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Biotech Science

Experimental Drug "Caffeinol" Tested 62

Posted by timothy from the awake-but-disoriented dept.
dan.hunt writes "Two of my favorite things: Cafeine and Alcohol have been combined into a new medicine. 'The idea of mixing alcohol and caffeine was "serendipitous", Grotta told HealthScoutNews.' I am sure a lot of /. readers knew that Irish Coffee was good for you. I will mix two strong cups of coffee with one ounce or two of Irish Cream http://www.baileys.com/ and one ounce or two of Sambuca http://www.luxardo.it/ to get a taste for this medical research."
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Experimental Drug "Caffeinol" Tested More

Experimental Drug "Caffeinol" Tested

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  • combined into a new medicine? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Tumbleweed ( 3706 ) on Sunday April 13, 2003 @06:49PM (#5723857)
    Medicine. Riiiiight.

    • Sounds crazy (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Dukeofshadows ( 607689 )
      Ouch. The last thing I'd want is a hangover with a side of caffeine poisoning. This is about as medicinal as heroin (which was actually considered a medicine for a while in early 1900s) and sounds like someone's drunken frat dare taken too seriously.

      • Re:Sounds crazy (Score:4, Funny)

        by coryboehne ( 244614 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @12:20AM (#5725760)
        Well, it almost makes sense.. I mean it is a medicine that treats a condition it causes :).. If you don't know what I mean, just go to a Denny's about the time the bars close... Every drunk in the house will be either a. Drinking Coffee, or b. puking up a combination of beer and coffee... So they obviously know something..

        heh, psych! :)
      • Ouch. The last thing I'd want is a hangover with a side of caffeine poisoning.

        It would make for a killer hangover. One of the main culprits in hangovers is dehydration. Caffeine, being a dieretic, would make it much, much worse. Wouldn't help the headache much either. Coming off of caffeine often causes headaches.

  • Drew Carey's already done this (Score:4, Informative)

    by lightspawn ( 155347 ) on Sunday April 13, 2003 @06:53PM (#5723894) Homepage
    Buzz beer: stay up late and get drunk all over again.

  • Alternative energy. (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Methanol: Fuels some cars.
    Caffeinol: Fuels IT personnel haunted by their decision to pursue the most mind-numbing [machall.com] profession on Earth.

  • Note: (Score:2, Funny)

    by Lazyhound ( 542184 )
    Use of this treatment is not authorized for patients under the age of 19 (21 in some states).

  • Has to be injected (Score:1, Informative)

    by Muhammar ( 659468 )
    And the dose of alcohol is small, the dose of caffein relatively large.

    Alcohol alone makes the bain damage worse. Does not work as preventive measure.
    • Equivalent of 1 shot of alcohol, to 2 cups of strong coffee.

      Read things though. Alcohol alone was proven to be helpful in small doses. They looked for things to mix it with to give greater benifits.

      And no, it's not a preventative measure, it's developed to be part of the post stroke treatment.
  • It's interesting to see what two harmful (okay, maybe caffeine isn't so harmful) agents put together can be used for...

  • woah (Score:5, Funny)

    by standsolid ( 619377 ) <{moc.dilosdnats} {ta} {ynnek}> on Sunday April 13, 2003 @07:17PM (#5724028) Homepage
    At first i looked at my watch

    no... not april first

    then i looked in my desk drawer

    still haven't smoked my crack

    wow! I can't wait to go to starbucks and see a new line of coffees... O'Reilly's special Blend ;p
    • Slashdot editors, I am waiting for the article on the time machine.
      What time machine.?
      The one you got locked on a particular day in time.

  • Red Bull and And Vodka (Score:4, Interesting)

    by spencerogden ( 49254 ) <spencer@spencerogden.com> on Sunday April 13, 2003 @07:40PM (#5724128) Homepage
    I believe the original version of this was mixing Red Bull with vodka. A suprisingly good tasting drink. Just the thing to get the night started.
    • If i recall correctly they told everyone not to do it.

      A couple of people went nuts and had strokes or something because of the speeding up of the system. (mind you they had had a few IIRC)
      • fact remains that it is one of the most popular drinks in bars nowadays(energy drink + clear alcohol, usually vodka), though, the real reason why i thin it is popular is because the strong taste of energy drinks is very good at hiding the alcohol, so it becomes ideal to drink it at the point of almost vomiting.

        well, finnish energy drinks are watered down versions of middle europe counterparts anyways(can't have that much drugs in them..).

      • Re:Red Bull and And Vodka (Score:1, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        -- BE CAREFUL -- with Red bull & vodka... Just a little personal advice from me as I have first-hand experience of this...

        I had 3 red bull & vodkas one night last summer... Oddly enough, I just didn't get drunk, so I kept drinking more. Then as we were on our way down to the club, suddenly it was like a kick in the head. I still didn't feel entoxicated, but my heart was racing, my pulse was weak and it felt like I was going to faint. My friends had to help me walk back home. I remained in this sta
    • For us ./'ers who aren't used to getting invited to parties, I think it would end the night rather quickly.
    • I think Irish Coffee predates Red Bull by a few years (centuries?). It's generally coffee and whiskey, although kahlua, irish cream, and amaretto are also popular coffee additives.

  • My root doctor's been prescribing me this since I was 6 years old.

  • Taste of your own medicine... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Chris Brewer ( 66818 ) on Sunday April 13, 2003 @07:48PM (#5724178) Journal
    "one ounce or two of Sambuca to get a taste for this medical research."

    Of course to some of us, Sambuca already tastes like medicine and doesn't need any caffiene to make it a wonder drug.

    Liberal application increases desirability towards other subjects of the female pursuasion and generates an empowering feeling that the subject's self-choreography technique is beyond reproach.

  • Congratulations! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Telecommando ( 513768 ) on Sunday April 13, 2003 @08:09PM (#5724305)
    They've invented Kahlua!

    Again.

  • Best coding job I ever did (Score:5, Interesting)

    by OpMindFck ( 204177 ) <edkearns@edkearnsGINSBERG.com minus poet> on Sunday April 13, 2003 @08:33PM (#5724444) Homepage
    was between about 3AM and 7AM on a Sunday morning with a project due Sunday night at midnight. I had been out drinking and was on my third cup of coffee back in my dorm room when I had the most joyous experience in my life. I wrote C code for 4 hours without compiling. Then, as I was getting ready for a power nap, I tried a compile. It worked. No syntax errors. Then I ran the sample data though. No errors. I was done. And it was all thanks to the miracle of caffeine mixed with about 8 shots of vodka. I got an A in 15- 213 that semester by using that same strategy right up to finals. Thanks Grey Goose!

    • It happens (Score:3, Interesting)

      by renehollan ( 138013 )
      ... though not due to booze.

      I once hacked up a wire-wrapped 6809-based embedded system with an associate, had a monitor ported to it just burned into EPROM.

      We were hooking up a 'scope to see if, of all basic things, some address decoding PALs were working, and powered it up, and...

      ...got a monitor prompt. It was rather freaky, as we certainly weren't expecting it to be glitch free.

      (It wasn't quite -- DRAM refresh circuitry was hosed, and it would die about 20 seconds after boot, but still. Though, I

  • I don't need slashdot's help getting sh*t faced.
  • Great. Now certain people [mailto] will be faking strokes down at the free clinic.

    Others will be saying, "Nawww <hic> - this is muDICenal <hic> (sic)"

    Besides, giving coffee to a drunk does not make him sober, giving coffee to a drunk just gives you a wide-awake drunk.
  • Wouldnt that be harmful?

    You know that its going to find itself into parties where young kids will take this and add it to an already potent cocktail of whatever else they may have taken.

    • I would worry more for Alcohol Pops. These look like a soda, but contains quite alot of alcohol. They were even sold in vending machines here. IMHO young kids shouldn't be left unsupervised on a party.
  • On a lighter note, all caffeinol is probably going to do is:
    • Give people a reason to get drunk
    • Give us drunk drivers who, instead of driving late night, pester us all day
    • Reminds me of something that I did a few years back in Bolivia. I was working at a remote area near the Brasilian border, and our flight out was cancelled due to inclement weather. Me and a colleague had this great idea to go to the nearby garimpeiro shantytown and booze it up. A couple cases of beer, a few bottles of cachaça, and a couple bags of coca leaves later, 6 am arrived and I was quite drunk, but wide awake. Must admit was great while it lasted. Coca, like caffeine is also diuretic, so w

  • Just what the doctor ordered: B52 is Kahlua, Baileys and Grand Marnier. Well they have not discovered yet the beneficial effects of triple orange liqueur in the mix, but give them some time.

  • Wrong recipe ... (Score:4, Informative)

    by ninewands ( 105734 ) on Sunday April 13, 2003 @10:28PM (#5725111)
    Irish coffee, aka "God's Blessing" (see, Callahan's Cross-Time Salloon by Spider Robinson):

    1 cup freshly-made Jamaica Blue Mountain
    1.5 ounce Bushmill's Black Label Irish Whiskey

    top with Whipped cream if you really feel motivated to gild the lily of perfection.
    • Thank you for correcting the author's revolting version of the blessing.
      Irish Cream and sambuca, indeed... Barbarian!

      BTW, I'm sure you know that the Spider has moved on to Sulawesi (formerly known as Celebes Kolossi) and Bushmill's 1608. And don't forget to sugar the rim! :)

      Cheers!
  • That mix has already been gone by the good folks at Flensburger Pilsner, in Germany. They called it Catch The Cat. It came in a blue bottle and it tasted like Buckleys (so I guess that's where the medicine thing comes in).

    I would tell everyone to stay as far away from it as you can.

  • Two thoughts: (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Pathwalker ( 103 ) <hotgrits@yourpants.net> on Sunday April 13, 2003 @11:07PM (#5725302) Homepage Journal
    1. Didn't I hear of some Canadian company making a caffinated beer years ago? ( I think I found it - Rethink Beer [rethinkbeer.com] (warning - annoying flash site)).
    2. When I was in grad school, and I needed to concentrate for an all nighter to whip the last bits of a project into shape for a demo in the morning, I would usually have a big mug full of of espresso on one side of my desk, and a bottle of scotch on the other. If I was feeling tired, I would sip from one, if I was too stressed out and twitching, I would sip from the other. It worked quite well in the short term, but really burned me out over the long term...
    It's good to know that in the second case, had the stress caused a stroke, I might have had a little protection.

  • Excellent (Score:2, Funny)

    by BrainInAJar ( 584756 )
    "A caffeine and alcohol cocktail similar to an Irish coffee could prevent severe brain damage in stroke victims"

    Excellent. I believe I shall preemptively protect myself from brain damage due to stroke... at 20... and healthy...
  • Caffine speeds you up, and alcohol slows your fuctions down. Sounds like we have something here!
  • Ok everybody, time to go try a new Liquor. Baileys is wildly overpriced. Go buy a bottle of Carolan's. It's right next to baileys and tastes EXACTLY the same. It's also half as much. Give it a try and come back and tell me how awesome I am. It's ok. I'll wait.
  • ooh boy! my lan parties are going to be a WHOLE lot more interesting...i wonder if they could some how add a certin "leaf" to this mixture. hey its for medical use!

  • Caffeine as migraine cure. (Score:3, Informative)

    by baryon351 ( 626717 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @06:45AM (#5726810)
    I can't vouch personally for caffeine's usefulness at anything else, but I used to have horrific migraines for years, often 2-3 a week which would last more than a day each. I'd been hospitalised a few times, had bunches of scans done, and tried dozens of drugs, variations to my diet, exercise and the like

    Turns out that for me the most effective relief is, when I start seeing auras over everything (which comes 20 minutes before the pain) I take a double strength coffee with double sugar, 2 aspirin, and sit quietly. Within half an hour it's easing off, and I'm back to normal within 1. They still take me out of action for an hour at a time, but that is FAR preferable to the feeling of having nails rammed into my eyes for 24 hours straight. That little fix also makes it far less likely another one will come along within a week. It's bliss!
    • My roommate gets the exact same thing (auras 20 min before), and meds rarely work for her either. I will have to suggest this to her.

      One odd thing is that she doesn't respond to caffeine as a stimulant. She's the first person I've ever met who isn't affected by it.

      • That sounds promising then, as I don't respond to it much as a stimulant either.

        The important thing is to get that mix into me as quickly as possible after noticing the visual effects. If the pain has started by the time I drink it I'm screwed for hours afterwards!

        Hope it works for your roommate. Relief is bliss :)
        • I'll second that one! I have the unfortunate combination of getting migraines, imitrex and relatives not working, being allergic to coedine, and somehow resistent to morphine. The caffeine sometimes works, if I get it quickly, as soon as the auras start. Otherwise, no dice and it's a dark room for a few hours to a few days. Funny, caffeine doesn't seem to have much of a stimulant effect on me either and I rarely drink it.
  • Grotta's colleague Roger Strong was aware of the association between moderate use of alcohol and reduced stroke damage, "so we started fooling around with combinations of it with other things."

    So they tried it with... other things. For example:

    Aspirin

    leftover chinese food

    electric shock

    tomato juice with tabasco

    tabasco by itself- who knows?

    tic-tacs, because that was what they found in the desk drawer

    zinc, thinking maybe they could cure the common cold AND a stroke at the same time...

    I'm making this list up myself, for amusement, because frankly, i'd like to see more of exactly how they got paid to do this research, and what else they tried on people to figure it out. I think that researchers should be required to publish their initial ideas along with how they came upon the idea... "so, we were sitting around one night getting hammered, and he looks at me and says, you know what? I bet this could cause cancer. "

    and i said, "we aren't testing on cancer, just on strokes!"

    And he hands me the bottle and sez, "so i bet this shtuff could cure stroke damage," and he passes out on the floor. I wrote it on the floor in magic marker and when we came to and got cleaned up, well, we tried it out..."

    seriously, on the migraine note, a lot of pain meds now include caffeine, because it really does change how things work. Me, i go straight for imitrex, which at $20 a pill is still a bargain, because if somebody were to walk up to me and tell me they'd make my migraine vanish for $20, i'd say pretty please. The caffeine and regular NSAID approach doesn't work any more, alas... Now if they'd just find that this cure works on migraines, we'd be in business.

  • vodka red bull? irish coffee? JD and coke? need i continue?

  • "The combination of alcohol and caffeine should be addictive as heroin but so far the sales haven't borne that out."

    --Dan

  • However, they ruefully note that having a cup of Irish coffee every day to prevent stroke damage will not work.

    It will work on the day of the stroke! Better safe than sorry!
  • there IS a God, now all we need is to add some THC to the cocktail :)
  • The Luxardo.it site that was linked at the bottom somewhat reminds me of how anyone can design a site (badly) today. Not only is it "canned" flash, it is elementary "canned" flash.
  • Now I just need to give myself a stroke for a legit reason to carry a bottle of this with me at all times while working!
  • Anyone ever try a vodka red bull? Or drink that yummy Orange goodness known as sparks?

    Both are alcohol & caffeine.

    A major advance in drinking technology.

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