Saturday, November 29, 2008

HAIRBALLS AREN'T JUST FOR CATS


An 11 year old girl in India was hospitalized with severe pain in her stomach. The operation revealed a foot long hairball.

The mass of hair - known as a trichobozear -is a potentially fatal result of a mental illness called trichotillomania, a condition in which the patient pulls her hair out and, in many cases, eats it. And while the condition is not well known, American doctors say that it may afflict 1 percent of all Americans.

The doctor went on to say most people with this mental illness do not eat the hair after pulling it out. "This extreme form of the condition occurs in between 30 and 50 percent of patients".

2 comments:

Tim Smith said...

That is truly disgusting!

Anonymous said...

Interesting. The shape reminds me of a gourd.

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