SHOULD WE BOOK A HANGOVER IV ON OUR BACHELOR OR BACHELORETTE?

Being a bachelor and bachelorette party planner comes with a lot of responsibility to make sure our parties are seamless and have a great flow to the weekend. We know that there are frequent late night rendezvous that sometimes get a little...wild. We do our best to make sure that our girls and guys are taken care of and can recover from those hard mornings as best as possible to allow them to enjoy the next day with their crew! We often put together our very own hangover kits to send to our groups, but if you want the full body recovery experience we work with a number of IV infusion companies all over the US and can send them directly to your hotel or house rental! 

One of our favorites is ASAP IVs, located in San Diego (one of our most popular destinations!). We talked to them about the real benefits of hangover recovery and they broke it down for our party people to review!

What does a Hangover do to your body?

The cause of a hangover is most certainly from alcohol, but even after centuries of investigation, medical professionals are still not entirely sure what causes the symptoms to develop in your body on the day after an indulgence. They are described as a “frequent, unpleasant experience among people who drink to intoxication”. The state of alcohol hangover has been shown to significantly impair prospective memory (ability to form new memories and perform daily tasks), which can dramatically decrease personal productivity in work, school, or personal life (aka bachelor or bachelorette party shenanigans). While these symptoms cannot be explained by dehydration alone, the effect that alcohol has on the fluid balance of your body most certainly makes these symptoms worse.

A study from 2003 from the journal of Alcohol Clinical Experimental Research sought to find and develop a scale for the severity of hangover symptoms. They included 1230 college aged participants, and asked them to rate the frequency of 13 different hangover symptoms via a retrospective questionnaire. The most common symptoms were feeling “extremely thirsty/dehydrated”, feeling “more tired than usual”, and “headache”. Higher scores on the hangover symptom scale had a positive correlation with frequency of binge drinking (getting drunk), quantity of alcohol consumed when binging, personal history of alcohol related problems, and family history of alcohol related problems. From the study, women typically had higher scores than men, indicating women may more frequently experience more significant hangovers.

While we don’t encourage the binge drinking of alcohol year after year due to the obvious negative effects it can have on your body, the occasional overindulgence is understandable, and that feeling you have the next day has you asking “What can I do just to feel normal again???”

HELP ME, I'M HUNGOVER! How do IV fluids help the symptoms of a hangover?

The gold standard of medical literature rests in what are called “randomized controlled trials”. What these involve are different steps to take an intervention (say giving one group of people IV fluids and another Gatorade) to two different groups and observing the change in their symptoms in response to the intervention. These can be blinded, such as single-blinded, double-blinded, or triple-blinded, depending on how many people in the study know which subjects receive which treatment. To date, there have not been any major studies to compare IV fluids to a non-IV fluid group. However, a quick search of “IV Hangover cure” on Google will show hundreds of different blog articles where bloggers get the treatment themselves after a night of partying with immediate results such as “yeah it totally worked; for the rest of the day, I had no headaches and no nausea” 

These anecdotal results are not the most firm in scientific literature, but then again, neither is a friend’s glowing review of a popular restaurant, but does that sway your opinion from eating there?. Whenever you are severely hungover and unable to get up off your couch, you want something that is going to work, and IV hydration does that, QUICKLY. Many of our clients have stated they feel immediately better after 5-10 minutes of an IV starting (which is only after 200-300cc of a 1000cc bag!!). In fact, a popularly cited study looking at IV fluids in relation to the placebo effect had 34 patients with Fibromyalgia randomized to either a IV fluid package with only IV fluid and electrolytes, versus an IV fluid package with a cocktail of vitamins (called a Myers’ Cocktail, including Magnesium, Calcium, Vitamin C, B vitamins…coming soon to ASAP IVs!). The results of the study found that all patients in the study felt better after the treatment!  While there was not a statistically different effect between the two groups in treating fibromyalgia (there were only 35 patients in the study and it was likely under-powered to detect a statistical difference), the fact that in this study all patients who received IV fluid improved is a testament to how helpful IV fluids can be.

Will an IV help me recover from my hangover??

While we cannot provide a 100% guarantee that an IV for fluid re-hydration will completely cure your hangover and symptoms, we can tell you that 9/10 of our patients feel significantly better within minutes of an IV infusion. This has led them to going back to work more productive, getting more effective workouts, or simply enjoying their life without losing a whole day to a hangover. 

Lucky for you, we have an exclusive discount with ASAP IVs specifically for our clients, and many other partners all over the US to help get you off the couch and into recovery mode! Contact us for more details and for us to put together the perfect weekend of partying (and recovery) for your bachelor or bachelorette party or bridesmaids and groomsmen after the wedding!

Bach to Basic is an all inclusive luxury bachelor and bachelorette party planning company. We can put together the weekend of your dreams in any destination. We are your go-to bachelor and bachelorette planner and can put together an amazing itinerary for your bach babes that they will never forget. We love planning bachelor parties as well! We can coordinate a birthday, bachelor or bachelorette weekend for the bride or groom that will exceed all expectations. Fill out a form to get more details and start planning your custom bachelor or bachelorette party!