What causes frequent hiccups in babies?
Dear Mirror Doctor, What causes frequent hiccups in babies and what can be done to treat it?
Keziah, Mamprobi, Accra.
Hiccup is experienced by virtually everyone at one time or the other. They are only found in mammals and are most common in infants becoming rare as mammals age. It has been suggested that suckling babies of mammals allow air trapped in the stomach to escape to allow more milk to be ingested and hence its frequent occurrence after feeding or when excited.
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Babies are particularly prone to hiccups, even within the womb, sometimes as early as the sixth week after conception. They may last for a minute or as long as an hour in some babies. As a newborn’s internal organs develop and mature, hiccups usually diminish in intensity and frequency.
Hiccups in babies are just one of those normal behaviours and reflexes. We are not to worry about it and in fact, some infants are amused by it.
Hiccups are caused by sudden contractions of the diaphragm triggered by irritation or stimulation of that muscle. A recent explanation suggests that hiccups may have evolved along with other reflexes developed in mammals that allow them to coordinate suckling milk and breathing.
This hypothesis suggests that the air bubble in the stomach stimulates certain well organised receptors in the stomach, oesophagus and along the diaphragm.
This triggers the hiccup, which creates suction in the chest, pulling air from the stomach up and out through the mouth, effectively burping the child.
This theory is supported by the strong tendency for infants to get hiccups and the existence of hiccups only in milk-drinking mammals.
Other mechanisms to explain hiccups in babies have been proposed. Some state that hiccups are caused by infant feeding, be it milk or other foods. Others also propose that it is due to a drop in temperature that causes the baby to get cold.
Hiccups are considered harmless, unless they prove persistent enough to interfere with regular feeding and sleeping. Babies with certain medical conditions such as gastroesophageal reflux disease may experience hiccup more frequently, accompanied by spitting up milk, coughing and irritability.
How to bring a bout of hiccups to an end? Old tales and cultural traditions have a whole lot of methods to deal with hiccups that go back centuries.
It has been stated that causing a sudden unexpected shock by bursting an inflated paper bag or dropping a cold key down the baby's back are just part of popular folklore. Certainly, slapping a baby on the back or roughly handling them in any way is never advisable.
But a gentle back rub, a sip of water or giving something to suck on, may just do the trick. I don't know the rational behind putting a white thread on the forehead of the baby but I see it all the time with no one so far able to give me an explanation for it.
Hiccups usually bother a parent more than the child, although they may cause distress to the baby during feeding. Changing the child’s position and trying to get them to burp or relax may help.
If the hiccups don’t go away on their own within five to ten minutes, a few drops of a natural cure such as Gripe water have been advocated with variable success rates reported.
If the baby gets hiccups often, always try to feed when the infant is calm and before they get extremely hungry. After a feed, avoid vigorous activity with baby, such as bouncing up and down or high-energy play. Also keeping the baby upright for 20 to 30 minutes after each meal is proven to help.
These steps should reduce the chances of hiccups occurring. Try to make feeding as calm, quiet and leisurely a process as possible with minimal external distractions for the child. If hiccups do occur during feeding, stop feeding and give them a chance to go away.
Burping the child can also help. As a child develops, so the incidence of hiccups recede and become just one more of those behaviours that babies grow out of.
The writer is a member of the Paediatric Society of Ghana.
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