Gastric Sneezing

Teebi and Al-Saleh (1989) described a 32-year-old healthy man in whom fullness of the stomach invariably resulted in 3 or 4 uncontrollable sneezes immediately after meals. The phenomenon was also present in his 3 brothers, 1 of his 2 sisters, his father, an uncle and the uncle's son, and the grandfather. The proband became curious about the phenomenon when his daughter began to show it at the age of 1 year. The 'stomach sneeze reflex' in this family had no relation to the type of food and occurred only when the stomach was full to the extent that no more could be eaten. There were usually 3 or 4 sneezes but sometimes as many as 15 consecutive sneezes. No one in the family had persistent otolaryngeal or allergic disease or other conditions known to produce paroxysmal sneezing (Kaplan and Lanoff, 1970; Foster and Nichol, 1957). Furthermore, photic sneeze reflex (100820) was denied. With a combination of good fun and serious intent, Hall (1990) suggested that 'the newly described condition be called the SNATIATION reflex--a combination of sneezing and satiation and easily remembered by the acronymous handle of Sneezing Noncontrollably At a Time of Indulgence of the Appetite--a Trait Inherited and Ordained to be Named.' In seriousness, she pointed out that we teach human genetics by diseases and know few examples of nonpathologic traits determined by single genes.