Faith's post yesterday about what to do when your fridge goes out got us thinking. Sometimes even after all precautions are taken, food-borne illness does happen. Those little guys in the photo above might be microscopic, but they can really ruin your day, or worse. Do you know what to do if one of them finds its way into your system?
What To Do If You Get A Food-Borne Illness
Food poisoning symptoms can occur as rapidly as 30 minutes of consuming tainted food and drink. Symptoms of food-borne illness include:
- Diarrhea (sometimes bloody)
- Nausea and vomiting
- Abdominal pain and/or cramping
- Malaise (general uneasiness)
- Fever
Most of the times, food poisoning runs its course within 24 to 48 hours. However, in extreme situations one should seek medical care. eMedicineHealth.com has a comprehensive list here on what symptoms should prompt you to see a doctor. Such symptoms include:
- Nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea lasts for more than two days.
- The ill person is younger than three years.
- The ill person stops urinating, have decreased urination, or have urine that is dark in color.
If your symptoms don't require medical attention, you can easily treat yourself at home. Do not eat any solid foods while you are vomiting. Instead, drink a lot of water to help prevent dehydration. Once vomiting and diarrhea have stopped for a period of time, slowly reintroduce plain, low-sugar foods that are easy on the stomach, such as the BRAT diet. Continue to stay hydrated.
Hopefully, you'll never have to use this advice, but it is good to know!
(Images: Clockwise from top left - Listeria, E. coli, Vibrio, and Salmonella.)
Comments (7)
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I can vouch for it ruining your day (or weekend, in my case). I drank a lot of seltzer with lemon because water just sounded vile for some reason.
view Tiamat_the_Red's profile
In terms of hydration, liquids like Gatorade or even salted water are good to replenish electrolytes, especially if you can't eat many bananas/food in general. When my husband got horrible food poisoning in India all he could process for days was Limca (a metallic-tasting Indian version of Squirt) with salt. Nursing someone with food poisoning really takes the realtionship to a whole new level of intimacy!
view Squirrely's profile
Don't take an anti-diarrheal drug (like Immodium or Pepto), it can sequester the bacteria and toxins in your intestine and cause major damage and also increases the length of time you're sick.
My trusted remedy is taking activated charcoal capsules. Don't be shy - you can take 10-15 in a single dose. The charcoal absorbs the pathogen as well as the toxins the pathogens belch out. You can get activated charcoal at Whole Foods or a health food store. It's saved me a number of times.
If you can't keep any fluid in, get to the hospital so that they can put in an IV drip. Getting severely dehydrated and having your electrolytes completely out of balance can be very dangerous (heart attack).
view laila's profile
Peppermint tea works well for soothing your stomach after a bout, I discovered (I had a case of food poisoning when I was visiting a dear friend in Ireland and we ate at a dodgy fast food restaurant after a night at the pub).
view empresscallipygos's profile
stay away from subway (i think bad ranch dressing) and coffee bean tea leaf (spoiled milk). ugh city.
view lagirl358's profile
"Do not eat any solid foods while you are vomiting. Instead, drink a lot of water to help prevent dehydration." - is not a very good advice.
In fact, drinking water right after a vomiting bout (when you have a food poisoning) can make things much worse: the irritated stomach will reject the water, causing the person to throw up more, becoming even more dehydrated in the process.
It's commonly advised by doctors to wait 2 full hours after the last vomiting bout before taking a small sip of luke-warm (not cold!) water. Then it's a good idea to wait 15 more minutes and take another sip. If after two hours of sipping, the vomiting has not resumed, it's OK to drink as much water as you'd like. If the vomiting came back, time to head to the ER.
view LuckyMonkey's profile
Last month I had to treat someone in the field for food poisoning. Poor guy couldnt even keep water down so he had lots of IV fluid, anti-nasuea meds, anti-diarrheals, and pain meds.
Benadryl works to help ease cramping of intestinal muscles.
view bramasoleiowa's profile