Head lice concerns!!

Keepstanding, ASN, RN · Feb 23, 2010

you might want to go to the school nurse forum here on allnurses. it is a wealth of information regarding these situations. best wishes to you !

praiser :heartbeat

Keepstanding, ASN, RN · Feb 23, 2010

you might want to go to the school nurse forum here on allnurses. it is a wealth of information regarding these situations. best wishes to you !

praiser :heartbeat

oh snap !!!! duh...you are on the school nurse forum !! :lol2: sorry......so confused

praiser :heartbeat

abreezies · Feb 23, 2010

Hi,

I am a school nurse in a mid- sized town in Missouri. Our protocol for head lice is that if they have live lice or a lot of knits, then they are sent home. They are allowed 48hrs to take care of it without being considered truant. We give them a lice sheet which explains how to treat the student and the home. A parent or other adult must bring the student back to the nurse to be checked before the student will be allowed back to school. If a parent cannot be reached, the student has to stay in the health room until one is reached, he/she is not allowed to go back to class (to prevent the spread of the head lice). We only do full classroom checks if there are 3 or more cases of head lice in the same class within a short period of time. Some other districts around here do not ever do full classroom head checks, they only do checks on a prn basis. I always tell my teachers to be on the lookout for itching heads and send any student down that seems suspicious to have it.

DistrictNurse19 · Feb 23, 2010

In our school district, we certainly send kids home if active lice bugs are noted, or if nits are located up to 1/2 inch from the scalp (nits need the body heat from the scalp to develop and hatch). Truancy is not an issue because we (school) are putting the kids out. However, some kids miss a ton of school because of chronic lice problems and parents that are unable or unwilling to do all that is necessary to rid the home and child of lice! If nits are noted more than 1/2 inch from the scalp, we consider these empty nit cases or non-viable nits (perhaps destroyed by shampoos/treatments?). We do all we can to promote our "nit-free" policy, but frankly, so many of our kids would never be in school! :crying2:

Artistyc1 · Feb 24, 2010

In our school district, we certainly send kids home if active lice bugs are noted, or if nits are located up to 1/2 inch from the scalp (nits need the body heat from the scalp to develop and hatch). Truancy is not an issue because we (school) are putting the kids out. However, some kids miss a ton of school because of chronic lice problems and parents that are unable or unwilling to do all that is necessary to rid the home and child of lice! If nits are noted more than 1/2 inch from the scalp, we consider these empty nit cases or non-viable nits (perhaps destroyed by shampoos/treatments?). We do all we can to promote our "nit-free" policy, but frankly, so many of our kids would never be in school!

When parents are "unable or unwilling" to do all that is necessary to get rid of lice, who suffers? And, all too often, these are the children that need to be in the educational setting the most! Lice do NOT jump, or fly. Nits can't be passed from person to person. Give the child a quick comb through, tie their hair up, and tell the child to please avoid head to head contact with others. Such draconian methodology for dealing with head lice is counterproductive to the educational process, and has never been proven to control lice effectively. It is based upon outdated information. :eek:

mustlovepoodles, RN · Feb 25, 2010

When parents are "unable or unwilling" to do all that is necessary to get rid of lice, who suffers? And, all too often, these are the children that need to be in the educational setting the most! Lice do NOT jump, or fly. Nits can't be passed from person to person. Give the child a quick comb through, tie their hair up, and tell the child to please avoid head to head contact with others. Such draconian methodology for dealing with head lice is counterproductive to the educational process, and has never been proven to control lice effectively. It is based upon outdated information.

If only it were that easy. I work in an elementary school. Often the younger kids cannot remember to put the thermometer under their tongue while I'm standing there telling them how to do it! I know for a fact that the "no head-to-head contact" speak would go in one ear and out the other. Not to mention that half of them speak mostly Spanish. In my school system the policy is set by each principal. Our principal says no live lice in school. Nits we're not so much worried about. Same as above, the kids go home, get treated, come back with there parent and the empty lice treatment box or an explanation of how they treated. School nurse checks head, no live lice, the child goes back to class and a note goes to the teacher. Live lice--sorry, go home and try again. In my particular community this has worked real well.

ETA: I always show parents how to back-comb the hair; most of them think you just apply the treatment and comb it out. I tell them if it's taking less than 2 hours to comb out medium length hair, they're not doing it right. :clown:

LACA, BSN, LPN, RN · Feb 25, 2010

In our school system, live bugs mean you immediately go home. If there are only a few nits, I just send a note home. But if the head is full of nits, I call home. Nits hatch and become live bugs...go ahead and treat that before it becomes a problem. And personally, I don't think its draconian methodology....it works, it gets the kids treated, and takes care of the problem before you have a whole kindergarten class with lice and no way to get rid of it.

Artistyc1 · Feb 25, 2010

In our school system, live bugs mean you immediately go home. If there are only a few nits, I just send a note home. But if the head is full of nits, I call home. Nits hatch and become live bugs...go ahead and treat that before it becomes a problem. And personally, I don't think its draconian methodology....it works, it gets the kids treated, and takes care of the problem before you have a whole kindergarten class with lice and no way to get rid of it.

It is NOT appropriate to treat if there are no live bugs found. Most products are not ovacidal, and will do nothing but expose the child needlessly to neurotoxic chemicals, and the family to unnecessary expense. This sort of overuse of these products has been one culprit cited for the resistance of lice to them.

There are many resources on the net that can help schools to formulate policies and procedures for this, some that keep the hysteria going (usually they are trying to sell you a product and have an agenda, continually spreading a lot of misinformation) and those that are evidence based and scientific. It is your choice as to which to refer to.

If current scientific, evidence based methodology is followed, and you keep an eye on a child, and work with his or her parents, why would a would a "whole kindergarten class" get them? No one is advocating ignoring lice, only learning more about the insects life cycle, and informing parents appropriately as to management.

LACA, BSN, LPN, RN · Feb 25, 2010

I'm sorry, I didn't clarify what I meant. In the case of nits only, I don't recommend using the actual OTC treatments...I meant "treat" as in nit combing and nit removal.