Last time I looked into this I decided I wouldn't want to try it even if it did work. ADH2 works by converting alcohol into acetaldehyde, which is not something you want absorbed in your bloodstream (instant hangover): http://health.howstuffworks.com/wellness/drugs-alcohol/hango...
Concur. With this scheme it seems you're just adding fuel to the fire. If a synthetic acetaldehyde dehydrogenase supplement could be scared-up (converts acetaldehyde into acetic acid) then hangovers could be a thing of the past. FWIW coming from NW Celt stock (Norman French, Dutch, et al) I never suffered from hangovers, given seeming continued expression of the lactase enzyme (can drink milk like water) and high acetaldehyde dehydrogenase output when stupid enough to over-imbibe (like on college and grad-school weekends).
Once I didn't get any sign of being drunk regardless of the drinks being >50% and 70% vol. and higher, even though we danced, made push-up and have had fun on a trampoline. To this day I still don't understand how not only I, but also the friends who drank the same didn't get drunk. There must have been a secret ingredient in that moonshine, because I didn't eat anything before that.
If the yogurt + yeast mixture had a noticeable effect then it would have been interesting to tease apart which component was responsible, but since it didn't I think it was fine to leave it out.
If you're deciding what to test based on your results, you're doing it wrong. Methodology needs to be decided on before the experiment. If you want to change what you're testing, you do it in a separate experiment.
Anecdote. I heard about Milk Thistle when I was college, it supposedly protects your liver from damage. So I tried taking it when drinking, or immediately after drinking.
I was surprised that something so benign and unnoticeable during normal life could cause such a painfully upset stomach and aches in my gut area. It felt like being poisoned. I tried several times with different brands of milk thistle, too.
On the other hand, I took a low dose daily for a year and felt nothing untoward. No idea if it helped my hangovers, but it was a heavy drinking year that didn't result in that many hang overs. But I was much younger and relatively healthy.
That's a lot of water - 16 ounces before, and after each drink? So they drank 1.8 liters of water during this experiment. I'm honestly really surprised it didn't have a bigger impact on reducing their BAC levels.
The water drink works extremely well for every person I know. If you simply have a large glass of water after every drink, then, in addition to slightly diluting the alcohol you are drinking, it also cuts in half the amount of alcohol you drink that night - presuming you don't speed up your liquid consumption to accommodate.
The best "trick" I know for processing alcohol fast and avoiding a hangover is plenty of sugar. Drink rum & coke and such like in preference to straight spirits or wine/beer.
Your liver rapidly uses up glycogen reserves while detoxifying alcohol, easily leaving you a bit hypoglycemic. The fructose in sucrose powerfully replenishes glycogen.
The sugar advantage really is very noticeable if you experiment. You'll sober up quicker from a screwdriver than from a glass of wine.
Sugar is a also a vasodilator. It's well known in the cigar industry that if you get nicotine sickness, eat some sugar to relieve the symptoms. One of the WWE wrestlers visiting a cigar shop before a big event in New Orleans learned this lesson from me the hard way. He had half of a medium strength cigar and told me he was feeling REALLY good. I warned him to put it down before he hurt himself. Didn't listen, and I got them to give him some Sprite.
While I doubt Koch's trick really has the effect he reports, there are other more-exotic mechanisms of potential action I've not seen mentioned:
Perhaps Koch's many years of drinking, and repeatedly using this trick, have resulted in a unique personal gastrointestinal flora that does react to that particular mix of inputs with accelerated alcohol metabolism.
Perhaps the pre-drink concoction even serves as a trained signal, like Pavlov's bell, triggering Koch's flora or liver to accelerate alcohol metabolism processes in anticipation.
Inviting Koch in for tests might provide the cheapest initial indicator whether these could be a possibility.
I'm not sure I believe the "keep you from getting drunk" part of this, as this experiment bears out. However, yeast is a good source of B vitamins, and alcohol often causes B vitamin deficiency. So taking yeast (or drinking unfiltered beer) is a good way to avoid that. So it might help with the hangover or long-term effects.
Alcohol blocks absorption of B1-B6 (due to preferential metabolism) but it doesn't deplete your body of vitamin B (and your body's stores of vitamin B may last months so you're unlikely to run out during your hangover). As long as you're not permanently drunk (i.e. an alcoholic), vitamin deficiency probably won't be an issue.
If you're not deficient in a vitamin, taking additional doses probably won't give any benefit.
Belief in vitamin B helping with hangovers usually leads back to this study:
but I wouldn't personally put much trust in studies from the 1970's about Pyritinol (B6) preventing hangovers. Subsequent studies have failed to reproduce the results. And large unnecessary doses of Pyritinol may lead to cholestatic hepatitis and other issues so exercise caution.
If you want to drink and not feel bad (in order of efficacy)
* exercise
* drink water
* eat well
* vitamin b (this what the yeast provides)
Exercise helps you metabolize everything you throw at your body, water keeps those chemical reactions running smoothly and allows the kidneys to remove everything they want to. Eating well, more of the same. Alcohol strips out vitamin b, which we need to metabolize sugar. That headache you have the next morning is a no-sugar headache. Bingeing on sugar is one way, having an over abundance of vitamin b is another. You piss out vitamin b, can't keep it in your system. So a couple hours before drinking take a tab, with water AND food. And then do the same at the end of the night. Don't take it on an empty stomach, will make you sick.
Run some of your own science on this advice. Be active and drink well!
----
Most people in the booze business have a BAC over 0.04 all the time. This was science done by non-scientists.
Well to think hydrochloric acid is chemically even close to the same as citric acid would also be far from the truth. Both have their own chemical properties, which invariably produce different chemical reactions.
Now to ask how citric acid in any way neutralizes, reduces, or some other factor x, the effects of alcohol, would be a better question.
Anyone know why Voltarin (Diclofenac) works for hangovers? It's an anti-inflammatory drug. I have a 25mg tablet before going to bed after a big night, even if I've not had water before bed, I've never have a hangover/bad stomach/queezy/headache after taking one of these the night before.
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[ 4.9 ms ] story [ 81.2 ms ] threadE.g. No.
http://www.businessinsider.com/yeast-key-to-drinking-without...
They couldn't even manage to compare yogurt with yeast vs yogurt without?
Is that supposed to make the homeopathy more effective? :)
I was surprised that something so benign and unnoticeable during normal life could cause such a painfully upset stomach and aches in my gut area. It felt like being poisoned. I tried several times with different brands of milk thistle, too.
The water drink works extremely well for every person I know. If you simply have a large glass of water after every drink, then, in addition to slightly diluting the alcohol you are drinking, it also cuts in half the amount of alcohol you drink that night - presuming you don't speed up your liquid consumption to accommodate.
Your liver rapidly uses up glycogen reserves while detoxifying alcohol, easily leaving you a bit hypoglycemic. The fructose in sucrose powerfully replenishes glycogen.
The sugar advantage really is very noticeable if you experiment. You'll sober up quicker from a screwdriver than from a glass of wine.
Perhaps Koch's many years of drinking, and repeatedly using this trick, have resulted in a unique personal gastrointestinal flora that does react to that particular mix of inputs with accelerated alcohol metabolism.
Since people can be infected with microorganisms that create alcohol (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-brewery_syndrome), it seems the reverse should be possible, too.
Perhaps the pre-drink concoction even serves as a trained signal, like Pavlov's bell, triggering Koch's flora or liver to accelerate alcohol metabolism processes in anticipation.
Inviting Koch in for tests might provide the cheapest initial indicator whether these could be a possibility.
If you're not deficient in a vitamin, taking additional doses probably won't give any benefit.
Belief in vitamin B helping with hangovers usually leads back to this study:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4588294
but I wouldn't personally put much trust in studies from the 1970's about Pyritinol (B6) preventing hangovers. Subsequent studies have failed to reproduce the results. And large unnecessary doses of Pyritinol may lead to cholestatic hepatitis and other issues so exercise caution.
If you want to drink and not feel bad (in order of efficacy) * exercise * drink water * eat well * vitamin b (this what the yeast provides)
Exercise helps you metabolize everything you throw at your body, water keeps those chemical reactions running smoothly and allows the kidneys to remove everything they want to. Eating well, more of the same. Alcohol strips out vitamin b, which we need to metabolize sugar. That headache you have the next morning is a no-sugar headache. Bingeing on sugar is one way, having an over abundance of vitamin b is another. You piss out vitamin b, can't keep it in your system. So a couple hours before drinking take a tab, with water AND food. And then do the same at the end of the night. Don't take it on an empty stomach, will make you sick.
Run some of your own science on this advice. Be active and drink well!
----
Most people in the booze business have a BAC over 0.04 all the time. This was science done by non-scientists.
Pray tell, if citric acid from oranges and lemons neutralizes alcohol, why doesn't the hydrochloric acid in my stomach do the same?
You're stating things as fact, and they're far from it. Please stop.
Now to ask how citric acid in any way neutralizes, reduces, or some other factor x, the effects of alcohol, would be a better question.
Gullible much ?
You can get it from Korea.