New Year’s Eve gatherings can be tricky territory to navigate, especially when alcohol is involved.
Things can go off the rails quickly when cries of “shots!” ring out or when an uncle or auntie fancies himself or herself a mixologist and starts overpouring in the first hour of the party.
Soon it’s the morning after and you’re wondering why the room is spinning and there’s a jackhammer going off inside your head.
Hangovers are typically never planned, and once you have one, there’s no instant cure for getting rid of it. But there are a few ways to attack the symptoms and ease the discomfort while recovering.
The old-fashioned way
For the vast majority of people suffering from a hangover, time is the only remedy. Symptoms usually resolve within 24 hours.
According to the Mayo Clinic, drinking too much alcohol causes the body to become dehydrated, which in turn can trigger an inflammatory response from the immune system. Alcohol can also irritate the stomach, cause a dangerous drop in blood-sugar levels and cause blood vessels to expand, which leads to those nasty headaches.
Deal with the dehydration by drinking plenty of water and sipping on fruit juice. Crackers or soup are a good idea to help settle the stomach and replace lost sodium. And while over- the-counter pain relievers like aspirin or acetaminophen can help with body pains and headaches, the Mayo Clinic warns aspirin can irritate the stomach and acetaminophen can cause severe liver damage, even in doses previously thought to be safe.
The Hangover Doctor
For speedier relief, some have been turning to a time-honored medical tradition: a house call by an actual doctor.
Dr. Ed Campbell is a board-certified anesthesiologist who works full time in Oahu hospitals. He said he launched HawaiiHangoverDoctor.com in 2014 to satisfy an entrepreneurial urge or call 860-375-3379.
Send the Kaiser High School graduate an email and he’ll show up just about anywhere to administer intravenous fluids along with vitamins and other hospital-grade medications to ease nausea and headaches, regardless of the cause. The one-hour treatments start at $199, with additional charges depending on which medications are administered.
“I knew the hangover thing would be something that drew attention,” said Campbell, 42. “I’ve got lawyers, actors, high-performance athletes, people who need immediate relief. Some of my patients are cancer patients. I’ve even had calls from women who have morning sickness.”
As an anesthesiologist, Campbell regularly works in the high-stakes environment of surgery. But his house calls, which account for roughly 10 percent of his practice, are no less important to his dehydrated patients, he said.
“It’s the same process for all my patients,” he said. “With this, I’m giving people only what the body needs.”
Not everyone in the medical field agrees on the usefulness of IV treatments to deal with the symptoms of a hangover.
“This has not really been embraced by the medical establishment as it is generally expensive and not proven to be any more effective than drinking some Gatorade, having a bowl of pho or chicken soup and using over-the-counter pain medications,” said Dr. James Ireland, assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of Hawaii John A. Burns School of Medicine and former director of the Honolulu Emergency Services Department.
No magic formula
Nutritional supplements that claim to help mitigate the effects of alcohol are a growing front in the anti-hangover campaign.
Recent radio ads in Honolulu have been touting Forgiven, which comes in a 2-ounce bottle and sells for about $2.99 at Longs Drugs stores. It claims to metabolize alcohol and allow users to “think clear” and “restore balance” with high doses of vitamins B and C, plus salt, sugar and a proprietary blend that includes rhodiola rosea extract, known in traditional Chinese medicine as hong jing tian.
Does it work? It’s hard to tell. While the Forgiven label claims to be “clinically proven,” it also contains a federally mandated statement that explains the product “is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.” So your results may vary.
The Mayo Clinic cautions that while alternative hangover remedies abound, “studies haven’t found any natural remedies that consistently improve hangover symptoms.” One thing is clear, according to the clinic: “The only guaranteed way to prevent a hangover is to avoid alcohol.”
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On the Net
mayoclinic.org
hawaiihangoverdoctor.com
