Hangover Tips for a less hazy New Year

At this time of year, many people get excited and over indulge in alcohol. This can cause a hangover.

As I get older, I do find my body can handle less alcohol. This is because my liver can’t detoxify alcohol and other toxins as well- if this is happening to you, consider this a wakeup call to attend to your liver (in January!) and integrate these tips to reduce your post holidays blues.

Here is my medical advice from a recent deep dive on hangovers:

1. Prevent: by drinking less, or not at all.

Eat before you go out.

Alternating soda water, mocktails or non alcoholic drinks with your drink of choice.

Setting a limit on your drinking. You will still have fun if you stop at 4!

2. Hydrate

A lot of the symptoms of hangovers are due to dehydration. This is because alcohol is a diueretic- it increases urine/fluid loss via making yo pee more.

If possible, alternate your alcoholic drinks with soda water or water, and drink a big glass of water before bed.

2. Go colourless & top shelf

Avoid alcoholic beverages with high percentage of “congeners”- these are chemicals produced by the process of distillation and fermentation of alcohol, but not alcohol itself. eg methanol, isopentanol, acetone and chemicals added to enhance colours.

Methanol is the main component leading to hangovers- after drinking, your body converts methanol into formaldehyde, a highly toxic substance which makes you feel terrible. Alcohol high in congeners include bourbon (worst!) whiskey, cognac, and 🌵tequila. ( No comment on that one). Avoid these.

Colourless drinks — like vodka, gin, and white rum — also have low levels of congeners. This is what I drink, when I drink because I have also noticed other alcohols cause my rosacea to flare.

The more expensive brands are more likely to have better distillation and hence have less congeners.

My favourite drink is now colourless gin or vodka with home made tonic or soda water with lime. I try to have it in a tall glass so I increase the hydration. I also now measure my alcohol serve (30ml for one standard drink of 40% alcohol). I find this keeps me accountable.

3. Supplement

Disclosure- there is still lot of research to do on this topic. Surprisingly, there is no funding for this ( I am volunteering for research if any one is looking for volunteers!).

There is some evidence that B vitamins, Vitamin C, Mg and Z and ginseng do help you to pull up faster after drinking. A low cost option is a Berroca, which contains a spectrum of B vitamins, Mg Zn, Vitamin C and Magnesium. They have different formulations- some contain guarana and caffeine- do not take these before bed!

A higher cost option is this: Afterdrink. https://loom.ly/YSEfLmg I’ve ordered some i’ll let you know how it goes…

I am also a fan of NAD+ Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+) , which is an essential vitamin to improve metabolism and energy, but also is specifically implicated in alcohol detoxification. I will do a blog on this in the new year.

4. Eat
My favourite hangover food is eggs. I spent 10 years at Uni, so I had a lot of n = 1 experimets!

I have recently discovered that this may actually have a scientific basis- egg yolks are high in cysteine, which can help to metabolise congeners and acetaldehyde

5. Management of Nausea: mild: ginger. Moderate: See your GP to get some maxalon or if you are really vomiting a sublingual tablet of ondansetron can help.

MEDICAL NOTE: heavy alcohol intake can cause serious health issues like pancreatitis or gastritis or even bleeding ulcers. So if you are vomiting blood after alcohol, or you have back pain or abdominal pain with vomiting - you need to see a doctor on the day.