Apr 30, 2008
Weston parents say lice policy is lousy
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by Patricia Gay
Hearing that your child has head lice is bad enough, but a change in procedure for handling lice at Hurlbutt Elementary School has some parents really scratching their heads.
They are confused as to why the school made substantial changes to its head lice policy but failed to notify them of the changes. Some say the lack of communication gave them a false sense of security there weren’t head lice in their child’s classroom, when in fact there were.
Joanna Genovese, Hurlbutt’s principal, acknowledged the Weston school district changed its practices and did not tell parents. “Parents are upset about not being notified, and that is a fair criticism. I think a letter should have come from the district level to notify them about the new practice and procedure,” she said.
Sometime in November, the schools changed their attendance policy regarding children with head lice. Originally, children with “nits” — the unhatched eggs of head lice — were not allowed into school until the nits were gone.
This practice often resulted in students missing a week or more of classes, Ms. Genovese said.
The schools then changed their procedures to allow children with nits — but not live lice — into the classroom.
The change is in line with what some other school districts in the area are doing (see related story below).
As a result of the change, school nurses stopped inspecting entire classrooms when only nits were reported in the class.
Nurses also stopped sending notices home to parents telling them “head lice” was reported in the classroom, because nits were no longer considered on the same level as live lice.
Head lice are blood-sucking parasites that live on the human scalp. The eggs of a louse are called “nits” (see related story below).
School year
In Weston, it is believed many students bring head lice into the schools at the beginning of the school year after picking them up in summer camps and trips abroad.
Sheryl Zulkeski, the school district’s nurse supervisor, said 11 students at Hurlbutt came to school in September infested with active lice.
At the time, the school district was operating under a “no nit” practice, and those students were sent home for treatment.
In addition, approximately 109 children in the classrooms with the infested students were examined by the school nurse and notes were sent home to parents informing them, without mentioning a specific student’s name, that someone in the class had head lice.
Ms. Zulkeski points out there was never an official “no nit policy” for the Weston school system. “There was never anything in writing. It was our practice and procedure to send the kids with nits home, but the schools never had a written policy about it,” she said.
After attending a local supervisors’ meeting, Ms. Zulkeski said she found out that other school districts were not sending children with nits home because the students were missing too much academic time.
“Students were missing a lot of time over nothing more than a childhood nuisance. It is not contagious or communicable. Parents were panicking. It was a totally inappropriate use of the nurse’s time and an academic loss of the students’ time. It seemed like the wrong thing to do to send children home just because they had nits in their hair,” she said.
Harvard report
Ms. Zulkeski referred to a report published by the Harvard School of Public Health, written by Richard Pollack, Ph.D., that states “no-nit policies” are often counterproductive because many nits do not ever develop into viable lice.
“We suggest that the practice of excluding presumably infested children from school is unwarranted,” the report states.
Dr. Laura Marks, the medical adviser to the Weston schools, said Weston was one of the only schools in the area that had a “no-nit” policy. “Kids were missing school, so the question was whether or not the policy was effective,” she said.
After consulting with Dr. Marks and central office, Ms. Zulkeski said, the Weston school district decided not to send children home anymore just because they had nits.
However, live lice are a different matter. “If they have active lice, we send the children home and inform the parents so they can get treatment,” she said. In the case of live lice, she said, students are allowed back into the classroom after there is proof of treatment and the live lice are gone.
Lack of communication
While some parents do not have an issue with the schools’ new “yes-nit” policy, they do have a problem with the fact they weren’t told about it.
Dawn Egan, president of the Hurlbutt PTO, said she asked Ms. Genovese and John Reed, interim superintendent of schools, more than a month ago to revisit the policy on notification based on complaints she heard from parents.
Meanwhile, the mother of a student at the intermediate school said her daughter became infested with head lice just one week ago and it has been an ordeal.
“My daughter complained that her head was itching and I pulled a bug from her scalp. At first I thought it was a deer tick. I then looked on the Internet and found a picture that looked exactly like the bug and realized it was a head louse. I then saw tiny, grayish nits all over her head. I followed standard treatment and used Rid shampoo and removed the nits with a comb. It was a very long process,” she said.
She ordered approximately $200 worth of natural lice treatment products online. Then she bagged up her daughter’s belongings into plastic bags and washed bed linens and anything her daughter touched on a daily basis.
“This is a contagious problem. The school nurse should be concerned about the nits and not just the lice. I don’t agree about not allowing people in the class to know about it. Most of my daughter’s friends came down with it, too. To not let parents know is a little disheartening because we aren’t able to catch it as quickly,” she said.
Misinformed
Emily Maestri, a mother of a first grader, said she was misinformed about Hurlbutt’s head lice notification policy.
Her daughter got infested in the beginning of February, and, after going through the lengthy shampooing and combing rituals to rid her daughter of nits, she found out the school would not be notifying parents in her daughter’s classroom.
“I said I would send the other parents an e-mail to let them know. I didn’t want anyone to have to go through what we did just because they hadn’t been informed. Going through head lice treatment is a real nightmare that I wouldn’t wish on anyone,” she said.
She said the school nurse told her not to e-mail anyone because a new state law went into effect at the beginning of the year forbidding notification based on HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) privacy issues.
Ms. Maestri said she also got a call from her daughter’s teacher advising her not to send the e-mail, because of the “new state law.”
However, according to the state Department of Public Health, there are no state laws pertaining to head lice, and HIPAA does not apply to individuals who want to disclose the names of their own children.
Ms. Zulkeski acknowledged that the school district, and not the state, controls head lice notification. She said it is possible the parent misunderstood discussion about any HIPAA reference — a claim Ms. Maestri denies.
Some parents also thought the school administration may have changed the nit notification policy because pressure and possible threats of a lawsuit were made by other Weston parents who complained after a teacher sent a note home about their children’s lice problems.
“That is absolutely not the case,” Ms. Genovese said.
Splitting hairs?
So how much of a problem is head lice in the Weston school system? The answer depends on whom you ask.
According to Ms. Zulkeski, it isn’t much of a problem at all. “We’ve only had four cases all year,” she said.
Many Hurlbutt parents say it has been a widespread problem and the schools are splitting hairs with their numbers.
About those four reported cases — didn’t Ms. Zulkeski say there were eleven students in September that had head lice?
“Yes, but those don’t count because they arrived at school with the lice already,” Ms. Zulkeski said.
And how about reports from parents who say they found lice on their children? “Those weren’t found by the school nurse,” Ms. Zulkeski said.
She also said the nurses do not keep exact track of every single case of head lice.
What about claims by some parents that entire classrooms and even teachers came down with head lice?
Ms. Zulkeski said she was not aware of that, and that some parents mistake nits for lice, which do not count in the calculation.
She said if a school nurse finds a live louse on a child, the child is immediately sent home for treatment. But even that claim was disputed by a Hurlbutt parent.
The parent said her daughter, a kindergartner, got head lice in early March. After a round of treatment, the daughter went back to school.
“The school nurse examined her, found a louse on her head and removed it, and then sent her back to class. I thought if the school found a live bug they would send her home, but they didn’t,” the parent said.
She said she is not happy with the school’s lack of notification. “You’ve got to tell people something. That’s the frustration,” she said.
Lessons learned
With the school year coming to a close, Ms. Genovese said the administration has learned a lesson from this situation.
“There will be better communication in the future and the school handbook will be updated to reflect the changes,” she said.
Ms. Maestri said she, too, is ready to move forward. She has helped several parents treat their children for lice.
“Emily is a saint! She came to my house and spent hours combing through my child’s hair, and she did the same for others,” said one parent.
But Ms. Maestri is not content to just treat the lice problem. She wants to stop it — permanently.
“In the end, it is not up to the schools. It is up to us as parents to communicate, treat, and eradicate,” she said.
© Copyright 2008 by Hersam Acorn Newspapers
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