Food poisoning may mean a mild reaction to a parasitic or bacterial agent from which people easily recover. It can also mean a very severe, possibly fatal, illness resulting from exposure to bacteria or parasites that will require medical treatment in order to resolve. Given this range of severity, it is very difficult to choose the best food poisoning treatment or recommend a generic treatment that is good for everyone. Instead, observation of symptoms and taking into account higher risk factors are the best way to determine when to see a physician.
The first step in choosing the best food poisoning treatment is to determine if it is actually food poisoning or the flu. Many people can’t answer that when they get hit with sudden stomach cramping and severe diarrhea and/or nausea. Fever doesn’t necessarily provide the answer, since a stomach virus may also come with fever. The smart approach to choose the best food poisoning treatment is to monitor symptoms and treat any serious stomach bug the same way.
First, it is important to stay hydrated. With many food poisoning and stomach flu cases, fluid loss can become dramatic with constant vomiting or diarrhea. Fluid loss may also ironically lead to more nausea, so attempting to keep some fluid down, in small doses, is important. The best choice for this is an electrolyte balanced solution, which can either be made at home or purchased at most stores. Especially with nausea, small sips of liquid are most useful. High sugar liquids are not recommended due to their tendency to increase diarrhea.
Some people are so violently ill they cannot keep any liquids down, and they might show other symptoms like high fever. When people are vomiting for four hours or more and especially if they have a fever of higher than 101 degrees F (38.33 degrees C), a doctor should be contacted. At this point the best treatment for food poisoning could be admission to a hospital, or at the least, intravenous (IV) fluids to help stabilize electrolytes. Similarly, diarrhea lasting for more than a day with fever of 101 or above deserves at least a call to a doctor.
If people have underlying medical conditions, it’s difficult to choose the best food poisoning treatment. Young children, the elderly, and anyone with a chronic medical illness tend to need earlier treatment. In general, it’s recommended that for infants and the elderly, medical help be contacted within two hours of profuse vomiting with no liquid intake. The same may apply for anyone suffering from serious illness. Similarly, anyone who is pregnant and thinks they may have contracted a food borne illness should contact the doctor right away.
In medical settings, common treatment is fluid, anti-nausea medications and testing for food borne illnesses. Diagnosis of an offending germ helps doctors choose the best food poisoning treatment. This could be nothing, decision to give more supportive care for symptoms, or treatment with antibacterial/antiparisitic drugs.
