hiccups

[Sloanie83]

Anyone know anything about hiccups and lung cancer? My mom can not get rid of her hiccups they put here on some med. to help relax her diaphragm, but the medicine nocks her out. If you look it up on the computer (what it’s used for) they give it to scitsophrenic (sp?) patients and lots of other things. I just wish there was something else they could give her that wouldn't make her so out of it. She doesn't even know we are really there when she takes it but she can't breathe with out it because the hick ups are so bad.

On another note she is getting scans today to see how everything is progressing. So hopefully we get good news this week.

[cat127]

i'm guessing they have given your mother thorazine? i would say call the dr and tell them that while you want the hiccups controlled, you also don't want your mother knocked out by the treatment. there are other drugs that doctors can use for treating hiccups. or see if they can reduce the dose enough that she isn't wiped out but that the hiccups stop. i can't find a lable for thorazine (it is a drug that has been around a while so it isn't on the fda website). but i do know that for psychological disorders the drug is given in a range of doses.

hiccups can be caused by pressure on the vagus nerve, which i would think could be possible from the tumor mass. though there are a lot of other reasons for hiccups, including the 'we have no idea why' reason.

i am a dr of pharmacology, i may be able to add more info if you tell me exactly what the drug and dosage is. but i think your best bet is to tell the dr that the side effects are not acceptable and see what other alternatives they may suggest (different drug or lower dose).

[Connie B]

A while back (a year or two) we had a couple of our members have this same problem. Meds didn't work for one of them.

I can't remember what they did, but you might find out if you do a "Search" and type in "Hiccups"

[dtay]

Hi

My Dad gets hiccups occassionally and it gets so bad that it disturbs his sleeping. He gets meds from Onc when they start up (some sort of anti-phsycosis med !!)- they dont know what causes Dads tho, other than to say 'it sometimes happens when someone has LC'. His get worse when he is on steroids and after chemo.

Dawn

[KatieB]

My dad always got hiccups when he was nauseated and they lasted for a very long time. Meds didn't help him either. During chemo breaks and after getting put on Pepsid (sp) A/R for acid reflux, the hiccups went away.

never really knew what the exact cause was, but it wasn't due to cancer growth or pressure from a tumor. it was either his treatments or how his body was reacting to the treatments.

[cat127]

esophageal reflux is a known cause of hiccups. if pepcid worked to stop them, i'd say that is a good argument for reflux having been the cause. sometimes in research medicine, that's how we figure the cause out. if drug A stops X and drug A stops Y then Y was caused by X. doesn't sound real scientific when i spell it out though.

[Alisa]

I read that acupuncture really works with bad case of hiccups. You may want to look into it. Also, it's known to relieve naseau in cancer patients.

Some insurance companies cover acupuncture for cancer patients undergoing chemo.

Good luck!

[DrWest]

Thorazine is probably the most commonly used drug to treat hiccups, and another choice is a muscle relaxant called baclofen. Both can be sedating.

In addition to it potentially being caused by tumor pressing against the vagus nerve or ticking the diaphragm, several chemo drugs can cause this.

-Dr. West

[angelofcharlie20]

Hi There,

My Father had the hiccups. For him a small spoonful of peanut butter cured it.

Worth a try. Let me know if it works for you.

Best,

Shirley

[mdsum1]

My daughter volunteers at our local hospice. During her training she was told that a teaspoon of sugar on the back of the tongue was helpful for hiccups. A neighbor was having problems with hiccups when he was over and tried this and they stopped right away.