly just brush out any tangles from the hair. If the hair is long enough section it into 4 sections (like a hot cross bun), and then simply saturate the hair with ordinary hair conditioner or our Aromatherapy head lice solution. Once the hair is saturated and tangle free then take small sections at a time and comb each section from root to tip, removing all lice and eggs. Work your way meticulously around the head until nothing is coming out on the comb.
You can watch our YouTube tutorial on how to effectively comb out lice and eggs below.
So now we know how to get rid of head lice, how do we avoid getting them in the future, or in the first place if you have been lucky enough to avoid them up until now?
Well, there are a few simple, yet very effective things you can do to avoid catching head lice. The first and foremost golden rule is to tie back hair that is long enough to be tied back. By doing this you make it much harder for head lice to migrate onto your child’s hair as the loose strands of hair won’t be so accessible when your child is in close contact with another child. Remember head lice can’t jump and they can’t fly, they need to crawl from one hair strand to another, so make that migration as difficult as possible for them.
The other thing you can do is to keep a bottle of our Nitty Gritty head lice defence spray next to your child’s hair brush. Every morning after you have brushed your child’s hair and tied it up simply spritz the hair with the defence spray and this will stop head lice from migrating on to your child’s hair. Just like mosquitos, head lice are drawn to the scent of blood and will take any opportunity they get to migrate over to a new host, but our defence spray was developed to mess up their radar by disguising the scent they are looking for with a blend of essential oils that they find offensive. So, although it smells lovely to us, head lice will be repelled by it and not migrate onto the hair. And don't forget to use it on the weekends too if your child will be anywhere that they will have close contact with other children, like play dates or birthday parties!
You can find out lots more helpful information about tackling head lice on our Lice School page and our Facts of Lice page.
Watch the below YouTube video to find out more about the head lice Life Cycle and why weekly checks are the key to avoiding a full blown infestation!
Found this blog post helpful? if so then why not share it in your class Whatsapp group, as the more parents that understand about head lice the more it will help reduce the spread of head lice in your child's school or pre-school.
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