Coins: Pica is a compulsion to eat things other than food -- like the 62-year-old Frenchman who ate 350 coins in his stomach in 2002. He’d been taken to hospital suffering from abdominal pains. The 12 pound mass they found inside weighed as much as a bowling ball.

Diamond ring: Hard-up romantic Simon Hooper went in to a jeweler to buy a ring to propose to his girlfriend with -- but when he realized he couldn’t afford it he swallowed it. He later denied it when cops X-rayed him, claiming it was a piece of foil. Jeweler Fred Burgess later got the ring back but said it was proving hard to sell because people knew where it had been.

Hair: In 2007, docs were amazed to yank a 10 pound hairball out of an 18-year-old woman’s stomach after she went to see her doctor about stomach ache and a worrying 40 pound weight loss. Turned out she had been eating her own hair. A year later she had ditched the habit and had was back in good health.

Magnetic toys: A toddler was admitted to hospital with three pieces of his older sibling’s magnetic building set inside him. When shown the offending articles, the boy said, "Candy."

Fork: A 32-year-old Israeli woman swallowed a cockroach while cleaning her house, then tried to fish it out with a fork but gulped that too. Doctors operated to remove the cutlery.

Nails: In Thailand, in 2006, a woman had 199 nails -- many of them rusty and three inches long -- removed from her belly after a bout of severe cramps.

Bed springs: Suicidal prisoners are unpredictable characters. Jailbird Carl E Rhoades of the Kansas State prison was no different. Docs opened him up and removed over 100 objects, including bed springs and even razor blades which he had eaten. He didn’t want them removed but doctors went to court to get permission to perform the operation.

Bullet: A Californian woman bit into a hot dog from a fast food place and swallowed a bullet.

Chain: An Indian man was admitted to hospital in 2007 with 236 metal objects -- including a chain -- inside him.