INNSBRUCK, AUSTRIA. Chronic hiccups is a fairly common disorder, yet little is known about its cause and conventional treatment with surgery or drugs is largely ineffective. Now Dr. Andreas Schlager, MD of the Univerity of Innsbruck reports the use of Korean hand acupuncture to successfully treat a case of persistent hiccups in a 70-year-old patient. The patient who also suffered from coronary heart disease, reflux esophagitis, and hiatal hernia had experienced uncontrollable hiccups for three months. When examined he was hiccuping continuously throughout the day. Dr. Schlager treated the patient with Korean hand acupuncture at points K-F3 (located on the palm side of the hand in the middle of the distal phalanx of the fifth finger) and K-A12 (on the palm above the third metcarpal bone). For the first two treatments Dr. Schlager used regular acupuncture needles in 30-minute sessions. This was followed by continuous acupressure applied to K-F3 for 24 hours a day using special discs with raised dots fastened with adhesive tape. The hiccups stopped completely after the second treatment. A further preventive treatment was applied for three days using laser acupuncture for 60 seconds at each point. Three months later the patient underwent gastroscopy and the hiccups recurred. Two sessions of Korean hand acupuncture stopped them again and no further episodes have occurred since (now 12 months ago). Says Dr. Schlager "Korean hand acupuncture should be the treatment of choice for chronic hiccups before applying other methods."
Schlager, Andreas. Korean hand acupuncture in the treatment of chronic hiccups. American Journal of Gastroenterology, Vol. 93, November 1998, pp. 2312-13 (letter to the editor)