A 11-year-old boy has hair growing all over his face and body, a rare medical anomaly. And doctors say that laser treatment or plastic surgery is the only way out.

Prithviraj Patil, son of a well-to-do farmer in Sangalwadi near Sangli, suffers from a rare medical anomaly though he is otherwise like any normal child.

Prithiviraj has no problem with his hair that is up to three-inches long except that it looks awful - there is no itch or rash on the skin or any bad odour accompanying the dermatological problem.

Hairy nevus, where a person has patches of excess hair growth or hirsutism, is not uncommon. But hair persisting all over the body is very rare, said plastic surgeon Vinay Saoji.

"Though I have not come across such cases or its documentation anywhere, I suppose options like epilation could be tried out to rid the boy of the embarrassment," Saoji told IANS.

Prithviraj became an object of curiosity at a health detection camp here Sunday as he waited his turn in a long queue of people for a medical check up.

The visit to the health camp was just another effort on the part of Dilip Patil, Prithviraj's father, in his quest to diagnose and possibly find a cure for his Class 5 son.

Skin specialist Dayanand Naik, who found that hormonal and pathological tests conducted on Prithviraj were normal, said that laser treatment or plastic surgery could be attempted after a few years.