continued
habit of swallowing hair, are almost exclusively found in the bodies of
women, generally of very young girls. The large size which they
sometimes attain is very surprising; in several instances they have so
filled up the stomach that they are moulded by it into its exact
shape. Although when a hair-ball has reached this size, and indeed
long before, the most alarming symptoms set in, frequently recurrent
vomiting being the most characteristic, we cannot but wonder how it is
possible for any food to enter and pass through the stomach
under such conditions, the only explanation being the great power of
dilation this organ possesses. Its disposition to patiently tolerate
foreign bodies where it cannot expel them, renders it often a poor
guide in a diagnosis based upon the patient's personal experience.
These hair-balls accumulate and lodge not only in the stomach but also
in the intestines, and in either case the eventual result is almost
certain to be fatal unless the obstacle is removed by operation. Very
occasionally only does nature react sufficiently to expel the
impediment without surgical aid. Of course all treatment is vain unless
the morbid habit of hair-swallowing can be overcome. This does not seem
to be an accompaniment of a distinctly diseased mental condition,
although that is sometimes coincident, but must assuredly result from
some derangement or abnormality of the nervous centres, inducing a
morbid and unnatural craving.36
The serpent-stone, called by Pliny ovum anguinum, or
"serpent's egg," is said to have been worn by the Druid priests as a
badge of distinction. Pliny relates that he had seen one of them which
was as large as a moderate-sized apple, its shell being a cartilaginous
substance. It was sup-
"
See Ledra Hazlit, M.D., " Hair-balls of the Stomach and Intestines,"
Jour. Α. Μ. Α., vol. lxii, No. 2, pp. 107-110, with illustration; and
G. A. Moore, "Hair Cast of the Stomach with Respect of a Case," Boston
Medical and Surgical Journal, Jan. 1, 1914.
