How Can You Remove Lice Nits from Your Hair Without a Lice Comb?
Using a lice comb in wet hair can be a great way to remove lice nits. But it’s possible to eliminate them with smothering agents, essential oils, and powerful treatments called pediculicides. It’s important to remove nits (lice eggs) from your hair so that they don’t hatch into nymphs and produce a new generation of lice within less than 2 weeks. Read on for some tips to clear out lice nits from your hair, even if you don’t have a lice comb.
Can you get rid of nits without combing? Wet-combing is usually a great method for head lice and nit removal. But you can remove them without combing them out of your hair. Here’s the theory: Adult lice lay nits that can stick to your hair with a glue-like substance that covers the entire outer shell of the nits. Anything that weakens this substance or damages the nit can help remove the nit from your hair. Weakening the glue-like substance results in cutting off oxygenTrusted Source to the nits, reducing the stickiness of the outer shell coating, or damaging the nit shellTrusted Source and killing the louse inside.
Methods to try that don’t involve wet-combing
Here are several methods you can try to remove lice nits without wet-combing your hair.
Smothering agents
Smothering agents suffocate lice by damaging their breathing organs and stopping them from releasing excess water from their bodies as they feed on blood. This can stop them from laying eggs and eventually kill them.
Here are some examples of common smothering agents:
isopropyl myristate
carthamus tinctorius (safflower oil)
You can purchase many smothering agents at drugstores or grocery stores. Some treatments labeled as lice sprays often contain these ingredients and natural insecticides like permethrinTrusted Source.
You’ll need to apply most smothering agents regularly for a few days or weeks for them to be effective.
Essential oils
Lice are insects. And some essential oils kill lice and other insects naturally.
A 2017 study compared Australian eucalyptus oil and lemon tea tree oil — a mixture called an EO/LP solution — to a solution comprising pyrethrins and piperonyl butoxide (P/PB). Participants had the oils put on their hair once every 7 days for 3 weeks and the P/PB once every 7 days for 2 weeks.
The researchers found that the EO/PL solution was twice as effective as the P/PB solution, killing 100%Trusted Source of the lice and their nits.
A small study from 2017 found that a couple of essential oils were effective against lice, helping stop the reproductive cycle that leads to more nits. Clove oil killed more than 90% of lice when directly applied to hair for 30 minutes. Yunnan verbena oil diluted with coconut oil was also effective.
Prescription or over-the-counter medications and shampoos
Aside from wet-combing, prescription or over-the-counter (OTC) pediculicides can be the most effective treatment for removing lice and nits.
Use a pediculicide labeled as ovicidal. This means that it kills lice and their eggs.
Malathion lotionTrusted Source is a common ovicidal pediculicide you can only put on children 6 years or older. Other pediculicides like benzyl alcohol and ivermectin lotion can kill lice but don’t directly kill nits.
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