WASHINGTON — Some parents are scratching their heads over less restrictive head lice policies that allow children with live bugs in their hair to return to the classroom.

And some school nurses are no longer sending home the dreaded “lice note” to other parents with kids in the classroom, alerting them to the possibility of lice in their own child's precious locks. The policy shift is designed to help keep children from missing class, shield children with lice from embarrassment and protect their privacy.

“Lice is icky, but it's not dangerous,” says Deborah Pontius, the school nurse for the Pershing County School District in Lovelock, Nev. “It's not infectious, and it's fairly easy to treat.”

Usually by the time an itchy child is sent to the nurse, Pontius says, the child has probably had lice for about three weeks to two months. She says classmates already would have been exposed. There's little additional risk of transmission, she says, if the student returns to class for a few hours until the end of the day, when a parent would pick up the child and treat for lice at home.

Pontius also doesn't send lice notes. “It gets out who had lice,” she says, and there's no need to panic parents. Parents with elementary school-aged kids should check their children's hair for lice once a week anyway, she says. If they are doing that, then there's really no need for the notes.

The idea of letting kids with untreated lice remain in class doesn't set well with some parents.

“I'm appalled. I am just so disgusted,” says Theresa Rice, whose 8-year-old daughter, Jenna, has come home from her elementary school in Hamilton County, Tenn., with lice three times since school started in August.

“It's just a terrible headache to have to deal with lice,” says Rice. To pick out the tiny eggs, or nits, and lice from Jenna's long blond hair is a four-hour process. Add to that all the laundry and cleaning — it's exhausting, she says.

Jenna's school implemented a new policy in the past year that allows children with untreated lice to go home at the end of the day, be treated and then return to school. The policy, the district said, complies with the guidelines of both the Tennessee Department of Education and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Other schools, in California, Florida, Nebraska, New Mexico, South Carolina and elsewhere, have similar policies.

The National Pediculosis Association in Massachusetts is opposed to relaxing bans on lice and blames the updated policies for spreading the bugs.

The association says lice treatment shampoos are pesticides that are not safe for children and not 100 percent effective. The group instead urges parents to screen regularly and use a special comb to manually remove lice.

Lice are tiny grayish-white bugs that infest a scalp. Lice don't jump or fly. They crawl. They are not a sign of poor hygiene.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that there are 6 million to 12 million head lice infestations each year in the United States among children 3 to 11 years old.

Tips for treating head lice from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:• Using an over-the-counter or prescription medicine, follow the instructions printed on the box or label. Hair that is longer than shoulder length may require two bottles. Be sure to note how long the medication should be left on the hair and how it should be washed out.• Do not use a combination shampoo/conditioner or conditioner alone before using the lice medicine. Refrain from washing the hair for a day or two after the lice medicine is removed.• Check for live lice eight to 12 hours after treatment. A few lice may survive. If they’re moving more slowly than before, do not re-treat. The medicine may take longer to kill all the lice. Comb dead and any remaining live lice out of the hair using a nit comb, which is designed to remove the lice eggs from the hair shaft.• After eight to 12 hours of treatment, if no dead lice are found and the lice seem as active as before, the medicine may not be working. Consult your health care provider before re-treating. If your health care provider recommends a different treatment, carefully follow the instructions on the label.• Nit combs, designed to remove lice eggs from the hair shaft, are often found in lice medicine packages. Use the comb to remove the eggs and lice from the hair. Flea combs made for cats and dogs may also be effective.• After each treatment, checking the hair and combing with a nit comb to remove nits and lice every two to three days may decrease the chance of self-reinfestation. Continue to check for two to three weeks.• Retreatment is meant to kill any surviving hatched lice before they produce new eggs. Depending on the drug, retreatment is recommended routinely seven to nine days after the first treatment. For other medications, retreatment is recommended only if crawling lice are seen during this period. • • Retreatment with lindane shampoo is not recommended.• Machine wash and dry clothing, bed linens and other items that the infested person wore or used during the two days before treatment using the hot water (130 degrees Fahrenheit) laundry cycle and the high-heat drying cycle. Clothing and items that are not washable can be dry cleaned or sealed in a plastic bag and stored for two weeks.• Vacuum the floor and furniture, particularly where the infested person sat or lay. However, the risk of getting infested by a louse that has fallen onto a rug or carpet or furniture is very small. Head lice survive less than one to two days if they fall off a person and cannot feed.