What are the dietary taboos for taking cephalosporins?

The core dietary taboo of taking cephalosporins is that you must not touch any alcoholic food or drinks within 7 days before and after taking the drug. Even external preparations containing alcohol should be avoided as much as possible. In severe cases, it may be life-threatening.

A while ago, I accompanied my family to a community hospital to prescribe medicine. I happened to meet a boy in his twenties who was helped in by a colleague. His face was red from holding in and he was gasping for breath. When I asked, I found out that I had just taken cephalosporin to treat pharyngitis the night before and bought it that afternoon. I drank a glass of ice drink with fermented glutinous rice. Within half an hour after drinking it, I started to feel flustered and nauseous. The doctor said this was a typical disulfiram-like reaction. Fortunately, the intake was not large and I was sent to the hospital in time. If I had drank high-strength liquor, I might have gone into shock and been admitted to the ICU. To put it bluntly, it is not difficult to understand. Cephalosporin drugs will directly block the metabolic pathways of alcohol in the body. Alcohol should be decomposed step by step into harmless water and carbon dioxide. As a result, the acetaldehyde metabolized in the middle is toxic and cannot be excreted. It accumulates in the body. If the dose is small, it will cause dizziness, vomiting, blushing and panic. If the dose is large, it will really cause trouble.

Many people think that only liquor and beer are alcoholic. In fact, alcohol is hidden in many inconspicuous things, such as liqueur chocolate, drunken crabs and shrimps, fermented bean curd, fermented glutinous rice dumplings, and even cooking wine is added to home cooking.

As for the widely circulated saying on the Internet that "you cannot eat seafood or drink juice when taking cephalosporins", it is actually not that absolute. There is currently no clear clinical evidence proving that seafood will directly have harmful reactions with cephalosporins. Many people feel uncomfortable eating seafood after taking cephalosporins, either because they are allergic to seafood, or because the seafood is not fresh and has a bad stomach. It happens to coincide with the time of taking the medicine, so it is the combination. There are also people who say you should not touch grapefruit. In fact, only a few cephalosporins will react with the furanocoumarins in grapefruit and affect the efficacy of the drug. If you are really worried, just don’t drink a lot of freshly squeezed grapefruit juice while taking the medicine. Ordinary peach juice, apple juice, and non-allergenic seafood are all fine if you eat them normally, and you don’t need to be overly restrictive.

When I was taking cephalosporins before, I specifically asked the doctor who treated me. He said that except for alcohol, which is a hard red line and must be avoided, as long as you eat the rest normally, you can eat normally. After all, you have a poor appetite when you are sick. This and other prohibitions will affect your nutritional intake and make your recovery slower. As long as you remember not to touch alcohol within 7 days, there will basically be no major problems.