First aid for alcohol poisoning

It is difficult to imagine modern holidays and big companies on vacation without alcohol. Indeed, alcohol helps to improve mood, allows you to relax and have fun. Good alcohol in a decent environment and for a quality snack can really bring only positive emotions. But, unfortunately, this does not always happen. Often an excess of alcohol or its dubious quality can lead to severe alcohol poisoning. How to get a person out of this state? How to help relieve intoxication? Today we’ll talk about alcohol poisoning - how the body acts on alcohol, what methods will help quickly sober up a person, and also learn how to prepare for a feast so as not to get drunk.

Alcohol intoxication

Alcohol enters the bloodstream quite quickly - just a few minutes after a person drank a strong drink. Especially if alcohol was consumed on an empty stomach. Alcohol is absorbed through the walls of the stomach into the bloodstream and begins to spread throughout the body. First of all, the nervous system, brain, muscle corset, and liver suffer. A person has symptoms such as clouding of consciousness, loss of balance, redness of the face, active sweating. Exposure to the nervous system leads to an excited state - loud conversations begin, laughter, inadequate dances, a sense of confusion and shame are dulled. In some cases, food and sexual instincts are activated - a person can intensely start eating or is looking for a partner for sex. A distinctive feature of alcoholic intoxication is the feeling of complete control over the situation - a rare drunk person recognizes himself as such. Sometimes the patient continues to drink and feels intoxicated, since he is in a sitting position. Awareness of the problem comes only after he gets up and realizes that he cannot walk normally.

The state of intoxication increases if the patient continues to drink alcohol. By the way, alcohol affects different people in different ways. Someone will not feel the whole bottle, and for someone, a glass will be enough to lose control of the situation. It depends on age, gender, weight, heredity and condition of the stomach. The worst consequence of intoxication is an alcoholic coma. This is a condition in which a person does not respond to light, pain stimuli, and sometimes to the smell of ammonia. In some cases, the patient may not control vomiting, bowel movements, urination, etc. Profuse salivation may begin, or foam from the mouth appears. With a deep alcoholic coma, the pulse is disturbed, the heartbeat ceases to be rhythmic, breathing becomes intermittent, and the pupils narrow.

Alcohol poisoning can occur not only as a result of an overdose of alcohol. A similar condition can be diagnosed with the use of low-quality alcoholic beverages, a surrogate. In no case should you take oral fluids such as alcoholic medicinal tinctures, perfume products, alcohol-based household chemicals. Refuse the consumption of cheap vodka without various quality guarantees on the package. Do not drink moonshine, especially if you do not know about its origin.This is a natural Russian roulette - you simply cannot assume that it can be in a treasured bottle. If poisoning nevertheless happened, you need to act immediately.

What to do with alcohol poisoning

First, you need to call an ambulance crew. To cope with intoxication on your own is possible only with mild poisoning, so it is still better if the patient is under the supervision of doctors. What can you do yourself before the arrival of specialists?

1. First you need to clean the contents of the stomach from alcohol residues so that intoxication does not increase. To do this, you need to do a gastric lavage. Dilute a little potassium permanganate in a liter of water so that the liquid is slightly pinkish. Ask or make the patient drink the prepared solution in small sips. Then you need to induce vomiting by pressing on the back of the tongue. In some cases, pressure is not needed - vomiting appears on its own, so the body tries to cleanse itself. After this, you need to repeat drinking and vomiting until the vomit becomes clean and transparent.
2. If a person is unconscious, in no case should you drink it with liquid - water may get into the wrong throat and the patient will choke. In this case, you just need to wait for the doctors and try to bring the patient to life - massage his ears, sprinkle cold water into his face, give a smell of ammonia, etc. Make sure that in this condition the patient does not have a sunken tongue - in this case, it should be pulled out with a teaspoon.
3. In some situations, vomiting can be constant and indomitable. Then you need to give the patient antiemetic drugs. If a person vomits blood or bile, it is necessary to hospitalize the patient in a hospital as soon as possible.
4. In some complex cases, patients are prescribed bowel lavage along with gastric lavage. To wash the products of the decay of alcohol from the body, you need to make a cleansing enema.
5. After this, you need to give the person sorbents - Activated Carbon, Polysorb, Enterol, etc. They enter the stomach and absorb toxins. Remember that sorbents should be taken by weight - one tablet of activated carbon per 10 kg of a person’s weight. This will help relieve symptoms of intoxication and relieve poor health.
6. If diarrhea appears on the background of alcoholic intoxication, doctors do not advise stopping it. This is also a reaction of the body, which is trying to cleanse the intestines of toxins, toxins and alcohol breakdown products.
7. Then it is necessary to normalize the water-salt balance of the body and save the patient from dehydration. The fact is that alcohol removes salt and potassium from the body. To normalize fluid balance, you need to drink mineral water or ordinary filtered water with lemon. It is very good to dilute a pack of Regidron in a liter of water and give the patient to drink this solution. Simple brine can replace pharmacy products - there are enough salts in it that will help defeat the feeling of thirst.
8. While a person is intoxicated, in no case do not need to give him potent medications. In combination with alcohol, they can give an unpredictable reaction. In an extreme case, you can consult with emergency doctors about taking a particular medicine by calling emergency number 103.
9. After cleansing the stomach, you can give the patient hot tea with lemon and sugar. This will reduce the symptoms of intoxication, glucose will give the exhausted body nutrition.
10. After the initial measures, you can give the patient special drugs to reduce the hangover syndrome. These are Alka-Seltzer, Limontar, etc. They will relieve a person of dizziness and dry mouth, restore clarity of thinking.
11. It is necessary to provide the patient with peace - the less he moves, the worse the alcohol will spread throughout all its organs.In some cases, the patient's legs and arms may be cold when drunk. In this situation, you need to warm your limbs with a heating pad, plaid, warm clothes. Better to put the patient on the bed and cover with a blanket. The patient's head must be turned on its side so that it is not choked with vomit.
12. In order for the patient to come to his senses faster, he needs to provide him with access to fresh air. In the room you need to open the windows - the patient becomes sober faster.
13. If your head is unbearably sore, you need to take pain medication. But do not resort to the help of aspirin - in combination with alcohol it can be dangerous. Ibuprofen-based painkillers can be taken.
14. In some cases, when cardiac or breathing stops, you need to be able to do an indirect heart massage or artificial respiration before specialists arrive. This is very important, because in 95% of cases, death from alcohol poisoning occurs before the ambulance arrives.

With alcohol intoxication, the main thing is to wait for the doctors and give the patient first aid. Already after the arrival of specialists, the patient will undergo various cleansing procedures, a drip infusion of vitamins and drugs that will help relieve intoxication.

How to protect yourself from alcohol poisoning

You need to monitor the quality of alcohol that you are going to drink. Do not buy products of dubious origin by hand without the appropriate documents. Alcohol should be purchased only in trusted and large stores. As a rule, they value their reputation, and will not distribute home-made alcohol.

But even if you bought a good high-quality alcohol, you need to drink it correctly. In no case should you drink alcohol on an empty stomach. If you are going to a banquet, you need to prepare in advance - drink activated charcoal, and most importantly, before going out, eat a few tablespoons of oatmeal. It gently envelops the walls of the stomach, protects the body from instant absorption of alcohol into the blood. When drinking alcohol, try to have a bite of each drink. In no case do not drink alcohol with fruit juices and carbonated lemonades - as alcohol absorption in the blood is enhanced. Do not mix drinks, and especially lower the degree of drinking. After beer, you can drink vodka, but not vice versa!

Well and most importantly - know the measure. It is important to understand that alcohol is not an end in itself and not the main guest of the evening. You can have fun with a small dose of drunk. At the first signs of alcohol intoxication, try not to drink more, otherwise you will be much worse. Better get up and dance, if appropriate. Think about the moral aspect - what will your relatives and colleagues think about you, how will you look into their eyes after sobering up? After all, at some point from a large amount of alcohol you drink, you can lose control of yourself. If at least once in your life you got drunk to unconsciousness, you need to carefully monitor yourself, know the measure and try to relax with dignity!

Video: treatment of alcohol poisoning at home