Every year, a large number of head lice cases are misdiagnosed by health care workers, parents and school officials alike. In a year 2000, researchers at the Laboratory of Public Health Entomology at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) asked volunteers to submit samples of what they thought were head lice or louse eggs along with a questionnaire.¹

Alarmingly, of the 614 submissions, 41 percent had nothing to do with head lice, but instead were objects such as other types of bugs, dandruff, scabs, knotted hair, and clothing fibers¹

Additionally, of the submissions that were associated with lice, about half seemed to be signs of infestations that were now extinct.¹

The following image collage of head live and their eggs was collected from a range of sources and may be useful in assisting parents in identifying active head lice infestaions.

 

_{1.Head Lice Frequently Misdiagnosed, Wrong Identification Results in School Absences and Inappropriate Medication, August 2000, http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/ats/Aug11/aug11_02.html}