Overview
What are hiccups?
Hiccups occur when a spasm contracts the diaphragm, a large sheet of Muscle that separates the chest cavity from the abdominal cavity. This spasm causes an intake of breath that is suddenly stopped by the closure of the vocal cords (glottis). This closure causes the characteristic "hiccup" sound.

What causes hiccups?

A very full stomach can cause bouts of hiccups that go away on their own. A full stomach can be caused by:
• Eating too much food too quickly.
• Drinking too much alcohol.
• Swallowing too much air.
• Smoking.
• A sudden change in stomach temperature, such as drinking a hot beverage and then a cold beverage.
• Emotional stress or excitement.
• Overstretching the neck
• Laryngitis
• Heartburn
• Irritation of the eardrum
• General anesthesia
• Surgery
• Bloating
• Tumor, Infection
• Diabetes
• Drinking excessive alcohol
• Hot and spicy food
• Smoking
• Eating fast.

Citrus and herbs. Chinese herbalists use tangerine and other citrus fruits. To abort an attack, eat a tangerine or brew a tea from dried tangerine or mandarin orange or from orange peel. Ayurveda and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) practitioners also recommend sucking on slices of fresh ginger root or some cardamom seeds.

Tincture tactic. Ed Smith, founder of Herb Pharm and recent past member of The American Herbalists Guild board of directors, mentions the case of a patient hospitalized for a couple of weeks with persistent hiccups. Various drug therapies had no effect. Then the person took, remembers Smith, “one dose of a Lobelia/skunk cabbage compound, and the hiccups ceased entirely in about one minute.” This compound, made from Lobelia seed, Skullcap, skunk cabbage, and myrrh with black cohosh and cayenne, was made legendary by Jethro Kloss in his famous Back to Eden, in which he named it an “antispasmodic Tincture.” Herb Pharm sells a version of it through many health food stores.

Sweet relief. “The best method,” opines Matthew Wood, an herbalist and author from Minneapolis, “is to take a tablespoonful of pure white sugar. I have used this method personally,” he says, “and have found that it works about nine out of ten times within the first three hiccups. In short, I consider white sugar to be a specific for one thing only: the hiccup.” A study in The New England Journal of Medicine verified the sugar treatment. Sugar was beneficial for 19 out of 20 patients, some of whom had been suffering for as long as six weeks. Ayurveda offers a similar suggestion: Swallow one teaspoon of Honey with one teaspoon of castor oil.

Water relief.  The old adage of drinking a glass of water, but with a twist.  Instead of drinking the regular way, drink from the opposite side of the glass.  Holding the glass normally, put your lips on the opposite side of the glass, with your chin inside the glass.  Bend over, allowing the water in the glass to flow into the mouth from the top side.  Drink a few gulps, upside down – the water flowing over the uvula in the throat is said to relax the contractions of the hiccups.