PICA

Today we had a 19y/o female come in with abdominal pain, D/V/N. They took an x-ray of her stomach and saw a blockage and come to find out that the girl has been eating cotton balls. Not only that she has a history of it and eats any kind of soft fluffy materials i.e. pillows. This seemed particularly weird to me because I cant understand what she could possibly be getting from cotton. The only thing we could do was to talk to her about eating high iron foods and giving her suggestions of foods to replace nonfood items. Although it seems like she does a pretty good job eating meats, beans and nuts so I can't seem to figure out the cravings. I wanted to read more into it because my knowledge of it is minimal. Turns out this group of people eat some pretty disgusting things other than the usual clay, rocks, ice etc such as feces, mucus, body parts, etc. It typically is seen in children and developmentally challenged individuals of which this patient was neither. The etiology of PICA points to nutrition deficiency but that has not been proven by research and can be any number of factors including low SES to stress. Just thought I would share because I dont think this sort of thing comes up alot. Have a good week!