The scene is fall 2004. Frank*, a UW-Madison sophomore, had come home from class on a Friday after a grueling week of upper-level math exams and little sleep.
He pondered three options for what to do with his afternoon.
""I could have been productive and began work on one of my projects that was due the following week, or I could have taken a nap as to be well-rested for the night ahead,"" he said. ""But of course, I instead took the third route, which consisted of tackling the ‘Halo 2' campaign with my roommate while drinking White Russians made with Everclear all afternoon.""
Add in a fraternity party and a wop-laced birthday celebration that evening, and Frank found himself not only covered in dried, pinkish vomit, but also feeling exhausted and nauseous.
These symptoms, however, were not related to an illness contracted from germ-filled parties, but rather directly from the alcohol itself—in other words, Frank woke up with the worst hangover of his life.
Hangovers are common to many party-loving students, and according to UW-Madison nutritional sciences lecturer Peter Anderson, come from the multiple effects of alcohol on the body.
These effects, Anderson said, include fatigue, queasiness and headaches from the dehydration and the breakdown of alcohol, which interrupt normal metabolic processes and can lead to low blood sugar. In addition, certain types of alcohol, such as red wine, can lead to more severe hangovers. This is caused by the body's response to congeners, or impurities in alcohol—the more the beverage contains, the worse the hangover.
Anderson added the breakdown of alcohol is a multi-step process eventually resulting in carbon dioxide and water, but including other phases where alcohol is converted into a slightly toxic substance, called acetaldehyde, a cause of hangovers. For some people, he said, this conversion occurs more slowly, meaning hangovers can last longer.
""There are genetic differences in how fast people break [acetaldehyde] down,"" Anderson said. ""People who break that down more slowly, when it lingers longer in the bloodstream, they tend to like alcohol less. ... They have more of the downside and less of the upside of alcohol.""
These genetic differences mean there are people such as Frank, who only get hangovers in cases of extreme alcohol intake, and people like Becky*, a UW-Madison junior, who finds herself with a hangover almost every time she drinks.
Despite the negative feelings from hangovers, most students refuse to reduce their alcohol intake. Dr. Vince Adesso, a UW-Milwaukee professor of psychology, said this behavior is related to the delayed effects of hangovers.
""People respond to the immediate consequences of their behavior more than to consequences that are in the future,"" he said. ""When drinking, people believe they are enjoying themselves. So, the immediate consequence of drinking appears to them to be enjoyment. The hangover does not occur until long after the drinking has ended, so it is not directly linked to the drinking.""
Rather than curbing their drinking, students often seek to prevent or cure hangovers by other means, with varying degrees of success. For example, Becky said she has established a post-drinking routine she calls her ""special three"" to cope with hangovers: food, ibuprofen and a lot of water.
According to UW-Madison nutritional sciences professor Susan Smith, two of these three—water to rehydrate the body and a meal before drinking—may lessen hangover symptoms. However, she said it is a myth that fatty foods like pizza and french fries slow alcohol absorption more than healthier foods like vegetables, and that a healthy meal will work just as well to curb hangovers.
However, consuming food while already hungover may make things worse. Becky recalled a post-Halloween hangover when she woke up before work feeling particularly nauseous.
""I tried to eat a lot of food before I left for work because when I'm hungover, it usually makes my hangover feel better, but my stomach couldn't handle me trying to stuff myself,"" she said. ""I set off for work and as soon as I got there, I headed straight to the restroom and got sick.""
As for the ibuprofen Becky usually takes, UW-Madison pharmacy professor June Dahl said painkillers such as aspirin, ibuprofen and acetaminophen may also do more harm than good when alcohol is in the body.
Acetaminophen, found in Tylenol and many other medications, may be the most dangerous for chronic alcohol users, she said, because a small part of it is converted to a toxic substance in the liver.
""If you've been drinking alcohol excessively, you've already been damaging your liver, and one of the things that you've done is to reduce the amount of that glutathione, which is a compound able to detoxify that toxin made from acetaminophen by the liver,"" she said.
While a liver that is not damaged by alcohol can detoxify this substance, she said the combination of alcohol abuse and acetaminophen can lead to permanent liver damage and the eventual need for a transplant.
Moreover, Dahl added that aspirin, ibuprofen and alcohol are all harsh on the stomach lining, and the combination of alcohol with either painkiller can lead to an increased risk for stomach bleeding.
While Becky's ""special three"" account for some of the most common hangover cures, other alleged antidotes abound. However, many hangover remedies, such as those commonly available in drug stores, contain various nutrient supplements, and are nothing more than ""snake oil,"" or placebos, Smith said.
""There's an implicit statement that you don't have enough of these vitamins and minerals, and that's wrong,"" she said. ""The average student is not malnourished ... and taking and increasing your level of Vitamin X is not going to make the oxidative restoration process occur faster. The body doesn't work that way.""
Smith added that consuming more alcohol in the morning does not ""cure"" a hangover, but rather delays its symptoms until later. The only benefit of the morning-after Bloody Mary doesn't come from the alcohol, she said, but rather the electrolytes in tomato juice. A Virgin Mary or a can of V-8 would provide with less harm to the body.
As for drinking coffee in the morning, Smith said this typically will only result in a ""wide-awake hangover,"" and that coffee will only help those who may be in caffeine withdrawal from sleeping in after drinking. For those who are not in withdrawal, she said, caffeine will only increase the dehydration of a hangover, possibly making symptoms worse.
When asked why so many hangover-remedy myths exist, Smith cited the irregularity of hangovers.
""It's not the same from time to time,"" she said, ""And so people do tricks, and since you don't actually know what the outcome is going to be, you attribute feeling better on a particular time to the cure, when in fact it was simply fated to be that you weren't going to have that big of a hangover.""
The only surefire way to prevent a hangover, she said, was to not overindulge in alcohol.
""Don't kid yourself,"" she said. ""Don't hide behind things that are not going to work.""
*Names changed at students' requests.
