News in Science
News in Science - Prickly pears ward off hangovers - 29/06/2004
[This is the print version of story abc.net.au]
Prickly pears ward off hangovers
Judy Skatssoon
ABC Science Online
Tuesday, 29 June 2004
Prickly pear extract may dampen the body's inflammatory mechanism during a hangover to reduce the severity of symptoms (Image: iStockphoto)
Prickly pear extract can prevent the worst of hangovers, according to new U.S. research.
An article in today's issue of the journal Archives of Internal Medicine says taking prickly pear extract can reduce the severity of a hangover if taken before a night on the town.
The prickly pear cactus, which is native to the Americas, was brought to Australia with the First Fleet.
It's now widely banned as a noxious weed, except for one variety, Opuntia ficus indica or Indian fig, which is grown in some states for its edible fruit.
Now researchers from Tulane University in New Orleans show this particular variety can prevent veisalgia, the medical name for a hangover.
The researchers tested 55 men and women aged 21 to 35 by simulating a night out under laboratory conditions.
Five hours before the study participants started drinking, the researchers gave them two capsules of prickly pear fruit extract (1600 IU in total) or a placebo. The people in the study then ate a junk-food meal and were told to start drinking.
They could choose from vodka, gin, rum, bourbon, scotch or tequila. But they couldn't mix their drinks.
Over the next four hours they drank 1.75 grams of alcohol per kilogram of body weight, which earlier research had shown was enough to induce a hangover. Limousines took them home at the end of the night.
How bad were their hangovers?
The next day the people in the study were rated for nausea, headache, loss of appetite, soreness, weakness, shakiness, diarrhoea and dizziness.
Three of the symptoms (nausea, dry mouth and loss of appetite) were significantly reduced and the risk of severe hangover was cut by half.
The extract did not seem to help the other six symptoms any better than the placebo did.
The researchers suggested prickly pear eased the body's inflammatory response to impurities or by-products of alcohol metabolism.
They showed that levels of a common marker for inflammation, known as C-reactive protein (CRP), were higher in people with the worst hangovers. And that the people who had taken the placebo had CRP levels 40% higher than those who had taken the prickly pear extract.
Extract or fresh fruit?
Australian complementary therapies researcher Professor Marc Cohen, from Melbourne's RMIT University, said while the study used an extract of the dried fruit it was likely fresh fruit would have a similar effect.
But the extract was unlikely to provide the same benefits if taken after drinking.
"It is probably wiser to avoid excess alcohol consumption altogether," he said.
Professor Stephen Myers, director of the Australian Centre for Complementary Medicine Education and Research, said alcohol was part of Australian culture.
"Having something that alleviate the downside of that is probably an appropriate therapy," he said.
The study received funding from Extracts Plus, the Californian supplier of the prickly pear extract capsules.
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