Bengaluru doctors remove cricket ball-sized hairball from 8-year-old’s stomach

In a rare case, doctors in Bengaluru removed a massive hairball — as large as a cricket ball — from the stomach of an 8-year-old girl, the hospital said on Thursday.

The girl Aditi (name changed) had a rare case of trichophagia — the compulsive habit of eating hair, also known as the Rapunzel syndrome.

Her



parents were baffled by her repeated bouts of poor appetite and frequent vomiting over the last two years. They took her to many doctors including paediatricians, general physicians, and ENT specialists hoping to identify the problem and a cure for her condition.

They diagnosed Aditi’s condition to be gastritis and prescribed pills accordingly.