Olive Oil for Head Lice

Head lice is often referred to as pediculosis. They are small bugs that live on the human scalp. They are wingless creatures, have six legs, and are brown to gray in color. Small children below the age of 12 are more prone to get head lice. Head lice spread from one human head to the another due to direct contact. It does not get transmitted via pets. Nor does it infest due to lack of personal hygiene. Rather, head lice prefer to live on clean heads.

The identifiable symptom of the presence of head lice is continuous itching of the scalp, neck and back of the ear. Head lice infestation is very bothersome but it does not cause any serious harm to the health of a child. However, excessive scratching of the can lead to secondary bacterial infection. The usual treatment of head lice are the use of chemicals or head lice shampoos. The use of chemicals can cause allergies as the child's skin is highly sensitive. For this reason, more and more people prefer head lice olive oil treatment.

Why Use Olive Oil for Head Lice?

Tests have been conducted in various research laboratories and it has been found that olive oil is an excellent form of alternative treatment for head lice. Head lice breathe through tiny holes present at the sides of their body. When olive oil is poured on them, these holes get blocked and as a result they are smothered to death. This way head lice can be treated using other agents like butter, Vaseline or mayonnaise. However, they are avoided in most cases because they can cause allergic reactions while olive oil rarely causes any such reactions. Even the smell of butter or mayonnaise are disliked by children. Moreover, olive oil is much easier to wash off from the hair as compared to mayonnaise, butter or Vaseline. Most importantly, it is not very expensive. You do not have to use expensive virgin olive oil for this purpose and the oil of low price range can work equally well.

Olive Oil Treatment

First of all, you have to talk to the child so that they are aware of what you are going to do and why it is important and then start the treatment. Here are the step by step instructions:

Step # 1: Make your child sit in a corner of a room and place a towel around the shoulders. This will absorb the excess of olive oil.

Step # 2: Take a generous amount of olive oil and apply it all over the head of your child so that the oil covers the hair thoroughly and reach out to all the head lice present.

Step # 3: Gather the longer hair strands at the crown of the head and wrap up the head with a plastic wrap. Try to ensure that all the hair strands remain inside the wrap only. Then put a shower cap over it. Finally, wrap up a towel tightly over it and tuck it well so that it does not fall off. This is done to lock the oil on the scalp.

Step # 4: Olive oil has to be kept on the head for a while because head lice are capable of staying alive for hours by shutting down all their systems. Therefore, it has to be done before your child goes to bed and let the oil smother the head lice all night long.

Step # 5: Next morning, take a head lice comb and divide the hair into a number of sections. Then comb each of the sections of the hair repeatedly so that maximum dead nits are removed from the head.

Step # 6: Then wash off the hair thoroughly with a mild shampoo so that all the olive oil is eliminated from the hair. You can mix one part of vinegar and four parts of water and use this mixture as the last rinse after shampooing. This will help to get rid of the oil residues from the hair.

Head lice treatment will give the best results if it is applied at an early stage of the infestation. Otherwise, the treatment has to be repeated several times before the problem can be completely eliminated. There are chances of re-infestation of head lice if any other members including the adults of the house still have head lice. Therefore, it is advisable that all the members of the family undergo head lice olive oil treatment one by one to wipe out head lice forever.