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Head Lice and School District Policies at Clay County Public Schools, St. John’s Public Schools and Duval County Public Schools

If you live in Jacksonville, FL, and surrounding areas, school is back in session. Time to review the North Florida School Lice Policies for the local school districts of Clay County Public Schools, St. Johns County for Public Schools, and Duval County Public Schools.

To see the full official head lice policies for schools in Central Florida, visit their official websites at Polk County Schools, Orange County Public Schools, Lake County Public Schools, Sumter County Public Schools, Indian River County Schools, and Seminole County Public Schools

For South Georgia and South Carolina, visit: Camden County Public Schools, Macintosh County Schools, Wayne County Schools, Long County Schools, Liberty County Schools, Chatham County Schools, Effingham County Schools, Jaseper County Schools, Beaufort County Schools, and Charleston County Schools

1. Clay County Public Schools Head Lice Policy

According to the Clay County Health Department and The Clay County School Board, students need to be free of nits (eggs) prior to re-entry into their school after treatment. Parents of Elementary school-aged children are required to accompany their children to school on the first day of entry after treatment. All children should be back to school within two days if treated properly. Habitual absentee cases may be referred to the community health nurse or the school attendance assistant or social worker. If the parent(s)/guardian(s) fail to comply with proper head lice treatment, they may be referred to the state attorney’s office for violation of compulsory school attendance law

2. St. John’s County Public Schools Head Lice Policy

In St. John’s County Public Schools, all students infected with head lice shall not be allowed back into school until all signs of lice and nits are gone. The school nurse or personnel in the Student Services Department shall contact the student’s parent(s) or legal guardian when a student misses three (3) or more school days for (1) incidence of head lice.

Readmission to school shall require an examination by a properly trained personnel, designated by the school principal, to determine if the student may return to school.

3. Duval County Public Schools Head Lice Policy

Students with nits (eggs) will be excluded from school until they are nit-free. All children excluded from school due to head lice and/or nits must be accompanied by a parent or an adult before they will be allowed to return to school or ride the school bus.

The above information is meant to guide parents regarding standard school policies regarding head lice and head lice treatment prior to their children returning to their school after experiencing head lice. Please refer to your child’s specific school policies for further details.

Because of the highly contagious manner of head lice and the need to ensure that all stages of lice are killed, it’s a safer course to seek professional help right away. Doing so will help your children return to school sooner.

The treatment team at Fresh Heads Lice Treatment Centers are trained and qualified to treat lice in one treatment session with our Revolutionary AirAlle Head Lice Machine. Fresh Heads Head Lice Removal Treatment Centers are located in Jacksonville, FL, and Orlando, FL. We also offer the lowest cost traditional comb out option.

So, if sometime during this school year your child brings more than homework home – like a case of head lice, we are here to help. Call the Fresh Heads Head Lice Treatment Center closest to you.

 

boy scratches head

How Can I Tell If My Kids Have Lice?

Nothing strikes fear in the hearts of mother’s everywhere like Head Lice.  Just the mention of the words will leave you scratching your head, and many parents list head lice as ‘their worst nightmare.’  Although head lice don’t carry diseases or cause illness, this pesky problem can wreak havoc on your home.

So, how can you tell if your child has lice?  It can be tricky, especially if you don’t know what you are looking for.  One of the biggest problems with head lice is that there are so many misconceptions about it.  Head Lice can happen to anyone, regardless of social class or cleanliness.  It is almost always passed via direct head-to-head contact, not from sharing hats or brushes or going to the movies or on a plane.  Young children are more susceptible, because they don’t have personal space needs like older children and adults do, and their heads are more likely to touch.

What are the signs of head lice?  Many people think that excessive scratching is the first sign of a head lice infestation, but actually, many people don’t itch for two or more weeks after they have contracted the first bug.  In fact, by the time your child is itching, they most likely have already had lice for several days or weeks.  Your best bet in identifying head lice in your child is to check their heads often, once a week is ideal.  You are much more likely to find eggs or nits that you are a bug.  Nits are dark brown in color when they are new and viable, and can turn clear or white when they are older and no longer viable.  You should look for small, dark brown bubbles that are firmly attached to the hair shaft, less than half an inch from the scalp.  If you see things that appear to be stuck to the hair shaft, but they are white and they will slide easily under your fingertips, this is NOT lice.  A nit will feel like a hard speed bump under your fingers and will not slide down the hair shaft without using your fingernails.  Some children develop a rash at the base of their neck, and yes, eventually they will start itching.

Of course, you can always delegate the checking to the experts at Fresh Heads Lice Removal.  Our head checks are incredibly thorough!  If you would like peace of mind, please give us a call and schedule your checks!

Do African Americans Get Head Lice?

Believe it or not, this is one of the most-searched questions on the Internet pertaining to head lice.  The answer is, yes, but not very often. According to Dr. Dale Clayton, renowned parasitologist and inventor of the revolutionary AirAllé Head Lice Treatment device, African American hair is shaped differently than Caucasian, Hispanic, or Asian hair, and lice have a hard time getting their grasping hooks around the shaft. Since lice are uniquely adapted to crawl along a hair shaft, and since lice glue their eggs to the hair shaft, this often prevents African Americans from getting lice. Cultural use of oils actually doesn’t affect this much, contrary to popular belief. It is, in fact, the different shape of the hair shaft that typically insulates the African American population from contracting head lice. At Fresh Heads Lice Removal, we have treated children who have one African American parent and one Non-African American parent. Although the incidence is quite low, less than a quarter of a percent of the families that we treat to have any African American descendants. And now you know!

Lice Treatment Safe for All Hair Types

In the small chance of a head lice outbreak, there are several effective treatment options. Beyond our preventative hair treatments, Fresh Heads offers a revolutionary treatment with our AirAllé® device that is exclusive to us. Using patented technology, the AirAllé® simply blows warm air on the head to kill any lice and eggs that may be alive in a single treatment. Because the AirAllé® only uses warm air—no chemicals or pesticides—it is a fantastic and safe lice treatment option for all hair types. The AirAllé® is FDA-cleared and has a 99.2% treatment success rate. The advantage of choosing Fresh Heads and the AirAllé® is that you’ll be lice-free in a little over an hour, plus you’ll receive our 45-day guarantee. Learn more about the innovation of the AirAllé®.

 

Fresh Heads recommends these products to help prevent or treat head lice in African American families whose hair texture is susceptible.

 

Fresh Heads Lice Removal serves Jacksonville, FL, Orlando, FL, Savannah, GA, and surrounding areas.  If you are interested in the AirAllé™ treatment and would like to find a Lice Clinics of America location near you, click below!

 

head lice treatment products and nit comb

So What DOES Kill Head Lice?

There is good news!  At Fresh Heads, we recommend the use of a silicone oil solution to suffocate lice.  The use of a blended Dimethicone Oil solution specifically formulated to kill head lice is the most effective treatment option currently available.  In a blind study, the use of a properly formulated blend of dimethicone is shown to be incredibly effective at killing live lice.  Additionally, this treatment is inexpensive and completely non-toxic.  Dimethicone will not, however, kill nits.  Fresh Heads uses Dimethicone in all our treatments, and we offer it for sale to the do-it-yourselfer.

Students Raising Hands in classroom

Head Lice — What Should the Schools Be Doing?

Nothing strikes fear in the hearts of mothers everywhere like the threat of head lice infestation. Many mothers today remember being checked as children by their school nurses or camp directors, but not all of us struggled with head lice like our children do today. As the head lice epidemic becomes more prevalent, families look to answers, and too often, blame the schools.

School head lice policies are usually handed down from the county health department and vary wildly from county to county, state to state. In North East Florida, most counties still have the strict ‘no nit’ policy, although this policy is not the nationwide norm. Volusia County made headlines recently when they adopted one of the most lenient policies in the country, allowing children with active cases of head lice back into the classroom. The county’s position was simple: Head Lice are not a medical issue, but rather a nuisance. The Center For Disease Control endorses this mode of thinking, pointing out that head lice do not cause any known medical issue.

At Fresh Heads Lice Removal, we feel strongly that much of this burden should be transferred to the parents themselves. Checking your children for lice regularly is the best way to detect it early, treat it effectively, and slow down this epidemic. Further, parents need to be completely honest and forthcoming with their friends and family when they have had a lice problem. Too many families are buying into the stigma that comes with having head lice, and are too embarrassed to tell the people they have been around. We really need to bring head lice out of the proverbial closet! Honest communication is so important and is probably the single best way to stop the spread of lice.

School nurses will do their part, and they do a phenomenal job. But if more parents were taking responsibility for their children, checking their heads regularly at home, and alerting the school, friends, and family when lice are found, there would be much fewer lice in the world. It is really that simple!

head lice closeup

Super Lice

Is “Super Lice” Real?
New research published in the Journal of Medical Entomology, a publication of the Entomological Society of America, shows that lice are becoming increasingly difficult to remove. That’s thanks to a new strain of lice that is resistant to traditional treatments. In fact, this new strain of “super lice” is spreading more quickly than health experts had initially feared.

How Did These Lice Become “Super”?
According to the Journal of Medical Entomology, when over-the-counter treatments aren’t used correctly, or maybe not enough product is used to treat the lice, some lice become resistant. Another scenario is that some treatments may not be left on for the required amount of time, and the lice can not only survive, but they can also grow stronger. These stronger lice then get passed from kid to kid; and over time, they become completely resistant to chemical treatments of any kind.

Super Lice Study Conducted by the University of Massachusetts:
To address concerns about “super lice”, the University of Massachusetts conducted a study to examine the effectiveness of traditional chemical treatment for lice removal. Dr. John Clark and his team collected samples from all over the United States, including samples from Fresh Heads Lice Removal Salon in Jacksonville, FL and found all lice populations to be 100% resistant (saturation of resistant alleles) for all three mutations, MI/TI/LF. The preliminary results suggested that the resistance to “super lice” has spread across the USA, and is at saturating levels (in other words, nearly all lice are resistant to traditional chemical treatments, both prescribed and/or over-the-counter).

One of the goals of the study was to identify the geographical distribution of these resistance frequencies. Thus far, specifically, they found resistance saturation levels in Florida, Texas, New York, California, and Minnesota. They stated they expect to find it in many other states, in addition to those noted above. Approximately 100% of the lice provided by Fresh Heads Lice Removal were found to be resistant to any type of chemical treatment; thus making treatments by the Revolutionary AirAllé™ Head Lice Machine to be the only available chemical-free, single-treatment option that comes with a 100% guarantee.

Treatment by the Revolutionary AirAllé™ Head Lice Machine 100% Guaranteed:
So what should you do if your child comes home with lice? Don’t panic! Super or not, Fresh Heads Lice Removal is a Science-Based Lice Removal Company that is 100% equipped to deal with Super Lice! Fresh Heads is the Exclusive Provider of the Revolutionary AirAllé™ Head Lice Machine, which provides a single treatment that does not require follow up visits or rechecks. Clinical studies have shown that the AirAllé™ device, which uses only controlled heated air (no chemicals), provides a very safe, fast and highly effective way to kill all stages of head lice, lice eggs, and “Super Lice.”

 

girls hugging

How Do I Know If My Child Has Lice?

Head lice are amazingly inconspicuous in your child’s hair and can be very hard to spot or detect. Itching can be one of the first signs of head lice unless your child has a very light case. If your child has an itchy scalp or has been exposed to another child with lice, it’s best to check your child’s head and scalp, and especially behind the ears and near the neckline. Your experts at Fresh Heads Lice Removal are happy to help you discern whether or not your child has lice.

Can I See Lice on the Scalp?
You may be able to see the lice, but they are difficult to distinguish. However, more visible are the tiny white nits (or eggs) that are found on the hair shaft, about one-eighth inch from the scalp. Nits are dark brown in color, only turning clear and sometimes white when they have already hatched. They can appear further down the hair shaft when older, as they are cemented to the hair with a glue when laid. This glue is very strong, and the nits remain on the hair even after they have hatched…so basically, it is a common misconception that nits are white. They are typically either dark brown, or sometimes clear, and feel like a hard speed bump on the hair. They are difficult to detach them from the hair without the use of a special, fine-toothed nit comb (such as the Terminator Comb from Fresh Heads Lice Removal). This high-quality metal comb features ultra-close prongs that provide the single most effective weapon against nit removal.

Check for Nits and Lice:
You may see the nits (or eggs) even if you don’t see any lice. Did you know that a single louse can lay up to 150 eggs? That’s a lot of nits, so keep your eye out for their small white eggs that resemble dandruff. Check the “nape” (back of the neck close to the neckline of the scalp) of the neck and behind the ears first, as this is where lice are commonly found. However, nits and lice can live anywhere on the scalp, so be sure to check all over the entire head. If you find any sign of nits or lice, call Fresh Heads Lice Removal for immediate assistance!

Perform Routine Checks of Your Child’s Hair:
Even if your child does not have lice, it’s important to regularly look closely at your child’s head, and comb through hair while it’s wet, using a fine-toothed nit comb. Good hygiene is not an indicator that a child will or will not get lice. Preventative care and early detection are key in keeping lice out of your hair! If your child has been exposed to another child with lice, he or she is likely to contract lice. If there has been an outbreak at your child’s school, you need to check your child’s hair and scalp immediately; the sooner you find the lice and/or nits, the sooner you can treat and combat the lice!

Call Fresh Heads Lice Removal for more information about lice removal, live prevention, and what to do if your child has lice.

JACKSONVILLE: (904) 517-4087

 

boy holding head lice sign

Oh My, Do We Have Lice? Now What?

An estimated six to 12 million infestations occur in the U.S. annually. It is particularly common among pre-school and elementary school children. Head lice do not transmit any diseases, but they are very contagious and can be very itchy. To determine if your child has been infected with head lice and what to do next, review the details below for more information on eliminating lice.

What Steps To Take If My Child Has Lice:

First, confirm that your child is infected with head lice by checking for the following:

• Check behind the ears and at the back of the neck for any signs of lice
• Look for a rash, as lice might cause a rash on the back of the neck
• Look for nits, as they are dark brown in color, only turning clear and sometimes white when they have already hatched
• Nits feel like a hard speed bump on the hair
• Don’t panic; lice are treatable; call Fresh Heads Lice Removal for assistance

Here Are Some Things To Do Right Away:
• Check other members of your family for head lice
• Notify anyone who has had recent contact with the infected person
• Notify the school that your child attends
• Call Fresh Heads Lice Removal for the most thorough Head Lice Treatment available
• Fresh Heads uses the AirAlle TM system, which is an all-natural method of lice removal that is 100% guaranteed

To Shampoo or Not to Shampoo:
• Over-the-counter shampoos and treatments are only designed to kill adult lice
• Lice shampoos don’t kill nits (eggs)
• Many shampoos and treatments contain toxic chemical and can enter the bloodstream through the scalp/skin
• Even if you use a shampoo that kills the adult lice, you still need to detect and remove all of the nits
• Don’t shampoo with harsh chemicals, call Fresh Heads Lice Removal, 7 days a week, for immediate help
• For additional information on lice removal and preventative care, click here!

How To Disinfect/Treat My Home:
Wash all clothing and linens worn or used by the infected within the last 48 hours
• Use hot water and high heat for at least 35 minutes
Isolate other commonly used items in tightly closed plastic bags for two weeks
• Items should include throw pillows, stuffed animals, helmets, hats, hair accessories, and the like
Vacuum surfaces that cannot be wiped down or washed including rugs, furniture, and the like
Soak hair brushes in rubbing alcohol for 20 minutes and store in a plastic bag for two weeks.

We know it can be very stressful to deal with a lice infestation, but we can help! We are safe, fast, and convenient.

Call Fresh Heads Lice Removal for a 100% guaranteed lice removal treatment using the AirAlle TM system. We are available 7 days a week for your convenience!

Call: 904-517-4087

Selfies and Lice

First Coast News Interviews Jacksonville Business Owner, Mandy Ottesen, of Fresh Heads Lice Removal about whether head lice can be transmitted via “selfies”:

Mandy explains that the most efficient ways to keep head lice at bay are to avoid head-to-head contact with other people, to avoid sharing hats, helmets, combs, brushes, and hair accessories. She has seen an increase in lice outbreaks among teens, but does not necessarily attribute that to “selfies.” Can children and teens contact lice by taking a “selfie”? Mandy says, “yes” but it’s not the most likely method of transmittal. View Mandy’s complete interview with First Coast News for more details on how to avoid and prevent head lice.

NOTE: Mandy Ottesen is the Owner of Fresh Heads Lice Removal, which is a Science-Based Lice Removal Company. Fresh Heads is the Exclusive Provider of the Revolutionary AirAllé™ Head Lice Machine, which allows them to provide a single treatment that does not require follow up visits or rechecks. They also offer thorough and low-cost traditional comb-outs and tools for the do-it-yourself option.

Learn more about Fresh Heads Lice Removal by visiting their website:

Or call: 904-517-4087

 

How To Check for Head Lice

Most parents are fearful of the idea that their children will contract head lice, yet until they actually do battle head lice, those same parents have no idea how to check for it.  If you have never seen it, how would you know?  It would seem logical to turn to the internet for advice, but unfortunately, the web is chock full of misinformation.  But knowing how to check and checking often is your greatest defense against a really tough infestation.  Here’s what you need to know about how to check your child for head lice:

checking-for-lice-jacksonville

It is easiest to start looking at the nape of the neck and work your way up toward the front of the hair.  If the child has long enough hair, you should pull it up into a ponytail with one hand, and slowly work your way up, pulling small, paper-thin sections of hair down and examining each hair closely.  You should concentrate at the base of the hair, as the lice eggs are going to be found glued to the hair shaft, quite close to the scalp.  When these eggs are new, they are dark brown in color, and on blonde hair can look like specks of dirt.  Newer nits can be more difficult to see on children with darker hair, as they can blend in quite well.  Nits that are not viable, or that have already hatched can appear clearish, like droplets of water, or white, but will still be firmly attached to the hair.  Nits are most often found at the nape of the neck, the crown of the head, or the hairline around the front or sides of the head.

Often, dandruff is mistaken for lice eggs.  Lice eggs will be firmly attached to the hair and will feel like a hard speed bump if you run your fingers over them.  They will not slide down the hair shaft with your fingertips.  If you are seeing white debris that appears to be on the hair but will slide under your fingertips, you are more than likely looking at dandruff, not nits.

As soon as you find any evidence of lice or eggs, you should take action immediately.  Fresh Heads Lice Removal offers guaranteed lice removal services and we are available by appointment 7 days a week.