Can i drink alcohol while taking antibiotics?

antibiotics and alcohol intake

In life, there are often situations when we have to take antibiotics and at the same time be invited to some kind of celebration. Therefore, the question of whether it is possible to drink alcohol while taking antibiotics is especially acute in such cases. Below we will provide complete information on this issue.

Treatment with antibacterial drugs is prescribed in a number of cases of bacterial and, less often, fungal infections. It is important to remember that the course of antibiotic treatment should never be interrupted. Its duration can be different, depending on the type of disease and its severity (from 3-7 days or more). The thought that it is necessary to "drop out" of the festive life and not accept invitations to any meal frightens many. But in practice, everything is not so scary.

If you approach this problem competently, from a medical point of view, then you can take part in feasts with relatives and undergo antibiotic treatment.

The golden rule: always drink in moderation.

Under certain conditions, described below, you can, of course, combine alcohol with antibiotics. But when prescribing antibiotics, you need to be careful not to overload your body with excess alcohol. In any case, ethanol gets inside you, and all your defenses will be thrown into the fight against it. And in the case of, for example, a lingering illness, these forces may be the last. Immunity will be weakened even more, and recovery will be postponed to the boundless future. And in some cases describedbelow, even death is possible.

Antibiotic and alcohol compatibility myths

Frightening stories that it is categorically impossible to combine antibacterial drugs and alcohol, most likely, began to spread immediately after the Second World War. At that time, venereal disease clinics were simply overcrowded with soldiers and officers, who endured all the hardships of military life on their shoulders.

Doctors then categorically forbade their patients to take alcohol during antibiotic therapy, but not because of the harm to health from mixing the latter, but for a very banal reason - after drinking a glass, a soldier could "go all out" and get a new genital infection.

According to another version, the ban was born due to the high labor costs when receiving penicillin, oddly enough, it was evaporated from the urine of the treated military personnel. Therefore, in order to obtain a medically pure medicine, they were forbidden to drink beer during the entire treatment period.

Since then, the theory of the dangers of mixing alcohol with antibiotics has become popular among the people, and many still believe that they cannot be combined. But what is the opinion on this issue of evidence-based medicine?

Research facts

It is known that in the late 20th - early 21st centuries, a number of studies were conducted on the effect of ethanol on various types of antibacterial drugs. The experiments were carried out both on laboratory animals and on human volunteers. The results clearly showed that most types of antibiotics are not affected by alcohol consumption.

All investigated antibiotics were effective both in the control and in the experimental group, no global deviations in physicochemical reactions (drug distribution throughout the body, mechanisms of absorption and excretion of decay products) were found.

However, there is a hypothesis that alcohol does increase the negative effects of antibacterial drugs on the liver. But in the scientific medical literature, cases of describing such situations are quite rare (up to 10 cases per 100, 000), and no special studies have been carried out in this area.

Antibiotics incompatible with alcohol do exist

There are some types of antibacterial drugs that interact with alcohol and produce very unpleasant symptoms - called disulfiram-like reactions in medical practice.

This reaction occurs during the chemical interaction of ethanol and some specific antibiotic molecules, due to which there is a change in the metabolism of ethyl alcohol in the body and the accumulation of acetaldehyde is observed.

Signs of acetaldehyde poisoning:

  • Vomiting, nausea.
  • Strong headache.
  • Cramps in the arms and legs.
  • Increased heart rate.
  • Heavy, intermittent breathing.
  • Fever and redness in the chest, face and neck.

In such cases, when taking large doses of alcohol, a fatal outcome is possible!

All of the above symptoms are very difficult for a person, therefore, a disulfiram-like reaction is used in many medical clinics in the treatment of alcoholism (the so-called "coding").