Hiccups
Hiccups are simple enough to explain. Your diaphragm (the major muscle
involved in breathing that sits like a cap over the stomach) goes into spasm.
Reasons that cause hiccups are:
- Eating too fast causing you to swallow air along with food
- Eating fatty foods filling your stomach and irritating the diaphragm
It is also believed that there is a hiccup centre in the brain
triggering the cycle of events. There is also a school of thought that hiccups are caused
by hyperacidity.
A hiccup is a protective mechanism preventing the person from choking on
food or drink. Luckily they are generally harmless and don’t last very long.
Questions to ask
Do the hiccups occur with severe abdominal pain and blood vomiting
or blood in the stools?
Have the hiccups lasted longer than 8 hours in an adult or 3 hours in a
child?
Have the hiccups started only after taking medicines?
Self
care procedures
A study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that one
tea-spoon of ordinary table sugar swallowed dry cured hiccups immediately in 19 out of 20
people. Repeat it three times at 2 minutes intervals if the hiccups do not stop
immediately.
Hold your breath for a count of ten. Exhale immediately and drink a
glass of water in one gulp. This pulls the diaphragm down and brings down any irritation.
Pull your tongue out with a gauze and hold it for few minutes.
Breathe into and out of a paper bag. This probably works, as breathing
in more carbon dioxide alters the movements of the diaphragm.
Swallow a small amount of finely crushed ice.
Eat dry bread slowly.
