What’s Effective, Visual Head Lice Checks or Combing?
Recently, we’ve had customers ask why we don’t do visual head lice checks in addition to our comb-out checking. The reason? Visual checks can miss a lot of things. The nits and lice are the same color if your hair is dyed and It can be hard to spot the few eggs/nits that are laid so close to the scalp. This is especially true if you have a light infestation.
In fact, a 2001 study showed that, “The average time until detection of the first louse was 57.0 seconds with the comb as compared to 116.4 seconds by direct visual examination. Diagnosis of louse infestation using a louse comb is four times more efficient than direct visual examination and twice as fast.”
While visual head lice checks are still better than no check at all, a lice infestation would have to be fairly advanced in order for it to be easily seen with the naked eye. Many summer camps, school programs, or day cares will use pencils or chopsticks to inspect the scalp. This is still good! Any check is better than no check at all.
However, we go right to combing to see what the comb finds. This is a better use of both our time and your time. It helps us find lice and nits twice as fast! Then we can get you lice free and back to your day.
We sell our Terminator brand professional combs, so you can use what we use on your children at home! We have a tutorial video on how to do thorough comb outs, and we have an instruction sheet posted as well. For more information or to schedule an appointment, call (865) 245-5353!