My Hangover Prevention Stack

For best effect these should be taken at least 30 minutes before starting to drink, but not more than 2 hours beforehand. The advantage of getting them individually is that it’s possible to get the clinically proven dosages.

• Prickly Pear Extract: Source Naturals – Nopal Endurance. This is the precise patented extract used in the studies for hangover prevention.
• Japanese Raisin Tree Fruit Extract: Dihydromyricetin – Note that this has the potential to actually reduce alcohol’s effect on the brain, and thus for those who like the feeling it might be best to take post-drinking to only get it’s anti-hangover effects.
• Red Ginseng – speeds up alcohol processing and lowers hangover symptoms. This has been shown to increase plasma acetaldehyde, so I would recommend pairing it with at least NAC to help mitigate any extra toxicity. ⁴. It is possible that the greatest anti-inflammatory effect may require doses of ~75mg/kg⁵(which comes out to ~4.5g for me).
• N-Acetyl Cysteine (NAC) – A glutathione precursor and one of the most commonly recommended supplements for hangover support, I used to be 100% sold on this. Subjectively, it seems to help. However, after doing a deep literature drive it seems like the only real clinical evidence for its helping with hangovers is one mouse study ⁶. The biochemistry also seems to check out, as we know that alcohol depletes glutathione⁷⁹. For now I’m still keeping it in my stack, but be very careful to only take this in advance of drinking rather than at the end of the evening (when it actually might make things worse).
• Vitamin C – One of your body’s primary antioxidants.  One study with guinea-pigs  fed alcohol showed that those with the highest tissue concentration of vitamin C proved to have significantly decreased residual levels of ethanol and acetaldehyde in the liver and the brain. In contrast, other studies have shown that chronic alcohol use tends to lower Vitamin C levels.¹¹¹²https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8317379[/efn_note]. (NOTE: I buy it in powdered form because it’s the best bang for buck and I like the taste when adding it to my smoothies.)
• Vitamin B Complex – B vitamins are depleted by alcohol consumption, as well as being involved in glutathione recycling and neurotransmitter production.
•  Green Tea Extract – Antioxidant, anti-inflammatory. I take this one when drinking in the evening, both for its quality and because it is decaffeinated.  Given the large body of evidence pointing towards its being super healthy overall, I also like to buy it in bulk powdered form and add it to my morning smoothie.
•  Milk Thistle Extract – Silymarin – Attenuates most hangover symptoms by almost 40%. I like this version because of its high concentration, and the studies use doses of 200mg/kg bodyweight.
• Magnesium Malate – Alcohol specifically causes your body to excrete magnesium, so it’s generally a good idea to replace what is lost. I like malate because it’s best for mitochondrial function / energy production, but glycinate is also pretty solid (and one of the more bioavailable versions, unlike citrate).
• Curcumin – naturally found in turmeric, curcumin is one of nature’s most powerful anti-inflammatories and thus does a fantastic job at alleviating the inflammation-induced hangover symptoms.