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Discussion

Pica

So I come to work today and take report for one of my patients. I am given the warning to not give her baby powder unless I supervise her. First thing, as soon as I walk in the door she asks me for baby powder. I give it to her, then do my assessment and sneak it accross the room I come back in about an half an hour later, there is white around this woman's mouth and half a bottle of baby powder there.

Another nurse and I ask her what she is doing with the powder, she says her lips are dry, so she uses baby powder. Half a bottle. All of this is going on while she has a room mate in the room. The funny part is that the room mate's daughter watched her eat the baby powder, by the way, the room mate's daughter is a psych nurse in the hospital were I work. She was afraid she would soon see this patient on her floor.

Has anyone else caught a patient eating anything weird?

Featured Replies

Why did you give her something that you were advised not to?

When I worked psych, some of the most common cravings I've seen in pica pts. have been:

1.talcum powder

2.laundry starch

3.chalk

4.dirt

5.soap

6.clay

And now that I'm dealing with a lot of pregnant pts. in public health, I see a lot of cravings

particularly for talcum powder or soap as the the top 2 cravings.

Makes me glad all I craved when I was pregnant was Tobasco and lemonade. OK, that sounds disgusting...Tobasco with pregnancy #1 and lemonade with pregnancy #2.

when i was pregnant i had craving for all kinds of crazy stuff. my ob/gyn told me it was because i had an iron deficiency. (i've been anemic forever). so she put me on a strict diet, changed my vitamins, and the cravings went away. it was only pickles after that ;)

I worked with a CNA who would eat Kleenex,you'd be standing at the nurses desk talking to her and she would pluck a tissue out of the box and shove it in her mouth.weird.

My husband was in the hospital after a broken femur caused him to throw a PE to his left lung. While he was in ICU...he used to get cravings for tomatos...covered with sand! Of course, I didn't bring it to him...but once he got out of the hospital, sure as anything...he was dipping tomatos in sand anytime we went down to the shore. I don't know why he does it. It's weird!

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