By Laura Finaldi, News Staff
Of all the mistakes college students make while drinking, downing vodka with Red Bull or popping a morning-after Tylenol might seem relatively low risk. While those behaviors are usually nowhere near as risky as drinking and driving or going home with a stranger, they do carry health consequences.
Bernie Murphy, a registered nurse in the comprehensive addiction program at St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center in Brighton, said mixing caffeine with alcohol is unhealthy for the brain. Since caffeine is a stimulant and alcohol is a depressant, the combination of the two can make a person feel very wired, until they crash.
“You may experience very agitated behavior as well as being drunk off of the alcohol,” he said. “You get sort of a wide-awake drunk. You’re very wired and your mind is racing. It’s a bad idea.”
Amaura Kemmerer, director of the Office of Prevention and Education at Northeastern (OPEN), said the combination of the two can make a person more drunk than he or she realizes.
“Consuming caffeine masks some of the intoxicating effects of the alcohol,” Kemmerer said. “People tend to not realize how drunk they’ve become and then over-consume.
Dr. Paul Heinzelmann, a clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School, said mixing alcohol and caffeine is not a new thing, citing Irish coffee as an example. He said although he does not personally recommend combining the two, they can be enjoyed together if one is responsible about it.
“As with many things in life, its the degree of use that creates some fuzziness about when it’s most dangerous,” he said. “In my opinion, it’s generally best to avoid combining them.”
Alcoholic beverages typically pack calories, but Nicole Cormier, a registered dietitian based in Middleboro, said to make sure to eat before a night of drinking, because saving the day’s calories for a night out can severely weaken an immune system.
“A lot of girls will not eat during the day because they’re afraid of too many calories, but you don’t want to replace nutrition with alcohol,” she said. “Your body is going to be malnourished without the vitamins, minerals, proteins and nutrients it needs to function at its best. Then, drinking is going to lower your immune system even more from not eating and drinking water.”
For a headache the morning after, Murphy said acetaminophen pills like Tylenol, which in excess are damaging to the liver by themselves, should be avoided while drinking due to the combination can sometimes have fatal consequences because they are damaging to the liver on their own. He said taking ibuprofen (like Advil) or aspirin is a better and healthier way of getting rid of hangovers, but that those pills should be taken in moderation.
“People can kill themselves inadvertently because Tylenol is so toxic to the liver even without the presence of alcohol,” he said. “Aspirin and ibuprofen can cause bleeding if they are taken more often than they should be. If somebody drinks once in a while that wouldn’t be a problem, but oftentimes heavy drinkers will do this and it is not healthy.”
For a greener, more nourishing hangover remedy, Cormier said it is important to replenish lost nutrients by eating lots of vegetables filled with vitamins and minerals.
She said eating a healthy breakfast, with foods like English muffins, egg sandwiches and whole wheat toast with bananas and peanut butter, will bring nutrients back into the body.
Another oft-cited hangover curing ingredient are pills that include milk thistle, a liver-boosting ingredient. Murphy said taking a pill like this can be an effective remedy for someone who wants to cleansetheir body, but it will not be much of a help for a person who drinks on a consistent basis.
“[The milk thistle pill] is more of a homeopathic way of dealing with the problem, and that’s fine as long as the person is committed to changing,” he said. “It’s not anything that’s going to do any good in a person who wants to drink.”
Dr. Heinzelmann said the damages caused to the body by alcohol go much further than just the liver, and anyone who drinks should be aware that a pill for liver restoration cannot repair the damages alcohol can have on the brain, gastrointestinal system and cardiovascular system.
“Alcohol consumption has destroyed the lives of many individuals and their families long before it destroyed their liver,” he said. “Such a pill would only address one of the many negative health effects of alcohol.
Mike Green, a junior international affairs and environmental studies major, said he likes to eat a big breakfast the morning after going out. However, his method is a little different than the one Cormier recommends.
“Go to the South Street diner at 2:30 a.m. and eat a huge meal,” Green said. “That way, you wake up with a nice full stomach of food, ready to face the day.”
