i am having troble with head lice?

Question

i am having trouble with head lice in my daughters hair, especially the eggs that are attached to the hair shaft. other than individually pick them out one by one i dont know of any other solution. any suggestions?

Answer 1

There is nothing else you can do when they don't come out in the comb (with or without conditioner). The best thing to do is make sure there are no live ones then go through her head every morning and night religiously. This will catch all the little sods that hatch from the embedded eggs and prevent them from breeding and laying more eggs. They only lay eggs at night and only within a couple of millimeters of the scalp so when an inch or so of the scalp is clear you know your'e doing a good job. If they are bothering you that much, as they do me, instead of pulling each one off the hairs, crack them between your finger nails so you know at least they are dead and will come out eventually. Good look, it's so hard to get the blighters nowadays!! (I'm itching now!!Lol.)

PS.You won't like this but the hair grows at an inch a month, and they only lay eggs at the scalp, this means that (eg) if your child has an egg in her hair 3inches from the scalp, she has had nits for 3 months. I work in a nursery, we did a project to make parents more aware.

Answer 2

Tea Tree essential oil - a few drops on your finger tips and massage into your daughters scalp - you will need to do this 4 times day 1, 3 day 2, 2 day 3, then once a day (bed time is best as she won't smell of tea tree at school etc) for a couple of weeks. You will still have to use a fine nit comb (the flat pronged, metal ones are best) to actually get rid of the eggs but the tea tree will kill the lice that are hatching and prevent reinfestation. It only takes one head louse to reinfect as they lay so many eggs - that's why you have to apply the oil so regularly, the little blighters just keep on hatching. If your daughter complains of an itchy head inbetween applications - just add one in.

Answer 3

When my granddaughter caught head lice at school (don't they ALL?) we used 'Prioderm' it works well if you follow the instructions and isn't as harsh and smelly as a lot of the other remedies.

You will need to use a 'nit' comb to remove the lice and eggs. We used to have a bowl of very hot water on hand when we used the comb, we rinsed the comb in the HOT water between each stroke; that way we felt we were killing anything that was still alive and weren't putting them back into her hair.

You can also buy a 'head lice repellent' which you can spray on their hair before they go to school to help keep them 'nit' free.

Tea Tree is an excellent repellent - as is dirty hair! Head lice can't attach their eggs to dirty greasy hair...but a child with dirty hair is most likely to be accused of STARTING the outbreak.

We used to mix a little 'Prioderm' in some warm water and combed it through her hair before normal shampooing if we felt she needed a 'booster' treatment.

She's been 'nit' free for quite a while now...thank heavens...

Answer 4

Buy a nit comb, which is a specially made comb with very little distance in between the bars on the comb (I'm having a mind freeze...what the bars are called!!). Use a head lice shampoo for the amount of time that the directions say...sometimes you can't go in water for 24 hours after using it. I had a similar problem. At summer camp, one girl had it, and it spread to basically the whole camp! The whole camp (even people who didn't have it) had to cram into 4 tiny showers!!

Answer 5

nightmare, aren't they?! hate the little blighters!

my daughter gets them occasionally at school.

this is what i recommend:

if you don't like using chemicals then douse her hair with vinegar and wrap it in a towel. leave it for an hour, (if your daughter will tolerate it that long!), and then remove the towel.
(if you examine the towel the chances are that you'll already see some of the bigger lice that have tried to escape the acidity of the vinegar)

then shampoo and condition her hair, preferably with a tea tree oil based conditioner.

you will still have to do the chore of going thru her hair with a nit comb afterwards, and every night for seven days. she won't have any left by then. continue using tea tree oil conditioner as it really does work well as a deterrent.

as for the nit comb, try to get one of the longer style ones with the metal tines as these take out a lot of the eggs as well as any hatchlings and big ones...the wee plastic ones are only useful for the bigger beasties, and if your daughter has long hair the tines break easily.

Answer 6

here is the traditional method for head lice. Put a clothe or towel and wrap it like indian.(turban style) Before you do that, spray some insect spray in it in the head. Wrap it tight for 2 to 3 days. Those eggs will die. Don't wash the hair or take the towel for at least 2 days.

then she should be okay after 3 days.

some say a week for be for sure ... but i think 3 days is good enough

Answer 7

combing with fine tooth comb is the only way I'm afraid, it's time consuming but if you do it every day it should get rid of them all in a few days. Wash her hair, then condition it - this makes the hair slippery so the nits don't stick so well. Sit her in a chair near a window - natural daylight is best. Comb her hair over some paper towels and the nits should fall out.

Answer 8

tea tree is an amazing thing to use for head lice. They hate it!!!
I work in a school and always wash my hair with tea tree shampoo, i never get them anymore!! Also can put tea tree conditioner on hair and comb it thru with a special lice comb! Another great trick is pure tea tree oil, just dab a few drops into hair line.

Answer 9

Be carefull with all these pesticide based 'Cures' the lice have become resistant and they can cause brain damage. Best to go to a herbalist and get a herbal treatment, or you can get 'natural' shampoo and a special comb from Magicomb, works really well and saves a lot of time.

Answer 10

Your gonna have to purchase a lice killing solution from the store. It comes with a nit romoving comb. Also the eggs and lice are living on pillows, bedding, carpet if she's had them awhile. They make a aerosol spray to kill them there.