Sometimes, the easiest way to cure a hangover is to prevent one in the first place. If you're prepared for a night of drinking and have a hangover prevention plan, you can avoid feeling sick the next day. Here are our best hangover prevention tips from doctors and experts, as well as potential remedies if the hangover symptoms still hit the morning after a big night out.
How to Prevent a Hangover: Before You Drink
Eat fatty foods. All foods, especially fatty ones, delay the body's absorption of alcohol, say doctors. And delaying the absorption of alcohol is a good step toward avoiding a hangover. An easy food to eat before going out that's filled with healthy fats is avocado–guacamole for the table, please!
Eat high-fiber foods. Chris Meletis, a dean at the National College of Naturopathic Medicine, in Portland, Oregon, says high-fiber foods–like vegetables–break down alcohol and absorb it, keeping it from reaching the bloodstream as quickly.
Take Vitamin C. Often touted for its cold-fighting powers, vitamin C may also guard against hangover symptoms.
Try Hangover Prevention Formula. Two hours before you plan to start drinking, and on an empty stomach, down one capsule of this mixture of B vitamins and prickly-pear extract ($25;
amazon.com) , which you can find over-the-counter at drugstores. Jeffrey Wiese, an assistant professor of medicine at Tulane University, says Hangover Prevention Formula speeds up production of heat-shock proteins, which help the body fight stress and inflammation. Real Simple testers said the supplement prevented the headache they usually get from one glass of red wine. One tester drank much more heavily and gave HPF high marks the next morning.
How to Prevent a Hangover: While You Drink
Avoid congeners. What are these, exactly? Congeners are the compounds that give liquor its flavor and color, and many turn into poisonous aldehydes as they are digested the next day. "Opt for lighter-color, highly filtered alcohol," says Wiese. Typically, the more expensive the alcohol, the more filtered it is and the fewer congeners there are to cause a hangover. SKYY Vodka, for instance, makes a point of its "four-column distillation," "three-step filtration," and "exceptional purity."
Stick to one kind of drink. You can keep better track of how much you're drinking, and you're less likely to upset your stomach.
Avoid carbonation. Richard Deitrich, M.D., an alcohol researcher at the University of Colorado, says carbonation can cause the surface area of the stomach to expand, which means increased alcohol absorption. The bubbles in champagne and tonic water, in particular, speed up the rate of absorption.
Alternate with water. Guzzling water keeps you from guzzling the hard stuff, and it keeps you hydrated, which is key to hangover prevention because alcohol is dehydrating.
Order onion soup gratinee. Onions are high in sugar, which speeds the body's metabolism and burns alcohol, and the cheese is dairy, which slows alcohol's entry into the bloodstream.
How to Prevent a Hangover: After You Drink
Drink lots of water. Think of it as a cleansing rinse cycle.
Drink fruit juices. There is some evidence that fructose, the sugar in fruit, burns alcohol. According to doctors, fructose will also restore a person's blood sugar level. (Watch out, though, for a sugar rush and the ensuing crash.)
Drink Pedialyte. Like bland Gatorade for vomiting babies, Pedialyte ($5;
target.com) replenishes sugars and fluid-balancing electrolytes, which is essential during a hangover.