Surgeons extracted a hairball weighing 700 grams from the stomach of a 12-year-old Argentine girl suffering from a rare psychological disorder that makes her compulsively eat inedible objects, an official said.
For seven years the girl had been eating her own hair, small pieces of toys, porcelain, cement and dirt, until she was discovered to be suffering from the rare disorder called 'trichophagy'.
"The patient had been seen in other hospitals without obtaining adequate diagnosis or treatment," according to Ana Rosi, head of Child Surgery at the Gandulfo Hospital outside Buenos Aires, where the girl is recovering favourably from the operation she underwent.
She had arrived at the hospital with signs of underweight, hair loss and a noticeable bulge in the abdomen that made doctors suspect the presence of a tumour, but which turned out to be a hairball lodged in the stomach, she said.