The South Page School District head lice policy/ procedure is in line with evidence based practice and is based on recommendations from the Center for Disease Control & the American Academy of Pediatrics, “Students diagnosed with nits do not need to be sent home early from school; they can go home at the end of the day, be treated, and return to class after appropriate treatment has begun. Nits may persist after treatment, but successful treatment should kill crawling lice. Head lice can be a nuisance but they have not been shown to spread disease. Personal hygiene or cleanliness in the home or school has nothing to do with getting head lice. Students with nits only should not be excluded from school (American School Health Association, 2005, Frankowski & Bocchini, 2010, Pollack, Kiszewski & Spielman, 2000), although further monitoring for signs of re-infestation is appropriate. It may be appropriate to screen other children who have had close head-to-head contact with a student with an active infestation, such as household family members, but classroom-wide or schoolwide screening is not merited (Andresen & McCarthy, 2009). In cases that involve head lice, as in all school health issues, it is vital that the school nurse prevent stigmatizing and maintain the student’s privacy as well as the family’s right to confidentiality (Gordon, 2007).”
When a student is found to have live lice:
1) The parent is notified by phone if possible and information related to detection and elimination of head lice can be provided at that time or sent home with the student in a sealed envelope.
2) The student is sent home from school and may return after first treatment. Confidentiality must be maintained.
3) The parent is instructed that the student must be treated before returning to school.
4) It is appropriate to have the student’s head checked upon return to school. If live lice are found,
the student will not return to the classroom. Parent will be instructed to remove all live lice before the student returns to school.
5) If nits are found, the parent is notified to keep combing them out with a lice comb at least daily
for the next two weeks.
6) Follow up head checks may be done by trained school staff to confirm lice management efforts.
3) Full classroom screenings for head lice are not done unless deemed necessary by the school
nurse. Screening for nits alone is not an accurate way of predicting which children will become
infested, and screening for live lice has not been proven to have a significant effect on the
incidence of head lice in a school community over time.