What to do and what to take in case of alcohol poisoning

Alcohol causes intoxication regardless of the amount drunk. But the severity of the condition directly depends on the dose, and is also determined by the initial state of human health. Ethanol breakdown products are integrated into the body's metabolic processes. All organs and systems suffer from this. If it is not possible to cope with their rapid elimination, severe intoxication with pronounced symptoms occurs.

You can be poisoned by methyl or ethyl alcohol—alcohol surrogates. But food ethyl alcohol also often causes intoxication. Even high-quality alcoholic drinks can cause poisoning if you exceed the dose. Severe alcohol poisoning with a high risk to health and life is caused by cosmetics and technical liquids.

Content:

1. Stages of intoxication and risk factors
2. Signs and symptoms
3. How to get rid of severe toxicosis
4. How to relieve alcohol poisoning at home
5. How to remove alcohol in a hospital
6. Chronic alcohol intoxication
7. What not to do

Alcohol intoxication causes tangible consequences for the body - from seizures to induction into a coma.
Its likelihood depends not only on the amount of drinking: gender and weight, drinking alcohol on an empty stomach, and sensitivity to alcohol also influence. Any of your friends or relatives can get poisoned, so you need to know what to do in such a situation, and how to relieve alcohol intoxication at home, when there is no time or opportunity to go to the doctors.

Postintoxicosis

Alcohol intoxication stages 1 and 2 is almost always accompanied by a hangover with characteristic symptoms:

• Bad mood;
• hand trembling;
• strong thirst;
• loose stools or constipation;
• nausea;
• insomnia;
• swelling;
• dizziness;
• increased body temperature;
• muscle weakness;
• cardiopalmus;
• surges in blood pressure.

Particularly dangerous are binge drinking, which causes the development of chronic diseases, disability and premature death. There is no need to wait for irreversible changes. Contact a drug treatment center and we will return sobriety to your body and restore its normal functioning.

Stages of intoxication and risk factors

It's good if you know your dose - moderate drinking is unlikely to lead to dangerous consequences. In this case, you need to provide yourself with a sufficient amount of fatty foods, meat, fish, and bread in advance. Then you will be able to enjoy the feast longer.

There are three stages of intoxication:

1. The first one is easy. There is up to 1.5% alcohol in the blood. A person with such indicators does not feel a sharp deterioration in his condition. His mood improves, his body feels light, sometimes he feels a little drowsy, and his heart rate increases.
2. The second is of medium severity. The concentration of alcohol in the blood is from 1.6% to 2.7%. The first symptoms and signs of intoxication appear: speech becomes incoherent, the person may lose coordination. At this moment it is important to stop.

1. The third is alcohol toxicosis. Blood ethanol levels exceed 2.7%. New symptoms are added to the above symptoms: the skin turns pale or even blue, confusion and vomiting appear. Over time, most begin to experience seizures.

If you have not encountered this condition before, it is very easy to make mistakes in assessing its severity, which often leads to serious complications. Therefore, at the first suspicion, do not allow you to continue drinking, and if your health worsens, call a drug treatment team.

You can suffer from just one glass of alcohol consumed throughout the evening - it all depends on individual characteristics:

• gender;
• weight and build;
• age;
• the presence of chronic diseases, liver conditions;
• metabolic rate.

Pay attention to the conditions under which strong drinks are consumed. Drinking alcohol on an empty stomach is an almost one hundred percent guarantee of the rapid onset of, if not the third, then the second stage of intoxication. In addition, the worse the quality of the drink, the higher the likelihood that you will get poisoned. But intoxication can also occur from a bottle of the most expensive cognac, if precautions are not taken.

Signs and symptoms

Poisoning can be recognized by the following signs:

• redness of the skin - especially in the face, neck and limbs;
• disturbances in speech coherence caused by a decrease in brain activity due to the effects of alcohol;
• loss of coordination in space - a drunk person stumbles and falls, the gait seems non-standard;
• nausea and vomiting, diarrhea, urinary incontinence is extremely likely;
• difficulty breathing, shortness of breath;
• short-term loss of consciousness.

These consequences are typical both for those who are experiencing ethanol poisoning not for the first time, and for beginners. Don't ignore these signs - offer first aid as soon as possible.

The most dangerous symptom is loss of consciousness. A series of short-term fainting often foreshadows more serious consequences (even alcoholic coma), so the patient should not be left alone. The task of those who remain nearby is to give more water, monitor the presence of consciousness, and prevent vomit from entering the respiratory tract.

It is better to start first aid at home. If your health deteriorates significantly, it is better to come to a drug treatment clinic, or call a narcologist at home.

How to get rid of severe toxicosis

Before figuring out how to relieve symptoms, you need to determine the severity of the condition. First aid for severe poisoning includes the following:

1. Make sure the person is sitting. Lying down is dangerous - you may start vomiting, which makes it easy to choke. If the patient wants to lie down, place him on his side, but do not move too far away.
2. Provide the patient with plenty of fluids. The more he drinks, the better - it will help flush out toxins.
3. Give any sorbents to drink (activated carbon, Enterosgel, etc.).
4. Call the drug treatment team and wait for the specialists. They may be able to provide further instructions over the phone.

While waiting for a team of doctors, there is no need to give the intoxicated person medication on your own, because he may be allergic to some active substances, and your intervention will only make things worse.

When is it better to go to the hospital or call a doctor at home?

• There are head injuries.

• Convulsions or severe tremors .

• Repeated vomiting.

• You cannot wake the person.

• Pale face, weak pulse, changes in blood pressure .

• A person talks to non-existent objects, has visual or auditory hallucinations, signs of delirium tremens .

•The above-described symptoms increase or the person has diabetes .

How to relieve alcohol poisoning at home

If you are sure that the patient's condition is within normal limits, you can try treatment at home.

To relieve alcohol intoxication, follow the following action plan:

1. Sit the victim down and hold him in this position.
2. Rinse your stomach with several liters of boiled water. It should be warm - this will induce vomiting, which will remove toxins.
3. At the first vomiting spasms, tilt your head so that the mass does not go back down the respiratory tract. Prepare the basin in advance so as not to stain your clothes. Take a towel and bring plenty of water - after a bout of vomiting you will immediately want to drink.
4. Keep the person awake - he should not fall asleep. Sleeping during intoxication is dangerous: you may easily not recognize loss of consciousness and not notice deterioration.

After you cleanse the stomach with boiled water, you can give enterosorbents. Among the most accessible are Smecta and Enterosgel: they will ensure the removal of toxins. Do not give antiemetic drugs - this will interfere with the natural removal of excess substances from the body. Do not mix medications with each other. You need to wait a few hours between taking two different enterosorbents.

Popular traditional medicines include drinking freshly squeezed citrus juice or lemon balm decoction . It is better to drink the latter the next day if the nausea has not yet passed. The decoction will help dull unpleasant symptoms and relieve headaches.

Recovery

After detoxification, time is given for rehabilitation. It is carried out using folk remedies. They drink grapefruit juice, a decoction of St. John's wort, tansy, lemon balm tea, Borjomi. A strict diet is prescribed:

• The food is not fried, but steamed or stewed, baked in the oven.
• Non-fatty meats.
• The predominance of vegetables and fruits in the daily diet.
• Refusal of fried and spicy foods, marinades and pickles.
• Exclusion from the diet of smoked meats and seasonings.
• To prepare first courses, use lean broths.
• Refusal of fast food.

With the help of traditional medicine, the recovery course is easy and makes it possible to heal in the shortest possible time. The recovery process takes a week, and improvement in well-being occurs on the second or third day.

Alcohol intoxication cannot be ignored. Without intervention it will get worse, and self-healing will take a long period of time. Therefore, immediately contact the clinic to receive full treatment from professionals.

Author of the article: Yakovlev Evgeniy Anatolyevich

Narcologist, Candidate of Medical Sciences.

How to remove alcohol in a hospital

Hospitalization will be required in the presence of the third stage of intoxication and if there is a need to return to its former form in 1-2 days. This involves:

• collection of tests for preliminary diagnosis;
• examination of the applicant;
• selection of the most appropriate treatment option.

Most often in the hospital they prescribe:

• droppers consisting of a detoxification solution, vitamin complexes (B vitamins and ascorbic acid), metabolic agents, nootropics, potassium-magnesium complex preparations, drugs that normalize blood pressure and organ function;
• plasmapheresis - special filtration of blood to quickly remove toxins from the plasma;
• xenon therapy, oxygen therapy, ILBI, other physiotherapeutic techniques.

It will take 3-7 days to fully recover from the effects of intoxication. In the future, experts insist on prevention and studying the culture of drinking alcohol. If such incidents continue after discharge, it is necessary to find the root of the problem and choose the most appropriate way to combat addiction.

Intravenous injections

There are many methods for eliminating the unpleasant feeling caused by drinking alcoholic beverages. In the clinic, blood purification is carried out by placing droppers:

1. 5% and 10% glucose solution;
2. 5% ascorbic acid solution;
3. Reomacrodex, Rondex, Reopoliglyukin, Disol, Hemodez - one bottle each;
4. vitamin B6 and B1 in the form of 5% solutions of 3-5 ml;
5. 10% calcium chloride solution.

Saline solution is a universal drug that restores water-salt balance. It will help thin the blood and reduce the concentration of toxic substances. It is not always possible to cope with tablets, so the medication is more beneficial when administered intravenously. Plus, saline solution is harmless for people who suffer from diabetes and cannot respond adequately to a glucose drip.

It is better to do the digging in the clinic rather than at home. There is no doctor who can prescribe the correct dosage and no nurse who can properly install an IV. Eliminating the symptoms of the disease under control is safer, produces results faster, and the body’s systems are fully restored. Complete detoxification is carried out in two to three days.

Chronic alcohol intoxication

Chronic intoxication is worth mentioning separately. It is provoked by regular consumption of alcohol due to psychological and physical forms of addiction. It manifests itself especially strongly during periods of heavy drinking. It is impossible to get out of it without the help of doctors and loved ones.

Characteristic features are:

1. Losing control. The addict does not know how to independently determine the dose after which he should stop. At the same time, he often does not want to get drunk; on the contrary, it seems to him that he knows how to stop drinking in time.
2. Alcoholic anorexia. A sharp loss of appetite - up to complete rejection of food.
3. Alcohol amnesia. Specific episodes are not stored in the addict's memory. He remembers only the pleasant emotions that he felt at a certain period of time, and this again and again motivates him to drink the bottle.

It will not be possible to bring a person out of this state on your own. Be sure to call a narcologist. The sooner you start treatment, the faster your recovery will occur and the more complications you will be able to avoid.

Medicines

As soon as the alcohol has been removed from the stomach, the person is given one of the following drugs:

• Anti-E;
• Colma;
• Zorex;
• Metadoxyl;
• Hepatofalk;
• AlkoStop;
• Yantavit;
• Glycine;
• Sofinor;
• Alka-Seltzer.

The use of these medications is appropriate for poisoning and treatment of alcohol intoxication. They should be taken in the dose indicated in the instruction leaflet. Many of them are freely available and allow you to instantly eliminate alcohol poisoning at home.

What not to do

Alcohol poisoning is a fairly serious problem, do not let it take its course. Only movie heroes can sleep well and look like new the next day. This will lead to serious consequences in life:

• disorders of brain activity,
• speech problems,
• difficulties with coordination of movements,
• chronic redness (and then blueness) of the skin in the facial area.

A detailed list of what not to do if the patient has severe alcohol intoxication:

1. Do not give coffee and other drinks based on it - caffeine quickly removes fluid from the body, which leads to unbearable thirst. In addition, at this moment he will also feel nausea, turning into vomiting: if there is no water nearby, the lack of fluid will seriously damage the brain and may contribute to loss of consciousness.
2. Do not try to induce vomiting in the victim yourself. Especially if he is in a semi-conscious state - your efforts can lead to vomit entering the trachea and subsequent respiratory arrest.
3. Do not pour cold water on the victim. An ice shower only relieves drunkenness in movies; in real life, it will only cause hypothermia.

The main thing is to take any alcohol out of sight of the alcoholic. This will keep a person from wanting to get hungover and go on a new round of binge drinking.

Learn in advance how to quickly relieve the symptoms of toxicosis and how to provide emergency assistance if breathing stops and the heart stops beating. After all, this knowledge can save someone's life

Gastric lavage

If it turns out that a person has signs of alcohol poisoning, gastric lavage will not be superfluous. This will help get rid of ethanol breakdown products and restore the functioning of nervous activity (alcohol will not have time to be absorbed into the blood). For this purpose, it is recommended to use activated carbon. Its action is aimed at binding toxic substances, and they quickly and harmlessly leave the body. The use of activated carbon is appropriate even if a person has mild to moderate degrees of intoxication.

After washing, weakness develops, but the person temporarily forgets about the signs of over-drinking. This method is effective even if the patient has a severe stage. After acute symptoms are relieved, all functions will gradually be restored. Plain drinking water is also used as rinsing. Give two glasses to drink and immediately induce vomiting by pressing on the root of the tongue. The purpose of rinsing is to remove alcohol, but if a person is unconscious, then it is strictly forbidden to pour water into him.