NOS Energy Drink Sends Teen to Hospital

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Reports of energy drinks causing adverse health effects on teens are becoming more common. Some have even been linked to deaths.

Several versions of NOS Energy Drink contain about 100mg more caffeine than the typical energy drink, and therefore, teens could possibly find themselves overdosing more readily.

One Such NOS Overdose

A Carl Junction, Missouri teen recently had quite an experience after he drank NOS Energy Drink.

Dakota Sailor came home from school and decided he would throw back not one, but two cans of NOS Energy Drink. That is the last thing he remembers as his parents found him unconscious on the sofa aspirating. He was rushed to the hospital and recovered a few days later.

The doctors ran various tests but concluded that it was probably the energy drink that was the culprit in this incident. The doctors said that high doses of caffeine could have caused his seizure.

Checking out the Caffeine Database, we see that NOS has 260 milligrams of caffeine per can so that puts Sailor at 520mg of caffeine from NOS plus he admitted to having additional caffeine earlier in the day. Note: NOS has reformulated their energy drink to contain 160 mg per can.

Normally, this amount of caffeine isn’t anywhere near a toxic amount. According to Death by Caffeine it would take around 45 cans of NOS to send you packing for the afterlife, but everyone is different and some are more sensitive to caffeine than others. The teen obviously had a reaction to something.

Teens and Parents are Urged to Heed Can Warnings

It is evident in the case above that the teen did not responsibly drink the product and heed the warnings clearly printed on the NOS can.

This case really highlights the importance of not only reading but following the recommended and max dosage warning printed on NOS as well as other energy drinks.

Energy Drinks are NOT soda and shouldn’t be consumed as such. Often teens may need some guidance in this area as they don’t always make smart decisions for their health and wellbeing.

Steps parents can take to prevent teens from consuming too much.

  1. Ask questions. Talk to your kids and find out what they are drinking throughout the day. Some parents may not even be aware their kids are drinking energy drinks.
  2. Accountability. Make your teens accountable for what they spend their allowance or money on. Make them save receipts and keep a budget. This teaches them money management and allows you to see what they are buying.
  3. Don’t buy energy drinks for your teens. Or, only buy them as an occasional treat and buy them ones with moderate levels of caffeine. A daily safe limit of caffeine for teens is about 100mg.
  4. Teach them how to read product labels and to look for warning information.

The reason this site exists is to educate the consumer about the caffeine levels of most of the energy drinks that are out there. This helps people be aware of how much caffeine they are consuming and hopefully works to prevent accidental energy drink overdoses, such as what happened with this young man and NOS Energy Drink.

Source: The Joplin Globe

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Last Modified: October 22, 2015