Stomach

Other nonneoplastic

Bezoars



Last author update: 1 August 2012
Last staff update: 1 September 2020

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PubMed Search: gastric bezoar

Elliot Weisenberg, M.D.
Table of Contents
Definition / general
Cite this page: Weisenberg E. Bezoars. PathologyOutlines.com website. https://www.pathologyoutlines.com/topic/stomachbezoar.html. Accessed December 23rd, 2024.
Definition / general
  • Foreign bodies composed of hair or vegetable matter
  • Motility abnormalities and obstructions predisopose to bezoar formation, may complicate diabetes mellitus, myotonic muscular dystrophy, chronic drug therapy (opiates, neuromuscular blockers)

  • Phytobezoars:
    • Plant material concretions
    • Usually caused by ingestion of unripened persimmons
    • Stomach acid causes polymerization of tannin monomers in fruit, causing a tannin-cellulose-hemicellulose-protein complex
    • Dissolves with cellulase (Arch Pathol Lab Med 1980;104:159)

  • Trichobezoars:
    • Also known as hairballs
    • Ingested hair coated with decaying food
    • Associated with partial gastrectomy, partial outlet obstruction, lack of teeth, vagotomy, trichophagia
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