Headlice (merged)

Curious_George_2

I had a terrible time getting rid of my childrens nits,
One of them actually ended up in hospital due to an infection caused by repeatedly scratching the same area so hard, It got so bad she had to have the back of her head shaved.
Because of this i could not use any kind of chemicals on her and all i could do was wet combing.
I dont think the problem is finding something that works, I think the problem is other people. I would clear my children of nits by carefully combing every night and the next day they would return from school with adult lice on them again, It made my flesh crawl!
I lost count of the amount of scratching free school holidays we had only to have the same old problem a few days after school started again!

Luckily we have been free of them for a while now (i think a lot of it is the age of your children and how close they play with their friends... lets not forget, Lice cant jump.... they can only walk) but i still keep a lookout!
For those not so lucky ones who are still looking for remedies, I would recommend wet combing with conditioner and a nice noisy electric comb (theraputic for you if nothing else)

Rachie_B

Curious_George wrote:

I had a terrible time getting rid of my childrens nits,
One of them actually ended up in hospital due to an infection caused by repeatedly scratching the same area so hard, It got so bad she had to have the back of her head shaved.
Because of this i could not use any kind of chemicals on her and all i could do was wet combing.
I dont think the problem is finding something that works, I think the problem is other people. I would clear my children of nits by carefully combing every night and the next day they would return from school with adult lice on them again, It made my flesh crawl!
I lost count of the amount of scratching free school holidays we had only to have the same old problem a few days after school started again!

Luckily we have been free of them for a while now (i think a lot of it is the age of your children and how close they play with their friends... lets not forget, Lice cant jump.... they can only walk) but i still keep a lookout!
For those not so lucky ones who are still looking for remedies, I would recommend wet combing with conditioner and a nice noisy electric comb (theraputic for you if nothing else)

i agree :mad:

joys of having school age children eh

barjam_2

we had just came back off our hols 11th oct my daughter had her hair braided while we were away , she had been back at school a week and a half when i noticed eggs :mad: i couldnt beleive it so i am now busy every other day in this half term holiday wet combing:mad: and will still be doing it for another couple of weeks to make sure i,ve broke the cycle of the little s***s breeding, i've also tried the straighteners , i'm sure i sizzled a few:rotfl:

DebtphobicDeirdre

try asking in school about whether there is a School Nurse-somebody must be responsible for immunisations and medicals and any children with ongong health problems. She may not visit the school very often because she may have 10 schools to manage but I bet the school have her phone number and you can ring her and request she comes to school to give a talk to concerned parents. The real culprits rarely attend though!

tawnyowls

Rachie_B wrote:

dont know about others schools but my sons school arent allowed to do this ,they also say that children dont have to stay off school until they are cleasr of lice ?

Apparently, it's considered damaging to their self-esteem. No consideration apparently given to the fact that louse bites can become infected or that a very heavy infestation can make a child lethargic (origin of the saying 'feeling lousy'). No, we must not in any way make the little darlings feel bad - you'd think that having a head full of lice over many months would be far more likely to damage a child's self esteem than being sent home to get them cleared.

DebtphobicDeirdre

Iwas told when I started as a School Nurse that periodic checking had been found to be innefective when studied in trials , compared with Giving advice to all. Iam very suspicious though as school nurses are spread ever thinner it would be impossible to do under the current financial constraints. Money for such non life-threatening things is scarce and Government officials probably don't have to deal withit at home themselves.

charliesmam

We used hedrin to get rid of the !!!!!!s the day before they went back to school - fantastic you can see them running away from the stuff.
After that is the nit comb - we get the 'bug buster kits' off the health visitor & i make her do it herself every other night - then the OH does it once a week - she hates that!

Eagle_1

tigger115 wrote:

Thanks for all your replies! Combing method it is then!

Thats all you need to do, I used to use lotions and found that they were not always getting rid of the lice. I now use something called the Bug Busting Kit which you can get from your GP on prescription (free for under 16s or benefits etc) . Its a set of fine toothed combs which you use with conditioner, this is the only product I use now.

dont buy things over the counter get the bug busting kit fom your gp. I tried to link the bug busting site to my reply but for some reason my pc is playing up and all im getting is page cannot be displayed but if you do a search on google you will be able to find more about the kit there.

tigger115

Thanks you for all your replies. It has been a tremendous help. Am nearing the end of the 2 weeks now and I am just about getting there - something I never thought would happen!:rotfl:

WelshLamb

I have found that using tee tree shampoo and conditioner as my daughter's frequent shampoo is a great way of preventing them. Also gives her hair an amazing shine.

I think Tesco sell tee tree shampoo and conitioner for something like 75p each, although my personal fave is the Numark version.