Alcohol And How It Affects Your Body – Clinically reviewed by Elaine K. Luo, MD — By Ann Pietrangelo and Kimberly Holland — Updated September 28, 2018
The effect of alcohol on the body begins from the first sip. Although the occasional glass of wine with dinner is not a cause for concern, the additional effect of drinking wine, beer, or spirits can cause harm.
Alcohol And How It Affects Your Body
A glass a day will do little harm to your overall health. But if the habit becomes severe or you have trouble stopping after one drink, additive effects can be added.
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Drinking too much alcohol can cause abnormal activation of digestive enzymes produced by the pancreas. Accumulation of these enzymes can cause inflammation called pancreatitis. Pancreatitis can be a chronic condition and cause serious complications.
The liver is an organ that helps remove harmful substances from the body, including alcohol. Drinking alcohol for a long time interferes with this process. It also increases the risk of chronic liver inflammation and liver disease. The scarring caused by this inflammation is called cirrhosis. Scars can damage the liver. As your liver becomes more damaged, it becomes harder to remove toxins from your body.
Liver disease is life-threatening and causes the body to accumulate toxins and waste products. Women have a higher risk of developing alcoholic liver disease. Women’s bodies absorb more alcohol and take longer to process it. Women develop liver damage faster than men.
The pancreas helps regulate insulin use and glucose response. If the pancreas and liver are not working properly, you are at risk of low blood sugar or hypoglycemia. A damaged pancreas can also prevent the body from producing enough insulin to use up sugar. This can lead to hyperglycemia, or high blood sugar.
How Alcohol Affects Your Body And Brain As You Drink
If your body cannot control and balance your blood sugar levels, you can experience serious problems and side effects associated with diabetes. Avoiding excessive alcohol is important for people with diabetes or hypoglycemia.
One of the easiest ways to understand the effects of alcohol on your body is to understand how it affects your central nervous system. Slurred speech is one of the first signs that you’ve had too much alcohol. Alcohol reduces the communication between your brain and your body. This makes coordination difficult. You may find it difficult to balance. Never drive after drinking.
Because alcohol causes more damage to your central nervous system, you may experience numbness and tingling in your hands and feet.
Drinking also makes it harder for your brain to form long-term memories. It also reduces your ability to think clearly and make wise decisions. Over time, the front part can be damaged. This part of the brain is responsible for emotional regulation, short-term memory, and reasoning, among other important functions.
Alcohol And Your Body
Chronic and severe alcohol abuse can also cause permanent brain damage. This can lead to Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome, a brain disorder that affects memory.
Some heavy drinkers may develop a physical and emotional dependence on alcohol. Quitting alcohol can be difficult and life-threatening. You often need professional help to recover from alcohol addiction. As a result, many people turn to medical detox to get sober. This is the safest way to get rid of physical addiction. Depending on the risk of withdrawal symptoms, detoxification can be managed on an outpatient or inpatient basis.
The relationship between alcohol consumption and the digestive system may not be immediately apparent. Side effects often occur only after the damage has occurred. And the more you drink, the greater the damage.
Drinking destroys tissue in the digestive tract, prevents the intestines from digesting food and absorbing nutrients and vitamins. Malnutrition can occur as a result.
This Is How Alcohol Really Affects Your Body
Ulcers or hemorrhoids (due to dehydration and constipation) are not uncommon in alcoholics. And they can cause dangerous internal bleeding. Ulcers can be fatal if not recognized and treated early.
People who drink a lot of alcohol can also get cancer. Heavy drinkers are more likely to develop cancer of the mouth, throat, esophagus, colon or liver. One of the people who drink and use tobacco frequently together
Alcohol can affect your heart and lungs. Long-term drinkers have a higher risk of heart disease than non-drinkers. Women who drink
Difficulty absorbing vitamins and minerals from food causes anemia. This is a condition where the number of red blood cells is low. One of the main symptoms of anemia is fatigue.
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You might think that drinking alcohol will lower your inhibitions and help you have more fun in bed. But the reality is very different. Men who drink too much alcohol are more likely to experience erectile dysfunction. Drinking too much alcohol inhibits the production of sex hormones and reduces libido.
Women who drink too much alcohol can stop menstruating. This puts them at high risk of infertility. Women who drink alcohol during pregnancy have a higher risk of premature birth, miscarriage, or stillbirth.
Women who drink alcohol during pregnancy put their unborn baby at risk. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FASD) is a serious problem. Other conditions include:
Long-term alcohol consumption can prevent your body from building strong bones. This behavior weakens the bones and increases the risk of fractures if you fall. And invoices can recover more slowly.
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Drinking alcohol lowers your body’s natural immunity. This makes it difficult for your body to fight germs and viruses that enter your body.
Chronic drinkers are also more likely to develop pneumonia or tuberculosis than the general population. About
All cases of tuberculosis worldwide can be linked to alcohol consumption. Alcohol consumption also increases the risk of several types of cancer, including those of the mouth, breast, and colon. Click here to learn the basics of alcoholism. You can also read about the stages of alcoholism and recognizing addiction.
It has strict source guidelines and is based on peer-reviewed studies, academic research institutions and medical associations. We avoid using third party links. You can read our editorial policy to learn more about how we ensure our content is accurate and up-to-date. Alcohol is usually used to refer to beverages such as beer, wine or spirits. They contain a chemical called ethyl alcohol (ethanol). It is a legal mood-altering drug that belongs to a group of drugs called “depressants.”
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This does not mean that alcohol causes depression (although it can have that effect). This means that alcohol slows down the central nervous system and stops most brain functions. It also affects almost all cells and systems of the body.
When a person drinks alcohol, it is absorbed into the bloodstream through the stomach and small intestine. It then travels rapidly to all parts of the body, including the brain.
It usually only takes a few minutes for alcohol to reach the brain. However, how quickly alcohol is absorbed can vary depending on several factors. These include:
The liver is the main organ that removes alcohol from your blood. Alcohol is processed according to the set standard. It generally takes about an hour to break down the alcohol in a regular drink.
How One Can Of Beer Really Affects Your Body From Wee To Food Cravings
Vomiting, taking cold showers, drinking coffee or other caffeinated beverages will not help remove alcohol from your blood.
Determining what exactly is a normal drink is not always easy. One standard drink contains 10 grams of pure alcohol (equivalent to 12.5 ml of pure alcohol).
Therefore, you should measure regular drinks by the amount of alcohol they contain, not by the number of glasses you drink.
Check the label of any bottle, can or keg for the number of regular drinks it contains.
Effects Of Alcohol On The Body
No alcohol can be said to be safe. There are factors that can change how alcohol affects different people, including:
Drinking more than the recommended amount of alcohol increases the risk of side effects. To reduce the risk of alcohol-related illness or injury, healthy adults should:
Even a small amount of alcohol consumption increases the risk of cancer. Alcohol increases the risk of cancer:
Drinking alcohol can also cause weight gain, which increases the risk of other types of cancer. The Cancer Council recommends that people limit their alcohol intake to reduce their risk of cancer.
How Alcohol Impacts The Brain
Pregnant women and women planning to become pregnant should not drink alcohol. Alcohol increases the risk of harm to an unborn baby. Fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) is caused by exposure to alcohol during pregnancy.
If you are breastfeeding, the safest option is to avoid alcohol, as it is present in small amounts in your breast milk.
A teenager’s body cannot deal with alcohol as well as an adult’s body. A teenager’s brain, heart and liver are not fully developed. This means they can process less alcohol. Therefore, drinking has a great impact on the health of a young person.
In some states, it is illegal to serve alcohol in a private home to someone under the age of 18. What?
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