We’ve all been there, at a great party, thinking there’s no harm in having just one more drink, and we’re all having fun. But we know all too well that the harm will inevitably come the next day. Everybody has one cure or another for hangovers that they swear by, but is there anything that actually works? If you got carried away and had just one too many, what can you do the next day to ease your pain?
As far as cures go, there are none. The US National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) says, “there is no cure for a hangover other than time”. Like in many other cases, the best solution is prevention, because once a hangover sets in, there is no cure other than giving your body time to process all the toxic byproducts of alcohol metabolism, to rehydrate, to heal irritated tissue, and to restore immune and brain activity to normal.
As for the tips meant to ease that feeling that makes you swear you’re never drinking again, a few are somewhat effective, while others can do more harm than good. The most important thing is to drink in moderation, but if it happens you slip, here are some things to remember.
1. What doesn’t work
Drink more. It is a common misconception that if you wake up hangover, one more drink will make it go away. The truth is, another drink could temporarily reduce the effects of a hangover. Alcohol acts as a sedative for the brain, and once the intake stops, the brain is overstimulated, which is why everything, even light, hurts. So giving it another dose of sedative could calm it down for a while, but that hangover will surely come back, probably even stronger.
Heavy breakfast. Contrary to popular belief, having a heavy, greasy breakfast could do more harm than good. Dr Robert Swift, a professor of psychiatry and human behaviour at Brown University’s Warren Alpert Medical School in Providence, Rhode Island, explained that eating greasy food after drinking is basically useless, since the alcohol in your stomach dissolves the fat. “It cuts through grease in your stomach much the same way it cleans grease off oily car parts”, he said, adding that greasy food is also harder to digest, so it will just cause more discomfort.
Strong drinks last. Some believe that if you respect the order of drinking weaker beverages first, like beer and wine, and leave the spirits last will prevent a hangover. This is irrelevant. The more you drink, the worse the hangover will be, regardless of the order. Not mixing types of alcohol also doesn’t make a difference.
Hangover pills. There are some pills that claim to cure hangovers, but a 2020 study showed none of them are effective. What the researchers called “the world’s largest randomised double-blind placebo-controlled intervention study on the efficacy of a food for special medical purposes (FSMP) against veisalgia symptoms” found no real improvement from any of the supplements containing vitamins, minerals, plant extracts, and antioxidants they tested. Even if some of the pills could alleviate one or two symptoms, the rest remained.
Paracetamol. Some people would suggest taking a paracetamol before bed will prevent a hangover. You should never take paracetamol when drinking. Both alcohol and acetaminophen (the active substance in paracetamol, Tylenol and other similar medication) are processed by the liver, so mixing the two can cause liver damage.
2. What works
Eat before drinking. “Eating food loaded with protein and carbohydrates can significantly slow down the absorption of alcohol,” said Dr John Brick, former chief of research at the Center of Alcohol Studies, Education and Training Division at Rutgers University in New Jersey, who authored “The Doctor’s Hangover Handbook”. “The slower the alcohol gets to your brain, the less rapid the ‘shock’ to your brain.”
Coffee. While coffee is not in itself a remedy, if you drink coffee regularly, chances are you will get caffeine withdrawal on top of your hangover. On the other hand, coffee can irritate your stomach lining, which is already inflamed by alcohol. So Dr Brick suggests to start with just a quarter of a cup and wait to see how you fell. “It takes about 20 minutes for the caffeine to start to have some noticeable effect”, he explained. If you don’t feel any better, don’t have any more.
Water. “Before you go to sleep and when you wake up, drink as much water as you comfortably can handle”, Brick suggested. Some of the alcohol you drink is not processed by the liver, 2-5% is excreted unchanged in urine, sweat or breath, so drinking plenty of water and doing some light stretching or walking to stimulate these processes could help.
Electrolytes. Drinking alcohol dehydrates your body and causes and electrolyte imbalance. Some electrolyte rich sports drink could help restore more quickly some of the minerals your body needs, speeding up recovery, Swift said. However, the NIAAA points out that research has not found a correlation between the extent of electrolyte disruptions and the severity of hangovers, or the impact of added electrolytes on hangover severity. The institute says that in most people the body will quickly restore electrolyte balance once the effects of alcohol subside. With this one, like with coffee, you’ll just have to test it yourself and see how you feel.
