Study warns of caffeine poisoning from energy drinks

William Atkins
Tuesday, 17 January 2012 00:42

Science - Health

Two Australian scientists contend that caffeine toxicity, including hallucinations, seizures, and heart attacks, is a possible consequence of drinking too many energy drinks - especially in adolescents.

The authors -- Drs. Naren Gunja and Jared Brown -- have published a paper in the Medical Journal of Australia called 'Energy drinks: health risks and toxicity' (MJA 2012; 196 (1): 46-49 doi: 10.5694/mja11.10838).

 

They analyzed data taken from the database of an Australian poison information center from 2004 to 2010, looking especially for such things as types of exposure, symptoms, hospitalizations, and other medicines ingested at the same time.

The median age of the 217 subjects was 17 years of age, with 57% of them being male.

Energy drinks include such branded names as Red Bull, V, Pulse, Mother, and RockStar.

They found that, from 297 exposures to energy drinks in a recreational setting:

'¢    100% of the subjects had co-ingested other substances, mostly alcohol (50%) but also other caffeinated products (44%).

'¢    The number of energy drinks consumed in one sitting varied greatly, with an average of 5, but with a range of 3 to 8.

'¢    87% of the subjects experienced symptoms after drinking energy drinks, with the most common symptoms being palpitations, agitation, tremors, and gastrointestinal upset.

'¢    21% had serious cardiac or neurological toxicity, which included hallucinations, seizures, arrhythmias, or cardias ischemia (also known as angina pectoris, which occurs when the heart receives insufficient blood flow).

'¢    128 subjects required hospitalization (57 of them after not ingesting other substances).

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