Head Lice–How To Tell If You’ve Got It

/0 Comments/in /by

The CDC estimates that every year between 6 and 12 million school-aged children will contract head lice.  That is as many as 1 in 5 kids, between the ages of 3 and 11!  YIKES!  I actually never had lice as a child, believe it or not.  But, I remember my mother losing her dang mind whenever we were exposed.  She would tear the house apart, cleaning everything from the drapes to the mattresses.  If you are a mom of school-aged kids, you know the drill.  The call comes in, usually a few hours after you picked your daughter up from the slumber party, her best friend has lice.  Or you get the dreaded note in the backpack, a child in your son’s class has been diagnosed with head lice…Again.

So how can you tell if you’re the child has it?  The sad truth is, it can be very difficult to tell for the first week or so.  When you first contract head lice (which almost always happens through direct head to head contact)  you probably have one very small bug, hiding out very close to or directly on the scalp, amid a very full head of hair.  If the bug is a female, it will lay 8-10 eggs per day.  These eggs, formally known as nits, are TINY!  If your eye is unfortunately trained, you will have a better chance.  If you don’t know what you’re looking for, you’ll need some help.

At Fresh Heads, we begin our head checks with a comb out.  We have found that a great nit comb is more effective than our eyes.  Listen closely parents–Every mother of school-aged children should have a TERMINATOR COMB.  No other comb will do.  I’m serious, it makes a huge, huge difference!  As soon as you know your child has been exposed, start combing.

Is it a nit or is it dandruff?  Nits ALWAYS, I repeat, ALWAYS have the same shape.  They are tiny, oval-shaped, hard and brownish (not white) with a small ‘tail’.  They are really never white, especially once pull off the hair shaft.  They are glued tightly onto the hair shaft, and will not come off or flake away easily.

If you are unsure, you should probably schedule a head check.  School nurses have seen it a hundred times, and will gladly check your child for free.  Fresh Heads offers a really thorough head check for a fee if you are still worried.  We always answer our phones and are happy to offer our best advice.  Good Luck!!!

Why Is Head Lice So Hard???

/0 Comments/in /by

Oh, head lice. You are so small! And yet you have driven us crazy for thousands of years. Why is head lice so hard to get rid of? When I was a kid, our parents slathered our hair ONCE with an over the counter pesticide and that was it! At Fresh Heads Lice Removal, we get calls every day from parents who have been battling these tiny bugs for a month or more, and dang are they hard to get rid of!  WHY???

Traditional pesticide treatments have become increasingly ineffective as the bugs are growing increasingly immune to the pesticides. Some of the stronger pesticides have been outlawed, and the weaker, over-the-counter variety have been way over-used. The result is super lice, which are very happy to have you slather them with this stuff because often, it doesn’t even touch them.

Secondly, these pesticides have never been very effective against the nits. The nits (or eggs) are laid by a female louse several times per day. When the nits are laid, the louse secretes glue that is chemically similar to cement. This glue firmly attaches the nit to the hair shaft, and it protects the nit. No chemical currently available is very effective at penetrating that glue. The best clinical study I have seen shows about a 70% effective rate against the nits. And with lice, its all or nothing baby. This is why all traditional treatments call for a retreat in 7-10 days. You are waiting for the eggs to hatch, and then hoping to kill them with the pesticide before they reach maturity and start laying new eggs. GROSS! And ineffective (see point above).

Third, these darn things spread like wildfire! If you’ve got just one child and a shaved head yourself, you might be alright. Most of the time, by the time you figure out junior, has it, he’s already shared it with his siblings. And more often than not, mom has it too, now who’s going to help her???

As a result, in comes the new and booming professional lice treatment industry. Fresh Heads, have you heard of us??? We are helping family every day, families who are nice and kind and love each other. Families who have worked their tails off trying everything they could find to get rid of these darn pests. Families who just want to be done with it!!! It’s what we do!