A party with friends, a family holiday, a solemn event at work – all these events in most cases are associated with alcohol. Unfortunately, sometimes they cannot do without such unpleasant consequences as a hangover. Therefore, almost every person at one time or another wondered how to quickly remove alcohol intoxication, is it possible at home and what needs to be done for this. On the Internet, you can find a lot of advice on this topic, but many of them are useless, and some are even dangerous. It is important to know the most useful advice on how to help someone with alcohol intoxication at home.
Hangovers and their causes
By and large, alcohol is poison. You can talk for a long time about the opposite, say that in small doses it is safe, but the essence of this does not change. Ethanol is a toxic compound, the intake of which negatively affects the functioning of the whole body. Alcohol causes the loss of water and electrolytes, upsets the acid-base balance, negatively affects the neurons of the brain, irritates the gastrointestinal tract. If the amount of alcohol consumed is insignificant, no poisoning can be expected . The human body is independently capable of getting rid of unwanted substances. However, if the dose is exceeded, then the functional systems do not have time to remove ethanol in time, in this case alcohol intoxication occurs.
In everyday life, this state is called a hangover. It is characterized by a variety of symptoms, such as:
- nausea,
- vomit,
- thirst,
- headache,
- diarrhea,
- general weakness
- sleep disturbance,
- irritability,
- tremor and others.
Often they do not pose a danger to the body and eventually go away by themselves. Sometimes the situation is more difficult and specialized treatment may be required. In any case, you want to remove this condition as quickly as possible, and some help can be provided at home.
Types of poisoning
There are several degrees of alcohol intoxication. You need to know about them in order to figure out in time whether it is possible to treat this condition at home or if you need qualified medical assistance, what to do in a given situation. Doctors distinguish mild, moderate and severe alcohol intoxication. A detailed classification can only be carried out after a blood alcohol test. But at home, such accuracy is not required. It is enough to pay attention to some key features.
Alcohol intoxication of mild and moderate severity is never accompanied by switching off consciousness, disruption of the heart and the function of external respiration. If the victim has shortness of breath, pain in the region of the heart, a feeling of palpitations, or he lost consciousness, then this is a reason to suspect severe intoxication and immediately call an ambulance. You should not try to treat at home, this can be fraught with the most unfavorable consequences.
The same goes for a condition called acute alcohol poisoning. It occurs after a single intake of alcohol in an amount equivalent to 300-400 ml of ethanol. In this case, convulsions, excessive salivation, loss of consciousness up to an alcoholic coma may occur. In this condition, there is a danger to human life, and it will have to be treated in a hospital setting.
Poisoning with alcohol substitutes occupies a special place. Here, the cause of intoxication is no longer the alcohol itself, but various harmful impurities. If there is even the slightest suspicion of this account, you should also seek emergency help from a doctor.
Thus, attempts to remove alcohol intoxication at home should be undertaken only if there is no doubt that there is no threat to the victim’s life and health. You can take further action only after you are one hundred percent convinced that there are no dangerous symptoms. If you are not sure that you will cope with the current situation, then it is better not to risk it and entrust the matter to professionals.
Several of the most affordable ways
The simplest thing to do in case of alcohol intoxication is to drink plenty of water. Best of all, if it is mineral water without gas. Thus, you can help the body to cope with a number of problems at once. Firstly, the liquid taken allows you to speed up the metabolism, quickly remove toxins. Secondly, it saves from dehydration and salt loss. In addition, a person in a state of hangover feels intense thirst, and the water taken allows you to get rid of this symptom. For this purpose, other popular liquids are also suitable: cucumber pickle, kefir, kvass, infusion of chamomile flowers.
Strong tea or coffee should not be drunk. Such drinks will only deplete the last reserves of the body, and in fact they are already significantly reduced during intoxication. It is better to raise the tone with a contrast shower. It will also be useful to ventilate the room or, if the condition permits, go out into the fresh air. The oxygen supply will help to quickly restore vitality. You can often find recommendations for visiting a bath or sauna. Experts give exactly the opposite advice. The fact is that in this case the risk is much higher than the expected benefit. It is impossible to predict how a weakened body will react to such severe stress, as a result, you can get serious complications from the cardiovascular system.
Many people wonder whether it is necessary to eat with a hangover syndrome. Here you can give the following recommendation: if there is nausea, vomiting or a complete lack of appetite, then it is better not to rush to eat. Don’t force a hangover person to eat. There is no threat of exhaustion in the near future, so it is quite possible to wait a while. After the aversion to food has passed, you may be advised to eat soup or broth. You should not immediately switch to “heavy” food, even if you have a good appetite. Overeating during this period is much worse than light fasting.
About the medicines used
When treating at home, medications should not be abused. With a hangover syndrome, help can be limited to just two means: aspirin and activated charcoal . Aspirin can help relieve headaches. As a rule, it is not possible to get rid of it one hundred percent, but after taking the pain reliever, the suffering is noticeably relieved. Activated carbon, being an excellent adsorbent, is good if not so much time has passed after taking alcohol, and also if there is nausea or vomiting. In addition, there are a number of special hangover medications that can also relieve some of the symptoms. However, one should not forget that all of them do not relieve intoxication, but only make them feel better.
Now let’s say a few words about what should not be done in any case: the victim should not be given diuretics, emetics, sleeping pills. Treatment with such means can only be prescribed by a doctor. At home, it can be downright dangerous. You can only make things worse and turn a fairly simple situation into a serious problem. After such “treatment” one should expect not an improvement in the condition, but serious complications.
Why you can’t “get drunk”
Some people think that with a hangover, it is best to drink some kind of alcoholic drink in the morning, citing the fact that after that the state of health is noticeably easier. However, this is a false and short-term well-being. Agree that it is foolish to treat poisoning with a product that caused such an unpleasant condition. It’s the same with alcohol. As a result, you can only aggravate the existing condition: after a short period of apparent improvement, poor health will return and only increase. Mild poisoning can progress to moderate or even severe.
In conclusion, it should be noted that the best hangover treatment is its prevention. Everyone should know how much alcohol can be drunk so that later they do not have to do anything with severe symptoms of a hangover syndrome. If the trouble does occur, then, as a rule, it can be dealt with at home using simple and affordable methods, without resorting to drug therapy. However, all this may turn out to be ineffective, which will mean that the situation is much more complicated than it seems. Then it is better to seek qualified medical help.