Perception of pica and its relations with iron deficiency by hospital physicians in the Paris area

OBJECTIVES: To ascertain the attitude of hospital physicians in the Paris a rea concerning pica and its relation to iron deficiency and to compare find ings with data in the literature. METHODS: An anonymous questionnaire was sent to 174 department heads of spe cialty units caring for iron deficiency patients: internal medicine (n=56), hepatogastroenterology (n=39), hematology (n=13), gynecology and obstetric s (n=34), pediatrics (n=32). RESULTS: The overall response rate was 40.2%. Ninety-seven percent of all t he physicians found pica in less than 10% of patients with iron deficiency, and 95.6% considered geophagia as the most frequent pica. For 58.5% of the adult medicine practitioners pica was regarded only as a cause of iron def iciency but for 64.7% of the pediatricians, pica was both a cause and a sym ptom of iron deficiency was not sought in a systemic way in 88.6% of the ph ysicians when a cause of iron deficiency was known. CONCLUSION: In the majority of the cases, the attitude of hospital physicia ns concerning pica is in disagreement with published data, suggesting eithe r epidemiological characteristics specific to the Paris area, or unawarenes s of the phenomenon.