Probably everyone is familiar with a situation when, while enjoying a borsch or a patty, a person suddenly feels hair in his mouth. An unpleasant surprise in some immediately causes a gag reflex, others try to get a foreign object out of their mouth, but sometimes without success. We will tell you what happens if you swallow hair and why some people do this quite consciously.
How does hair get into our mouth?
Do you know that a person has 80 to 120 hairs lost per day? And this is considered the norm. Moreover, blondes lose hair on their heads much more intensively than brunettes and red ones.
However, the indignant phrase: “Your hair is everywhere!” Always refers to owners of braids to the waist or elongated squares and cascades. And all because the long hair in the sink or in the mouth cannot be overlooked, and you will swallow a short one and you will not feel it.
Therefore, most often people are concerned about the question of whether it is dangerous to swallow long hair, which can get into the mouth with food. It happens that a small child picks it up, crawling on the floor and in the bed of parents. Let's find out what happens to the hair that is in the gastrointestinal tract.
Keratin hair protection
Human hair and animal hair are covered with keratin scales, a fibrillar protein material that is second only to chitin in strength. Once in the esophagus, and then in the stomach, the hair will not be digested, for this the acidity of the gastric juice is not enough. Other damage to the keratin membrane also does not occur, because the hair begins to dissolve only when boiled.
Therefore, a single hair, even very long from the stomach, freely and without any changes enters the intestines. Many people know what will happen if you swallow a person’s hair using the example of pets. Certainly, cats of long-haired housewives at least once in their life walked in large “beads”. The same thing happens with dogs, only owners who do not clean their pets on the street do not know about it.
An adult who accidentally swallows long hair should not worry, he will come out naturally without outside help. But often there are situations when a child chews hair, and mother does not have time to pull it out.
The kid ate hair: is this a cause for panic?
As practice shows, many mothers find their own hair in diapers of children, twisted by a ring and have no idea how and when they got into the baby's mouth. But if you saw a child swallowing hair, what to do in this case? Be patient and wait. You can give the baby a laxative syrup or use candles, which are usually used for constipation.
If the mother suspects that this could not be the first time, it is better to show the child to the doctor. The fact is that single hair leaves the body, and eaten regularly accumulate, turning into dense, sticky and very dangerous formations - trichobesoars. Let's find out what will happen if you swallow hair, then the second, and after them a whole bunch and do this for years.
Trichotillomania and Trichophagia
There is such a concept in psychiatry - trichotillomania or pulling out hair on the head and other parts of the body. Conscious or unconscious actions occur against the background of serious stress, hence the expression "tearing hair on the head." However, more often people with mental disorders suffer from this, and women are prone to trichotillomania 2 times more than men.
Hair pulling is often accompanied by eating it, and this mental disorder is called trichophagy. Sometimes people only eat hair roots, and can swallow them whole and directly in bunches. For a sick person who satisfies his obsessive need, it often does not matter whose hair he eats: his own or others. And certainly he does not bother what will happen if you swallow hair in large quantities.
Rapunzel Syndrome
When the hair lump in the stomach resembles a solid knitted hat, and its “tail” descends into the intestines, the human condition is called Rapunzel syndrome. Sick people most often hide and deny the fact of swallowing hair, but they experience very severe pain in the stomach.
If trichobesoars in the gastrointestinal tract are not diagnosed in time, the syndrome with a fabulous name can lead to the death of the patient.
Accumulations of hair are most often removed surgically. For example, one 18-year-old American woman suffered from severe stomach pain, periodic vomiting, and a complete loss of appetite for 5 months. The girl lost 18 kg and admitted to doctors that she ate her own hair for many years in a row. An endoscopic examination revealed a huge ball of hair in her digestive tract.
How much hair can accumulate in the digestive tract
Specifically, in one 38-year-old woman a trichobesoar 15 × 10 cm in size was removed from the small intestine 3 × 4 cm from the stomach. And in an 18-year-old patient, surgeons removed 4.5 kg of hair clumping from the stomach.
Therefore, if parents noticed a child’s habit of biting the tip of a braid, wrapping hair on his finger and gnawing, this should be a reason to beware.
And if you follow very simple rules, you can avoid accidental hair getting into the esophagus:
- long-haired women should comb more often;
- When preparing dinner, it is better to tie your hair with a headscarf, because it is not just that all catering workers have hats;
- wipe carpets more often with a wet sponge - you will be surprised how much hair remains after the vacuum cleaner;
- shake out bedding before putting a small child on your bed.
Now you know what happens if you swallow hair. Most likely, a scandal will break out. After all, trichophagia is not so common and most people are extremely sensitive to eating hair, especially strangers.