A team of doctors at Sarvajanik Hospital at Gojharia in
Mehsana operated upon a girl and removed 1.1 kg hairball from her stomach.
Rajita (name changed), a 22year-old girl with no record of
major medical illness, gradually started losing weight. Simultaneously, she
started complaining of stomach pain, too.A medical diagnosis found a sizeable
hairball mass in her stomach that left the medical team surprised.
“The size of the lump really made us curious. We knew it was
not a flesh lump but hairball. Many psychiatric patients have a habit of
pulling their hair. In medical term, it is called Trichophagia. In extreme
cases, they start eating it also. But this girl was denying it completely,“
said Dr Dushyant Pawar who operated upon her.
Despite the doctors' constant questioning, the girl kept
denying any kind of addiction that added to their confusion. However, on the
day of surgery when the doctor again questioned her, she finally accepted that she
had been eating her hair for past 10 years without anyone's knowledge.
“We were dumbstruck by seeing a huge hairball. I had read
about it in books during studies but never came across any such case like
that,“ added Dr Pawar.
Explaining the syndrome, Dr Keyur Panchal, a psychiatrist at
SAL Hospital, said: “Trichophagia is an impulse control disorder wherein the
patient has the habit of hair pulling. It may be because of depression or other
psychiatric disorders.“
“All Trichophagia patients don't eat hair but those who do
develop Rapunzel syndrome.Hair gets deposited in intestine and form hairball.
It can be fatal for a patient,“ added Dr Panchal.
In many cases, patients don't show the symptoms until last
minute and operation remains the only way to save the patient's life.“Under
this habit, people also start losing their hair as they keep on pulling their
hair continuously,“ said the doctor.
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