..................................................................................................................................................................
Facts About
Hangovers
11 Interesting Facts About
Hangovers
By Lauren Cahoon Roberts
Introduction
Many
people have been there: After a night of one too many martinis, you wake up
with a pounding headache and crippling nausea. The hangover has plagued mankind
since drinking began, with records of the phenomenon dating back to ancient
Egypt.
Despite
the hangover's long history, its exact causes are still being parsed out.
"The question is: What's causing the
hangover?" said Dr. Robert
Swift, a professor of psychiatry and human behavior at Brown University who
studies alcoholism.
"It could be the alcohol, it could be how it's
drunk, it could be the other substances along with the alcohol."
But in any case, "a hangover is a clear
indication that you've done something that's not very smart," said
James Schaefer, an anthropologist at Union College who specializes in alcohol
metabolism research.
"It's
a warning signal."
While
many people have received that warning, there are a number of facts about these
dreaded post-imbibing episodes that are not widely known.
Here's
a look at 11 things you should know about hangovers:
Smoking
can make hangovers worse
Not
only are cigarettes bad for your overall health, they can make your hangover
that much worse the next morning.
Researchers
who looked at the smoking and drinking habits of college students found that
those who smoked on the nights that they drank heavily had much more severe
hangovers the following day.
While
the exact reason for this is still unknown, researchers surmise it may be
because smoking can cause people to drink more, according to a 2005 study in
the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence.
This
leads to more severe symptoms the next day. Another idea is that chemicals in
cigarettes can heighten the overall pharmacological effects of alcohol.
Hangovers
are expensive
While
hangovers can take a toll on individuals, they can also affect the economy.
It's
estimated that hangovers cost $148 billion annually, with an average annual
cost of $2,000 per working adult, due to missing work and poor job performance,
according to a 2000 study in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.
In
fact, even though a person's blood alcohol content may be back to zero the day
after imbibing, research has established that hungover workers have an
increased risk of accidents and injury.
The
more severe the hangover, research finds, the greater the neurocognitive
deficits, including poorer reaction times, memory and attention span.
Darker
liquors can cause worse hangover symptoms
Darker-hued
drinks, such as bourbon, red wine and rum can often be the culprit of a brutal
hangover, thanks to high concentrations of compounds called congeners.
These
byproducts of fermentation get metabolized by the body into formaldehyde, a
highly toxic substance that can contribute to a person's overall misery during
a hungover morning.
In
a study comparing the effects of drinking bourbon with drinking vodka, those
people who drank bourbon felt worse the next day.
"The clear, the five-times-distilled vodka is
better than thick, goopy rum,"
Schaefer said. "The darker the liquor, the more congeners it has."
But, if a peaty, single-malt scotch is your drink of
choice, "drink it neat and chase it with water," Schaefer
advised.
Genetics
plays a role
Hangover
symptoms are closely tied to how efficiently the body breaks down alcohol and
its byproducts.
Certain
genes are directly responsible for key enzymes, such as aldehyde dehydrogenase,
which breaks down the toxic alcohol byproduct acetaldehyde.
A
large percentage of Asians don't have enough of this enzyme, which can cause a
heightened negative response to alcohol, according to an article in the
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.
On
the other side of the spectrum, studies have found that roughly 25 to 30
percent of the population seems to be resistant to hangovers, which is likely
due to "a very effective ethanol metabolism," Schaefer said.
You
may be going through withdrawal
The shakiness, sweating and sensitivity to light and
sound that can accompany a hangover are also symptoms of withdrawal. "There
is a theory that hangover is a type of withdrawal from heavy drinking,"
Swift said.
"This puts your brain in a supersensitive state —
lights are lighter, and sounds are louder."
Along
with this supersensitivity, the body is battling an overload of acetaldehyde,
the toxic byproduct of alcohol breakdown that contributes heavily to the misery
of overdrinking.
Some
people deal with the pain by a "hair of the dog" remedy, which
involves drinking more alcohol in the morning to ease the pain of a hangover.
However,
in reality, this simply increases the amount of alcohol in the blood.
"Getting drunk all over again masks the
hangover," Schaefer said. "It's
both foolish and risky with respect to developing dependency."
Snacking
on protein can help
A hangover prevention plan, Schaefer said, can include
"grazing on protein snacks. Protein keeps the stomach busy."
Because
they take a relatively long time to digest, protein-rich foods such as meat,
nuts and cheese will delay the opening of the pyloric valve, which allows the
stomach's contents to pass into the small intestine.
The
small intestine is where most alcohol is absorbed into the blood.
If
you can't find a protein-rich snack, make sure you eat something else.
"Eating food of any sort keeps the stomach
busy," Schaefer said. "And,
food will absorb and dilute the alcohol that's poured into the stomach."
Carbonated
beverages make hangovers worse
Beer
and champagne drinkers take note — the bubbles in your beverage can contribute
to a hangover's severity.
"If you drink bubbly drinks, [the gas] causes
your pyloric valve to open,"
Schaefer said.
Thus,
bubbly alcohol is more likely to quickly reach the small intestine, from where
it is swiftly taken up into the bloodstream.
Higher blood alcohol content is more likely to lead to
intense hangover symptoms in the morning, so, Schaefer advised drinking "alcohol
on the rocks with water as a chaser."
Your
brain is dehydrated
That
signature, pounding headache of an epic hangover is due to dehydration.
Specifically, "ethanol dries out your
brain," Schaefer said.
Alcohol
does this by suppressing the hormone argenine vasopressin, which conserves
water levels in the body.
Without
argenine vasopressin there to regulate things, more water gets lost in urine,
causing the body's water levels to drop.
In fact, during heavy drinking, "the amount of
fluid you lose can be more than the fluid you consume," Swift said.
The
brain loses much of this water, making it literally shrink, and causing the
splitting pain in your head.
Women
have a higher risk of hangovers than men
The
body's water content is to blame for a woman's more potent hangover. While all
humans are roughly 80 percent water, this varies between the sexes.
As
a percentage, women have less body water due the fact that they have more body
fat (which holds less water) while men have more muscle (which is made up
mostly of water).
"When a man and a woman who weigh exactly the
same drink the same amount of alcohol, the woman will always have a higher
blood alcohol content because there's less water to dilute it," Swift said.
Inflammation
is a key culprit
Inflammation
adds to the complexity of a hangover's causes. Alcohol releases inflammatory
molecules from the liver, known as cytokines.
"Cytokines
are what make you feel achy and feverish when you have the flu," Swift said.
While
no one knows exactly how alcohol enacts this process, Swift said that
inflammation may be due to the large amounts of alcohol that our livers have to
handle when we drink.
"We ingest alcohol at 10 times the concentration
that you normally take other drugs," he said.
Additionally,
because alcohol causes inflammation in our bodies no matter where it is (such
as when poured on an open cut) Swift says it's natural that the liver would
respond the same way, releasing those painful cytokines into our bloodstream as
a result.
There's
no silver bullet
While hangover cures are hawked online constantly, "there's
no pill you can take that's going to cure it, because no pill can address all
the things an alcoholic beverage does to you," Swift said.
"Alcohol has so many effects itself; its
metabolites have effects and the congeners have effects."
However,
certain substances have been found to improve at least some of a hangover's
symptoms.
Activated
charcoal has been found to help with the effects of congeners, according to
research conducted by Schaefer.
And
there is some evidence that prickly pear extract may combat inflammation
involved in hangovers, according to a 2004 study in the journal Archives of
Internal Medicine.
Finally, "the best silver bullet is 'don't
drink,' obviously," Swift said.
Or, if you must, "drink moderately, on a full
stomach, hydrate yourself and don't stay up all night."
Pass
it on: Hangovers have surprising causes and effects.
For the science geek in everyone, Live Science
breaks down the stories behind the most interesting news and photos on the
Internet, while also digging up fascinating discoveries that hit on a broad
range of fields, from dinosaurs and archaeology to wacky physics and astronomy
to health and human behavior. If you want to learn something interesting every
day, Live Science is the place for you.
No comments:
Post a Comment