Article Sidebar
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors retain copyright of the published papers and grant to the publisher the non-exclusive right to publish the article, to be cited as its original publisher in case of reuse, and to distribute it in all forms and media. Users are required to provide full bibliographic description of the original publication (authors, article title, journal title, volume, issue, pages), as well as its DOI code. In electronic publishing, users are also required to link the content with the original article published in the Ethiopian Medical Journal. Authors can enter separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of their work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
Main Article Content
Persistent hiccups in men with COVID 19: Two cases from Nigeria
Abstract
Hiccups are defined as extraordinary type of respiratory movement involving a sudden inspiration (intake of air) due to an involuntary contraction of the diaphragm accompanied by closure of the glottis (the vocal apparatus of the larynx). The abrupt inspiration is the result of a sudden contraction of the diaphragm. The classification of hiccups is by their duration. Acute hiccups are of less than 48 hours duration, persistent last over 2 days, and intractable last over a month. It is a rare but distinct chemosensory presentation of COVID 19 disease and seldomly reported from Africa. We report 2 cases of persistent hiccups in Nigerian men with RT-PCR positive cases of mild COVID-19 disease. Both men (aged 59, 63 years) had associated fever, anosmia and ageusia, with hiccups onset 2-4 days after COVID- 19 diagnosis, and in one case it persisted for 10 days, including for 3 days after SARS-CoV-2 negativity.
