Mebendazole is the main medication used to treat threadworm infections. It can be bought over the counter from your local pharmacy or prescribed by your GP. It's available as a chewable tablet or a liquid. Mebendazole works by preventing the threadworms absorbing sugar, which means they should die within a few days.
Raw garlic
Garlic is said to kill any existing eggs and prevent female pinworms from laying more eggs. You can ingest it in small doses or apply it topically like a salve. If you wish to ingest the garlic, dice up a clove and mix it into pasta or sprinkle it on bread. You can also eat the garlic on its own.
If you have worms, a GP will prescribe medicine to kill them. You take this for 1 to 3 days. The people you live with may also need to be treated. Any worms in your gut will eventually pass out in your poo.
"Changing and washing bedding can help to remove threadworm eggs within the linen," agrees Dr Luke Powles, clinical director at Bupa UK. "However, be careful when removing the sheets as shaking bedding around may cause the eggs to land on other surfaces and spread infection."
The worms die after about six weeks. Provided that you do not swallow any new eggs, no new worms will grow to replace them. So, if you continue the hygiene measures described above for six weeks, this should break the cycle of re-infection, and clear your gut of threadworms.
Threadworms usually produce no symptoms except an itchy bottom. In fact, people may harbour them for years without realising it. Distaste aside, threadworms do no harm - except, as my GP wryly observed, to the sufferer's self-esteem. The worms are white and about a centimetre long by 0.5mm in diameter.
Threadworms. An itchy bottom that's worse at night is often caused by threadworms, especially in children. Children under 2, and pregnant and breastfeeding women, cannot usually take medicine for threadworms – see a GP, midwife or health visitor instead.
It moves. If it doesn't wiggle, it's probably lint or a thread. The worm may be seen around the anus or on the child's bottom. It is especially active at night or early morning.
They don't always cause symptoms, but people often experience itchiness around their bottom or vagina. It can be worse at night and disturb sleep. Read more about the symptoms of threadworms.
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 medications used for the treatment of pinworm are either mebendazole, pyrantel pamoate, or albendazole. Any of these drugs are given in one dose initially, and then another single dose of the same drug two weeks later. Pyrantel pamoate is available without prescription.
For the itching, wash the skin around the anus with warm water. For severe itch, use 1% hydrocortisone cream (such as Cortaid) 2 times per day. Use for 1 or 2 days. No prescription is needed.
To treat pinworm infection, your doctor may recommend over-the-counter pyrantel pamoate or prescribe medication to all members of your household to prevent infection and reinfection. The most common prescription anti-parasite medications for pinworms are: Mebendazole. Albendazole (Albenza)
The eggs are laid in a sticky, jelly-like substance that, along with the wriggling of the female pinworm, causes severe itching.
The eggs pass into the digestive system, where they hatch. About 1 to 2 months later, adult female pinworms lay eggs on the skin right around the anus, which makes the area itchy. Often, this happens at night.
Medications kill only the adult worms and have no effect on developing eggs and larvae. The prescription of choice is mebendazole* and the non-prescription medication of choice is pyrantel pamoate. Both mebendazole and pyrantel pamoate are given as a single dose and repeated in 2 weeks to kill any newly ingested eggs.
Threadworms spread when their eggs are swallowed. They lay eggs around your bottom (anus), which make it itchy. The eggs get stuck on your fingers when you scratch.
Summary. Pinworm is the most common worm infection in Australia. The major symptom is an itchy bottom, particularly at night.
If left untreated, the intense itching and scratching associated with these infections will result in secondary bacterial infections. Some of these may be difficult to treat. Untreated people can continue to infect other people.
This infection occurs after a person swallows tapeworm eggs. The larvae get into tissues such as muscle and brain, and form cysts there (these are called cysticerci).
You or your child can get threadworms by accidently swallowing worm eggs found on contaminated surfaces. This can happen by scratching the anal region and then touching your mouth or food.
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.
Clean the home post-treatment
Worm eggs can survive for several days on external surfaces, but you can play your part in preventing a reinfestation by doing the following: Wash all the bedsheets and linen that family members have been sleeping on with hot water, to kill any remaining eggs.