Article: Hiccups: Yet another of life's irksome plagues: Determining a cause for the annoying spasms is as elusive as finding a cure.

Byline: Darryl E. Owens

Feb. 27--Jennifer Mee has won her 15 minutes of fame for an irksome reflex that sometimes doesn't last even that long. The 15-year-old St. Petersburg girl has become the talk of TV talk shows and generated headlines, all because she began hiccuping Jan. 23 and hasn't stopped.

Hiccups that last that long are unusual, says Dr. Jeremiah Donovan, an Orlando gastroenterologist. Usually with hiccups, or singultus, as doctors call them, "you get them and they go away on their own [within] a few hours," he says.

Few dodge the occasional bout of hiccups -- even unborn children in the second trimester regularly get them.

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