After St. Patrick's Day, Curing the Hangover

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ALISON STEWART, host:

Hey, thanks for checking out this Tuesday, March 18th edition of the Bryant Park Project from NPR News. We are on digital, FM, Sirius satellite radio, and online at npr.org/bryantpark. I'm Alison Stewart and coming up in a few minutes, Blender Magazine's Lizzy Goodman. We'll have the latest ear candy for your iPod. But you know that last segment we just did all about green diapers and how to look for marketing of products? That's what we call in the news game "news you can use."

You know, a little bit of information that might have meaning in your life and you can apply to your life. This time of year you can find tons of news you can use - reporting offering tax tips or spring cleaning ideas, but we here at the BPP, we know the news you can use this morning - how to cure a hangover. I mean, it is the morning after St. Patrick's Day, for goodness sake, and if you think we're making a stretch, check out a piece of evidence gathered by our producer at a bar near Times Square yesterday, where people were, shall we say, in the spirit. We asked them how they planned to handle the morning after.

Unidentified Woman #1: My cure for hangover is sleeping all day and Tylenol the night before.

Unidentified Man #1: Food, Gatorade and Advil.

Unidentified Woman #2: Three glasses of water, plus Ibuprofen, plus an egg sandwich.

Unidentified Man #2: Drink more beer. My cure for a hangover is probably a bagel, some iced coffee, and some, I don't know, fresh air.

Unidentified Woman #3: Sleep and Alka-Seltzer.

Unidentified Woman #4: Advil, Gatorade and sleep.

Unidentified Man #3: A lot of water, a lot of Aspirin, a good night's sleep, and hopefully my wife will take care of our daughter.

STEWART: Those people had those answers very ready, I would have to say. And we actually found a Scottish gent in the street who told us how he gets over a hangover.

Unidentified Man #4: The best thing (unintelligible).

STEWART: OK, and of course, wherever we go, we always find loyal NPR listeners. Oh, we don't have the NPR listener who likes to celebrate either? We'll find that tape for you later. Yes, all those people also let us video them and that's going to be on our blog at npr.org/bryantpark. So let's hope some of those people are listening right now as we talk to Dr. Billy Goldberg, co-author of "Why Do Men Have Nipples?" and "Why Do Men Fall Asleep after Sex?" Both books have questions you'd probably ask your doctor after a drink or two. Hey, Dr. Goldberg.

Dr. BILLY GOLDBERG (Author, "Why Do Men Have Nipples?"): Good morning.

STEWART: Hey, good morning to you. So first of all, let's just talk about what's going on with you physically when you have a hangover.

Dr. GOLDBERG: You know, it's interesting. The people who were responding from the bar in their drunken states were actually - they were kind of right on with their cures, because one of the worst things that happens is you get dehydrated, so that drinking of water is probably the best thing. Alcohol is a diuretic, so it changes your body's chemistry, and you lose, actually, water, even though you seem like you're drinking so much. That's probably why you're making so many trips to the bathroom.

STEWART: The ones you remember, anyway.

Dr. GOLDBERG: Absolutely.

STEWART: Now, are there different types of alcohol which are more or less likely to cause a hangover?

Dr. GOLDBERG: You know, that's actually probably the most important thing, and the thing about hangovers is prevention really is the best thing you can do. But there's something called congeners, which break down products during fermentation, a byproduct of fermentation, and that's what makes certain alcohols cause worse hangovers. And it's basically the darker alcohol that have more of these congeners. So your bourbon and your whiskey and, actually, red wine also. So clear alcohols, gin and vodka, have less of those congeners, and then it's those products that cause a worse hangover.

STEWART: What about carbonation? If you're mixing some rum with your cola?

Dr. GOLDBERG: Well, you know, there's that old saying which we talked about in our book, and I can never remember what it is. "Beer before liquor never sicker" or "liquor before beer, in the clear." People think that the carbonation increases the absorption of alcohol. You know, that's never really been shown to be necessarily true, but it's one of those ideas that's out there.

STEWART: All right. Well, you know, we posted this question on our blog and as we found out NPR listeners, you know, sometimes they do like to take a drink or two. Take a listen to this.

Unidentified Man #4: NPR my favorite.

Unidentified Woman #5: National Public Radio is the best station ever. I only listen to that for my news. That's it.

DAN PASHMAN: What do you like to listen to when you're drinking?

Unidentified Woman #5: Well, I'm drunk right now, so I can't think of it right now, but the Prairie Home Companion, everything, love it.

Unidentified People: This is NPR, National Public Radio. Yeah.

STEWART: Yeah, some of our classy listeners there, doctor.

Dr. GOLDBERG: I love it.

STEWART: Well, they made it to our blog.

STEWART: Well, they made it to our blog. Jane says her cure is, quote, "dry toast, two pickles, and Pellegrino." Is there anything in that combination which makes medical sense?

Dr. GOLDBERG: You know, the Pellegrino sounds like a great choice. Again, rehydration is probably the best thing. Food helps a little bit. I mean, the thing you want to do is - people talk about sleeping all day and I would love to do that. Alcohol disrupts your sleep also. It disrupts your REM sleep, that's that Rapid Eye Movement portion of sleep where you dream and also your deep sleep. You know, sleeping and eating and drinking are good.

STEWART: Stewart also wrote in, he says, quote, "eating something before going to bed is good advice, hence the canonical dodgy kebab or street-meat hot dog eaten at two a.m." Now, does that make sense? Eating before or after, which one is better for you? Should you just go to bed in an empty stomach?

Dr. GOLDBERG: I just want to talk about the "dodgy kebab." I love that. No, actually, both are probably good. So definitely, you know, if there's food in your stomach it allows - it actually decreases some of the absorption of alcohol.

STEWART: Does it make a difference, the kind of food? Because people here, I hear repeatedly, I eat cheese, I eat bacon, I eat eggs, something really greasy.

Dr. GOLDBERG: You know, there is some evidence that greasy food might help a little bit. It's funny. There's not an enormous amount of studies out there. There was actually a review in the British Medical Journal - that's probably the same people who talk about the dodgy kebab, where they looked at studies of hangover cures, and there is some information. But a lot of it is anecdotal stuff. But there is some evidence that maybe greasy food might be a little bit better.

STEWART: We're talking with Dr. Billy Goldberg, co-author of "Why do Men Have Nipples?" and "Why do Men Fall Asleep After Sex?" He's giving us some medical opinions about hangovers and come of the anecdotal treatments that people have come up with. Here's one from Charlie. He wrote this on our blog. "When I was in Tokyo, someone suggested I drink a bottle of Pocari Sweat before I go to sleep to avoid a hangover. It worked! I haven't had a hangover since then."

Now, before everyone gets all grossed out, Pocari Sweat is not what it sounds like. It is more like Gatorade. It is sugar and electrolytes. Is that going to help them out?

Dr. GOLDBERG: Really? I thought there was some guy named Pocari who sweats into a bottle and you're basically drinking his, you know, his sweat. Yeah, that can - definitely can help, it's the same idea. Unfortunately, you get a little repetitive about this - sleep, drink a lot of fluids. People mentioned Tylenol or Advil or Aspirin. The Advil and the Aspirin are probably a little bit better...

STEWART: What do they do?

Dr. GOLDMAN: Because they are anti-inflammatories. And there is some association with problems in - Tylenol can cause problems with the liver. Really in high-overdose amounts, not just in a small amounts when you are drinking. So you take the Advil or aspirin with the food and water or Gatorade, and you'll be a little better in the morning.

STEWART: Now, I'm not advocating this, but a personal trainer once told me he swears by a B12 shot or some sort of B12 will put you back on your feet.

Dr. GOLDMAN: You know, it's interesting. Those are the things that are studied. They've studied B12. They've studied B6. They've studied some weird stuff, this Alpha-linolenic acid from a yeast, and they've studied artichoke extract. And, I mean, none of it has really shown to be all that important or really all that successful.

STEWART: The good old-fashioned one you hear, "hair of the dog that bit you."

Dr. GOLDMAN: That doesn't work either. You know what a great thing I came across? Do you know what the formal name for a hangover is?

STEWART: What is it?

Dr. GOLDMAN: It's veisalgia. It's from a - this is the best part of it for me, the "algia" part of is just a suffix for pain. And the first part of it is from a Norwegian word meaning "uneasiness following debauchery."

STEWART: That is the best thing I've heard all day.

Dr. GOLDMAN: Yeah, I love that one.

STEWART: All right, I think there's something suffering from veisalgia today - sounds a little more glamorous than a hangover. Hey, Dr. Billy, thanks for being with us.

Dr. GOLDMAN: My pleasure, anytime.

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