Our Nanny has lice! What do we do?
January 25, 2016 9:41 AM Subscribe
It turns out the friend who we pay to take care of our nine-month-old baby had head lice (which she thinks she got from another kid she looks after).
What do we all do? How long does she need to stay away from the house? We want her back here as soon as possible, but we also don't want to risk getting lice ourselves or infecting our baby.
Searching for answers online has been a lot less fruitful than I would expect so I am asking here...
Lice are not like bedbugs; once they fall off a person's head, they die. So, they will not be spreading into anyone's house or clothing. Once she goes through a treatment and is lice free, you should be good to go. It takes 1-2 days to do treatment completely.
posted by Melismata at 9:53 AM on January 25, 2016 [15 favorites]
posted by Melismata at 9:53 AM on January 25, 2016 [15 favorites]
It's really not a big deal. Make sure she is using medicated treatment and she should be fine to return right away. Here's a page from the CDC on kids returning to school, if that helps calm your nerves: http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/lice/head/schools.html
In fact, you can dig around the whole CDC page on lice to get more (trustworthy) info: http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/lice/head/
posted by galvanized unicorn at 10:13 AM on January 25, 2016 [2 favorites]
In fact, you can dig around the whole CDC page on lice to get more (trustworthy) info: http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/lice/head/
posted by galvanized unicorn at 10:13 AM on January 25, 2016 [2 favorites]
Here's more info about lice than you may want to know that was put together by the Harvard School of Public Health. Most important for me (second link) was they can come back after 10 days if the treatment is not repeated.
https://identify.us.com/idmybug/head-lice/head-lice-FAQS/index.html
https://identify.us.com/idmybug/head-lice/head-lice-FAQS/what-methods-can-i-use.html
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/richard-pollack/sites-of-note/
I know all this because our 2 little ones got lice from daycare last year and it was a nightmare to take care of. Because they'd get clean and go back to the daycare and get reinfected.
You don't need to go crazy and put everything in the house in the washing machine but maybe in a bag and leave it for a week or so. Or throw stuff in the clothes dryer.
posted by eatcake at 10:41 AM on January 25, 2016
https://identify.us.com/idmybug/head-lice/head-lice-FAQS/index.html
https://identify.us.com/idmybug/head-lice/head-lice-FAQS/what-methods-can-i-use.html
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/richard-pollack/sites-of-note/
I know all this because our 2 little ones got lice from daycare last year and it was a nightmare to take care of. Because they'd get clean and go back to the daycare and get reinfected.
You don't need to go crazy and put everything in the house in the washing machine but maybe in a bag and leave it for a week or so. Or throw stuff in the clothes dryer.
posted by eatcake at 10:41 AM on January 25, 2016
SHAVE ALL HEADS! BURN TOYS, BEDDING, AND FURNITURE! AND CLEANSE THE GUILTY ONE WITH FIRE!!!
OK, that said, some people are sooooper paranoid and will check for two -- or even four -- weeks, but I think that once the treatment is complete, any louse eggs will have hatched within like ten or 14 days and so after that the people are clear.
(You spend those days doing laundry and obsessively scrubbing your entire house, car, and yard.)
Not to be a downer, but I hear they are developing resistance to the chemical treatments, and so the simpler, oil-based methods are more effective. It all sucks, though, and you have my sympathy.
posted by wenestvedt at 12:07 PM on January 25, 2016
OK, that said, some people are sooooper paranoid and will check for two -- or even four -- weeks, but I think that once the treatment is complete, any louse eggs will have hatched within like ten or 14 days and so after that the people are clear.
(You spend those days doing laundry and obsessively scrubbing your entire house, car, and yard.)
Not to be a downer, but I hear they are developing resistance to the chemical treatments, and so the simpler, oil-based methods are more effective. It all sucks, though, and you have my sympathy.
posted by wenestvedt at 12:07 PM on January 25, 2016
As a mother of two long-haired girls with multiple long-haired friends who all came for sleep-overs all the time, I am the master of lice extermination. I hate lice. I cannot understand that other parents are less disciplined. But I have developed methods.
First of all: relax. Lice have a very short life-span - if they can't find a person to feed on, they are all dead within 8 hours, or even less.
I'd be really surprised if the lice had jumped from your friend to the baby without you already knowing it. And lice don't hang around on the furniture. So mainly you should relax.
No matter what, you should relax. Lice are irritating, but they are generally not dangerous. If there is a bad infestation and the bearer scratches herself a lot, infections can arise, including bad infections. My daughter got a really bad staph infection during camp once because of lice, but I mostly blame the staff there for not reacting immediately. Generally this is very easily avoided.
I don't think your nanny needs to be away more than five days. Or she could use a Hedrin product and come back right away tomorrow. These are very, very efficient, the lice don't become resistant to them, and few people get allergic reactions. However, they must be used correctly according to the package instructions, and they are very expensive and bothersome to use. I use them for myself if the kids get lice, because I am single, and I have no one to comb me. I rarely used them for the kids when they were smaller, because the products are really difficult to wash out and they are difficult to use correctly on squirming kids who hate to have their hair washed or sit still with product in their hair.
The other - pesticide-type - chemical treatments are very problematic for several reasons.
Below is advice for if for some reason you have lice in your household. Skip it if you don't.
You do not need to clean anything obsessively. Put all hats in plastic bags and in the freezer overnight. Wash the bed-linen as you normally would.
If even one single louse is found in your home, every person in the family needs to have their hair washed, conditioned and then combed very systematically with a louse comb with the conditioner still in the hair. No one can skip this. A dad who is almost bald may have lice, tiny babies may have lice.
For your baby, use a plastic comb. For yourselves, use a metal one.
Have a piece of white paper near you to knock the comb on so the lice and other impurities fall off, if there are lice or eggs, you can see them. This is important. You need to know how big the lice are, and if there are eggs.
Lice grow from newborn nymphs to adulthood in 8-9 days. So if you find only little tiny nymphs, you need not worry - just make sure you have them all out. Repeat after four days, to make sure you caught them all before they grow up and multiply. If there are no lice or only tiny lice after four days, you should be good. Repeat again after four days anyway.
If you don't find any lice, you probably don't have any. Actually, I don't think you have any. Repeat once after four days for safety.
If you find big lice, they may have lain eggs (eggs are not easy to comb out), which will hatch out more lice. This means you may need to repeat the treatment one more time (always with four days between treatments). That's all.
There needen't be any lice in the world if all parents were rigorous concerning their children's hair. Crew cuts and tight braids were there for a reason, but even during hippie times, my otherwise very relaxed aunt made a point out of washing, combing and braiding our long hair (across genders).
I've been known to bring a huge bottle of Frontline Vet to the kindergarten, with the threat that I would spray all kids if they came in with lice. That was efficient.
posted by mumimor at 2:50 PM on January 25, 2016 [7 favorites]
First of all: relax. Lice have a very short life-span - if they can't find a person to feed on, they are all dead within 8 hours, or even less.
I'd be really surprised if the lice had jumped from your friend to the baby without you already knowing it. And lice don't hang around on the furniture. So mainly you should relax.
No matter what, you should relax. Lice are irritating, but they are generally not dangerous. If there is a bad infestation and the bearer scratches herself a lot, infections can arise, including bad infections. My daughter got a really bad staph infection during camp once because of lice, but I mostly blame the staff there for not reacting immediately. Generally this is very easily avoided.
I don't think your nanny needs to be away more than five days. Or she could use a Hedrin product and come back right away tomorrow. These are very, very efficient, the lice don't become resistant to them, and few people get allergic reactions. However, they must be used correctly according to the package instructions, and they are very expensive and bothersome to use. I use them for myself if the kids get lice, because I am single, and I have no one to comb me. I rarely used them for the kids when they were smaller, because the products are really difficult to wash out and they are difficult to use correctly on squirming kids who hate to have their hair washed or sit still with product in their hair.
The other - pesticide-type - chemical treatments are very problematic for several reasons.
Below is advice for if for some reason you have lice in your household. Skip it if you don't.
You do not need to clean anything obsessively. Put all hats in plastic bags and in the freezer overnight. Wash the bed-linen as you normally would.
If even one single louse is found in your home, every person in the family needs to have their hair washed, conditioned and then combed very systematically with a louse comb with the conditioner still in the hair. No one can skip this. A dad who is almost bald may have lice, tiny babies may have lice.
For your baby, use a plastic comb. For yourselves, use a metal one.
Have a piece of white paper near you to knock the comb on so the lice and other impurities fall off, if there are lice or eggs, you can see them. This is important. You need to know how big the lice are, and if there are eggs.
Lice grow from newborn nymphs to adulthood in 8-9 days. So if you find only little tiny nymphs, you need not worry - just make sure you have them all out. Repeat after four days, to make sure you caught them all before they grow up and multiply. If there are no lice or only tiny lice after four days, you should be good. Repeat again after four days anyway.
If you don't find any lice, you probably don't have any. Actually, I don't think you have any. Repeat once after four days for safety.
If you find big lice, they may have lain eggs (eggs are not easy to comb out), which will hatch out more lice. This means you may need to repeat the treatment one more time (always with four days between treatments). That's all.
There needen't be any lice in the world if all parents were rigorous concerning their children's hair. Crew cuts and tight braids were there for a reason, but even during hippie times, my otherwise very relaxed aunt made a point out of washing, combing and braiding our long hair (across genders).
I've been known to bring a huge bottle of Frontline Vet to the kindergarten, with the threat that I would spray all kids if they came in with lice. That was efficient.
posted by mumimor at 2:50 PM on January 25, 2016 [7 favorites]
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posted by fingersandtoes at 9:46 AM on January 25, 2016 [4 favorites]