Food poisoning usually results in nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. It may present just like what we all consider the “stomach flu”. It can be caused by bacteria or viruses contaminating the food we eat. Because of this, others that ate the same food as you will probably be sick just like you are. This part of the medical history investigation is important to know and will help you and your doctor figure out the cause of your illness.

The symptoms can begin quickly or take as long as 12 or 24 hours to appear. In most cases, the illness is self-limited and will resolve in 24 to 48 hours, sometimes as long as 72 hours. Dehydration is a concern due to diarrhea and vomiting, which can be severe at times. Rarely, food poisoning can be dangerous and even fatal due to toxins released by the contaminating bacteria. An example of this would be botulism, which occurs in canned foods. It begins with a progression of profound weakness and blurred or double vision. Luckily, botulism is easily prevented by cooking the food that was in the can or jar.

Most of the common food poisonings, however, are simply the gastroenteritis variety in which we see the nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. Because these symptoms can be severe at times, especially for children and the elderly who cannot tolerate dehydration as well, you should see your doctor if you suspect you might have food poisoning. What you ate and where you ate are important too because if we begin to see a pattern with a particular type of food, or from a particular restaurant, we can notify the health department which will take steps to identify the tainted food source and remove it from the shelves in order to prevent more cases.

Allowing the stomach to rest for two to three hours with nothing taken by mouth will sometimes give enough time for the nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea to subside. At that point, you can begin taking one-ounce sips (half ounce for toddlers) of water every 30 minutes for an hour or so. If the sips stay down and you have no diarrhea because of them, you can begin to increase the amount of water by one ounce (half for the kids) each 30 minutes. If this fails, you should see a doctor who will be able to further evaluate you and perhaps prescribe some medication for the nausea and diarrhea in order to prevent dehydration.

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[tags]urgent care, food poisoning, gastroenteritis, flu, stomach ache[/tags]