Quantcast
ZME Science
  • News
  • Environment
  • Health
  • Future
  • Space
  • Features
  • More
    • About
    • The Team
    • Advertise
    • Contribute
    • Our stance on climate change
    • Privacy Policy
    • Contact
No Result
View All Result
ZME Science

No Result
View All Result
ZME Science
No Result
View All Result
Home Science News

Man drinks vodka until his pancreas calcifies

After drinking several shots of vodka every day for 15 years, a man in Pennsylvania had a very bad day.

Mihai Andrei by Mihai Andrei
February 3, 2017
in News, Nutrition
Reading Time: 1 min read
A A
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterSubmit to Reddit

After drinking several shots of vodka every day for 15 years, a man in Pennsylvania had a very bad day.

Image credits: crschmidt / Flickr

The 50-year-old man had been drinking half a pint of vodka since he was 35 and went to the Emergency Room vomiting blood. He reported suffering from abdominal pain and “foul-smelling diarrhea” that had been plaguing him for two months and was quickly diagnosed with chronic pancreatitis, often caused by alcoholism.

“Chronic alcohol use leads to a vicious cycle,” the internal medicine resident who treated the man at Mercy Catholic Medical Center in Darby, Pa., tells Live Science.

What basically happens is that alcohol spurs the pancreatic cells to produce enzymes that destroy and inflame tissue there. The calcium in the body (even at normal levels) tends to accumulate in the inflamed tissues, which causes further inflammation and so on.

ADVERTISEMENT

The high degree of calcification in the man’s pancreas is rarely seen, doctors report. However, his recovery was rather uneventful after he was administered enzyme supplements. Eventually, he was sent back home but not before he was enrolled into an alcohol abuse rehabilitation program to tackle his drinking problem.

Sorry to interrupt, but you should really...

...Join the ZME newsletter for amazing science news, features, and exclusive scoops. More than 40,000 subscribers can't be wrong.

   

His case is presented in a paper called Calcific Pancreatitis Associated with Alcohol Use, published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

ADVERTISEMENT

ShareTweetShare
Mihai Andrei

Mihai Andrei

Andrei's background is in geophysics, and he's been fascinated by it ever since he was a child. Feeling that there is a gap between scientists and the general audience, he started ZME Science -- and the results are what you see today.

ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
  • News
  • Environment
  • Health
  • Future
  • Space
  • Features
  • More

© 2007-2019 ZME Science - Not exactly rocket science. All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • News
  • Environment
  • Health
  • Future
  • Space
  • Features
  • More
    • About
    • The Team
    • Advertise
    • Contribute
    • Our stance on climate change
    • Privacy Policy
    • Contact

© 2007-2019 ZME Science - Not exactly rocket science. All Rights Reserved.