How to Teach Families About Safe Hair Care for Skin of Color

Candrice Heath, MD, discusses how to teach families about safe hair care practices for skin of color. Dr Heath (Instagram @drcandriceheath, Twitter @DrCandriceHeath) is a triple board-certified dermatologist and assistant professor of dermatology at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA.

Transcript

Dr Heath:  What I'd say is I try to really approach this gently, because I understand that it's not just you walking in and telling the patient, "Oh, all of this entire hairstyle that you have is too tight. We need to just not do any of this." I know it's about moderation. I actually try to select my words very carefully.

There's an article that I wrote in the Pediatric Dermatology journal with an anthropologist here at my university. We talk about how the child's hair...really, when you have tightly coiled hair, it really belongs to someone else. It doesn't even belong to the child because there's this sense of pride and if my child's every hair in place, then it is reflective to the community that my child is well cared for. When you are giving advice, you are really putting yourself directly into that relationship.

I always begin with complimenting anything that I can compliment with the family, with the child and how they're being cared for, so that they know that this is not a place of blame. I also ask them, "You can keep it simple. Keep it simple." I actually give them permission for every hair not to be in place. I said, "If you're going to do the child's hair, you want to really treat it gently. You don't want to do anything that's going to inflict pain on the child." When you get that style finally in, make it look like it's already a week or two old. I give them that permission. Just the cultural standards are every hair in place, every hair in place, so giving them that permission.

Also, another simple thing that I recommend is when the child comes home, does really removing any hats, any barrettes, anything that can be loosened. I want that to be loosened as soon as they come in, because we know the more that we're able to limit tension on the hair, the more likely we are to try to prevent some of the preventable forms of hair loss.

Also the other segment is really instilling pride in one's hair. That's why I really like to compliment the hair because from the child's point of view is like—this is something that they hear adults complain about—"Oh, we have to do the hair. Oh, it's going to take forever. Oh, we're never going to have time to do that this week." It's like the child begins to feel like it's a burden. It's a burden that this has to be done. We really want to instill some confidence to say, "Your hair is great. I love you. I love that your mom or your dad or whoever is coming to get some advice for this.

Again, to keep it simple, when I'm giving you know lectures, I say, "Limit the tension. Remove the barrettes. Really select moisturizing hair care products and also really involving the care of a dermatologist for anything that looks like hair loss, hair breakage, any bumps on the scalp." Really giving people permission, any persistent, itching, all of that, I give them permission to bring that child back but just very simple hair care advice in the beginning.

Also, moisturizing the hair every day, that may be something they're not doing. That's usually the shocker for most people that even between wash days—yes, I call it wash day because it takes like a long time—in between wash days, it is okay to moisturize the hair throughout those weeks and hopefully try to do your wash day once a week or once every other week.