Berlin (dpa) - Combining alcohol with prescription drugs can have
harmful effects on the body. If you are prescribed a medicine consult
your doctor and ask if drinking alcohol is allowed in combination
with your therapy. That rule applies in particular to elderly people,
according to Erika Fink, president of the German Chamber of
Pharmacists.
Sleeping tablets and sedatives as wells as drugs for treating
depression, Parkinson's disease and epilepsy can have powerful
interactions with alcohol. A patient who drinks alcohol in
combination with a sleeping tablet will feel very tired the next
morning and should not sit behind a steering wheel. Even medicines
that combat allergies can reduce your ability to drive when taken
with alcohol.
There is also the possibility that the medicine will prevent the
body from breaking alcohol molecules down, leaving traces in tissue.
That can lead to nausea, breathlessness or rapid heartbeat. That
explains why patients who take certain antibiotics and drugs that
treat fungal infections feel ill if they drink alcohol, says Fink.
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