Head lice checks at school

[Easy]

Had to treat my ds for nits AGAIN last night, 3rd time since term started, treated only las tuesday, then had them again yesterday. We do all the precautions at home, use teatree oil on his hair, changed his bed, the lot.

Anyway I asked teacher this morning about why, when it is obviously a major problem in his class, they can't check the children and point things out to offending parents. Apparently there isn't the funding for checks (although they've just had a professionally built garden job, and are putting new fencing round inside a perfectly good chain link fence).

Anyway, my childminder, who is an NNEB, has a CRB check certificate, and helps out at the school nursery when they are short staffed, says she will volunteer her time to go in and check the children (she's an expert at bug spotting by now).

How would you put this to the headteacher?

I have the impression that the offer might not be welcomed.

Carla - they all have access to a school nurse. At dd's school the nurse comes in about once a fortnight to chat with anyone who wants too about things like nits, bedwetting etc.

Mn - I agree that ''time of school will not in itself clear the infection, particularly if the source of the infection is from home rather than school'' but if parents thought that a child would have to stay off it might encourage them to take a more active role in keeping their child nit-free.

to not too.

Carla, I belive that in England (don't know about the 'colonies') the Local health authority assigns a nurse to visit each school. The nurse doesn't have a permanent office at the school. Ours is at the local health centre.

Try your Local primary healthcare trust to find out.

Potty, does the school make the presence of a school nurse known just to the children, or the parents too?

Re boarding school - DH commented the other day:

Well, I've never experienced this before. We certainly didn't have them with X, X and X.

No, I thought, that's because they were at boarding school. Either they're less likely to get them as they're fairly insular or if they did get them you were hundreds of miles away in a different country and didn't have to deal with it!!!

HHHHmph!

Sympathise with all these comments!!

It was once explained to me by a "haitdressing lecturer" thatthe lifecycle of a louse is 4 weeks - therefore after treatment you have to nit comb for a full 4 weeks afterwards ( at least every other day)
re-infections within 4 weeks are often because a live egg has been left in.
Lice are becoming resistant to the chemicals therefore it is easier for the odd one to remain alive and therefore re-infect - and the cycle starts again and again.....

It has happend to us..

My comment about boarding schools.....

My guess is that they very quickly get to grips with any outbreak, treating, combing and checking to make sure all the kids are cleared.

After all, if you're paying £3,000 per term or something, you would expect your darling to come home without nits wouldn't you?

Carla - the dates and times of her visits are posted on the school door and in the newsletter.

Just to let you know that the school nurse rang me this morning!!

After a long chat with me, she agreed to ring the school to see if the headteacher would run any bug-busting events.

She rang back later to say that the head says she'll offer a meeting to discuss it with any parents who want to come, and offer information on dealing with them.

School nurse says she'll keep on at the school until it happens, and perhaps offer something herself by way of an after school advice session.

So at least someone is interested.

Well it's a start at least!

Our school nurse runs "lice awareness" sessions, which are very informative. Unfortunately the parents who most need to come ... don't!

Having said that it is still worthwhile, as many of us who went to the session said they had been doing headlice checks, but not doing them properly. So we did learn a lot.

Hiya

I just wanted to say that there is a product coming out soon, i dont know if im allowed to mention the name of it for legal reasons. That ACTUALLY WORKS.
The people who came up with it are friends of ours, who got so fed up with them and came up with a formula. My sisters have used it, think i have too. We only had to put it on twice then again in a week. and know more hassel.

so there is something coming out soon ne way!

xx

I'm a primary teacher and we're not allowed to check children for lice. An even if we know a child has them because they are literally crawling with them, we're not even allowed to mention this to the parents, we can only give out a general letter to the whole class. This is of course absolutely ridiculous, along with another million rules and regulations restricting what teachers can and can't do! There is a group of children in my class who permanently seem to be infested, it's a miracle I haven't had them. Anyway, I did make a mistake once by informing a parent that her child had lice. I simply mentioned that her daughter had been scratching her head and that I had noticed a louse on her parting. I was very discreet, and giving advice in a "my daughter's had them, I know what a nuisence they are" kind of way. But OMG she was so rude, and quite agressive, she later phoned the school to complain about me checking her dd's hair even though I stated that I hadn't checked her hair, nor touched her, but that I had simply 'noticed' and thought she'd want to know! It's a mistake I won't make again!

aniles, how awful! I've taught one child in secondary school who was crawling with them and we were not allowed to write home about it either. Thankfuly at seconday you tend not to get as close to the children IYSWIM (!) so I never got them, But I bet she passed them on to her friends. She was also always quite dirty. (not linked I know but it made it difficult to be round her sometimes)

Mine have had them a good few times. It is a pain in the backside but nothing to get worked up or agressive about. When mine had them I would have welcomed someone tellign me, that way you can start to clear them asap.

We get little slips home from the girls' primary school saying that "a child in your child's class has lice - please check your child's hair tonight". Apparently, they are not very effective, because they come so often. I check my kids hair at least twice a week anyway, and always do the conditioner/nit comb in the bath with them.

At my boys' school (private), matron is very happy to do checks, but phones the parents first for their permission.

I remember having nits once at primary school - over 30 years ago - detected by the nit nurse. It was just me and one other girl. My mum chopped my hair off .