According to a recent study, eating too bitter cucurbits could cause hair loss and body hair. Three French women were recently victims of this phenomenon after being poisoned by squash.
If you are a big fan of squash and cucurbits of all kinds, this is likely to appeal to you. According to an article published by a French dermatologist published in March in the journal JAMA Dermatology, these plants could cause hair to fall out. To arrive at this conclusion, Doctor Philippe Assouly, of the Saint Louis hospital in Paris, relied on the case of two French women living in the Paris region who presented a loss of hair and body hair after consuming this food.
The first case concerns a sexagenarian suffering from nausea, vomiting and diarrhea after having eaten a bitter soup made from orange squash with green skin in 2010. A few days later, she began to lose a lot of hair. Two months later, she consults Philippe Assouly.
“A lot of hair has fallen out, others have been partially poisoned and continue to grow. Those that have fallen out measure only 2 cm at two months. Other hairs, not fallen, have a structural anomaly. This one , following intoxication, also allows dating. The hair shaft is therefore either broken 2 cm from its emergence and then presents a whitish bulge at its end, or a whitish bulge at this same distance from the scalp while continuing to push “, explains the doctor to World.
A responsible pollinating insect
Then, in 2017, a 40-year-old suffered from severe vomiting an hour after consuming a spaghetti squash. She vomited for several hours at a stretch. Three weeks later, she too begins to lose a lot of hair as well as underarm and pubic hair. Six months later, she meets Doctor Philippe Assouly who discovers, as in the first patient, abnormal swellings at the ends of the hair.
While it is already well known that squash, which is part of the Cucurbitaceae family, can be very difficult to digest due to molecules called cucurbitacins, this is the first time that we have observed alopecia in France (loss of hair and body hair) following intoxication with a bitter gourd.
According to Doctor Assouly, the person responsible for this strange phenomenon would be a pollinating insect transferring on cultivated squash the toxic cucurbitacin present in wild squash, occasionally giving them such a bitter taste. “Hence the importance, in order to limit this risk, of not cultivating edible species near decorative, inedible squash”, he insists while more and more individuals are cultivating cucurbits in their vegetable garden. The toxic cucurbitacin would attack the hair during its anagen phase, ie during the active growth of the bulb, thus giving the same effects as chemotherapy.
Hair always grows back
By reading the article published in the JAMA Dermatology, a thirty-something living in the Grenoble region, realized that she too owed her recent hair loss to poisoning by an overripe bitter gourd. She then immediately contacted Philippe Assouly.
In December, Charlène prepares butternut, she tells the Parisian in an article published Thursday, May 24. Tasting it, she realizes that it tastes particularly bitter “weird” and stops immediately. Too late, “30 minutes later, I was seized with stomach aches and was never as sick as that night. I had cramps, cold sweats, the beginnings of hallucinations. I even had lost consciousness. I thought it was a big gastro after the holidays, “she explains daily. A week later, her hair begins to fall out in clusters. “After a month,” she continues, “they left as if I had put on depilatory cream. When I washed them, I heard a creak, they broke to the surface. I was panicked, panicked,” said himself. she remembers.
While no blood test or analysis manages to explain this strange problem, Charlene, who works in a laboratory in medical research, decides to take matters in hand herself and passes one of her hair under the microscope. She then discovers a fork dating from “the period of the squash”. Then “when I came across Dr Assouly’s post, it clicked. I contacted him. That, plus the fact that my nails were sticking out confirmed the diagnosis. The toxin attacked my hair in the bulb. When they came out after a week, they broke one by one, “says the young woman who ended up cutting her hair very short. They have been growing back normally since then.
Because, do not worry, “the hair always grows back”, reassures Dr. Assouly, recalling occasionally that all squash or pumpkins do not make you sick. “It is the particularly bitter taste which should alert the consumer as well as the doctor who treats the patients”. And this, especially if the product is cooked. In conclusion, the doctor therefore advises to taste a small piece of cucurbitacea in order to detect any bitterness.
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