Children can get threadworms when they accidentally get worm eggs on their hands and swallow them. This might happen if they put their hands in their mouths or bite their nails after coming into contact with people with worms or with worm-infected dust, toys or bed linen.
The worms get into the body when people swallow the tiny pinworm eggs. The eggs can be on contaminated hands, under fingernails, and on things people touch a lot, such as: clothing, bed linens, and towels. bathroom surfaces.
They're common in children and spread easily. You can treat them without seeing a GP.
If you or your child has threadworms, everyone in your household will need to be treated as there's a high risk of the infection spreading. This includes those who don't have any symptoms of an infection. For most people, treatment will involve taking a single dose of a medication called mebendazole to kill the worms.
Threadworms in kids are easy to treat and usually aren't serious. Your GP will probably tell you to give your child a dose of antiparasitic tablets, which you can get over the counter from a pharmacy. Your child usually needs to repeat the dose after 2 weeks to make sure all the worms are gone.
Any worms in your gut will eventually pass out in your poo. You may not notice this. To avoid becoming infected again or infecting others, it's very important during the weeks after starting treatment to wash your hands: after going to the toilet.
A child can go through deworming on a regular basis to get the intestinal worms removed. If the worms are not removed, they can multiply and lay eggs in the intestine, leading to major damage to the body. Some of these intestinal parasites can even be fatal and hence should not be ignored.
Although often asymptomatic, parasitic infections can lead to disruptions in mood, behavior and sleep – particularly in children with worms.
You may be able to see threadworm if you examine your child at night. Take a torch, separate your child's buttocks and look carefully around the anus (and the opening to the vagina in girls). You might see tiny white threads that may be moving.
Give to children 1 year up to 5 years (12-59 months) of age. It is safe and effective to give deworming in combination with vitamin A every 4-6 months.
Worms are mainly spread in small bits of poo from people with a worm infection. Some are caught from food. You can get infected by: touching objects or surfaces with worm eggs on them – if someone with worms doesn't wash their hands.
When the eggs are scratched off onto the hands or under the nails they can be transferred to other children at home or at school, or to adults. Most often they go to the scratching child's mouth where they can be swallowed and start another infection, known as an “auto infection”.
This is why you may need to take another dose 2 weeks later to help prevent reinfection. How long does it take to work? The medicine should start to work straight away but it may take several days to kill all the worms. It's important to take the medicine as a pharmacist or doctor tells you.
Having worms can make you feel extreme hunger just after eating, or extreme fullness when you haven't eaten anything. This is because the worms feed on the food that you have eaten, leaving you hungry, but can also cause you to feel nauseous or gaseous, which can make you feel full.
Tulsi leaf juice with honey or peach juice and honey is also helpful. Food like ajwain (caraway), black pepper (kaali mirch), asafoetida (hing), black salt (kala namak), dry ginger, garlic, turmeric are good for deworming. Take ajwain mixed with a pinch of salt on empty stomach for a week to eliminate worms.
Infants, toddlers, and very young children in day care settings are at risk for the parasitic disease called giardiasis that causes diarrhea and is spread through contaminated feces. Pinworm infection (enterobiasis) also occurs among preschool and young school-age children.
The symptoms that indicate the presence of the worms are poor appetite, unintentional weight loss, rashes on the buttocks, stomach pain, constipation or diarrhoea, frequent urination and fatigue.
Threadworms live about 5-6 weeks in the gut, and then die. However, before they die the female worms lay tiny eggs around the anus. This tends to be at night when you are warm and still in bed. The eggs are too small to see, but cause an itch around the anus.
Sometimes worms are visible in the anal area, on underwear, or in the toilet. In stool, they look like small pieces of white cotton thread.
Adult worms may live up to 17 years in the human body and can continue to make new microfilariae for much of this time. Most people with loiasis do not have any symptoms.
If you have a large number of worms in the intestine, you might have: Severe abdominal pain. Fatigue. Vomiting.