A teenage girl in the UK who compulsively ate her own hair developed a huge hairball in her stomach that opened a hole in the stomach wall, according to a new report.
The oval-shaped ball of hair was 48 centimeters long and completely filled his stomach, according to the report, published on February 9 in the newspaper BMJ Case Reports.
The 17-year-old initially went to the hospital after passing out twice, injuring her face and scalp during falls.
Doctors wanted to rule out a head injury, but during an examination, they also noticed a mass in the girl’s upper abdomen. The teenager said she had experienced intermittent abdominal pain in the past five months, which had worsened in the two weeks prior to her visit to the hospital, the report said.
She also had a history of two mental disorders: trichotillomania, or a strong desire to pull her hair out; and the condition related to trichophagia, or compulsive eating of hair.
A computed tomography (CT) scan revealed a “grossly distended stomach” with a large internal mass and a tear in the stomach wall, according to the study’s authors, at Queen’s Medical Center in Nottingham, England.
Related: 27 strangest medical cases
The teenager was diagnosed with Rapunzel syndrome, in which a hairball in the stomach – known as trichobezoar – extends to the intestine, Live Science previously reported.
She underwent surgery and doctors removed the hair ball, which was so large that it “formed a mold of the entire stomach,” the authors said.
Between 0.5% and 3% of people will have trichotillomania at some point in their lives, according to the National Organization for Rare Disorders. Only about 10% to 30% of people with trichotillomania also experience trichophagia, Live Science previously reported. And among people with both conditions, only about 1% develop hair mass in the gastrointestinal tract, according to a 2019 study published in the journal. Pancreas.
Eating hair can cause serious complications, including bowel obstruction and even death, according to Mayo clinic. In 2017, a 16 year old girl in England died of Rapunzel syndrome after a hairball in your stomach caused a fatal infection.
In the current case, the teenager was admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) after the surgery and was fed through a feeding tube inserted in the small intestine while the stomach healed.
After evaluating psychiatrists at the hospital, she had an “uneventful postoperative course” and was discharged from the hospital seven days after surgery, the authors wrote. A month later, she had no sign of complications, “was doing well with dietary advice” and was seeing a psychologist, they said.
Originally published on Live Science.