Alcohol in your saliva, blood, urine, and hair
If you want to avoid dangerous drug interactions and problems with your physical and mental performance, you should know how long ethanol (alcohol) stays in your body.
It has been studied in great detail how alcohol is broken down in the body, but many things affect how long alcohol stays in your system and how long it takes to leave your body. Different types of tests can tell if you’ve been drinking for 10 hours to 90 days, depending on your age, body mass, genes, sex, and overall health.
Alcohol can be just as harmful as many illegal drugs if it is used in the wrong way. People who abuse alcohol also run the risk of becoming physically and mentally dependent on it, as well as having an alcohol use disorder (AUD).
How long does it take to start to feel better?
It only takes minutes to start to feel the effects of drinking. When you drink alcohol, it quickly enters your bloodstream through your stomach and small intestine. It then makes its way to your brain and spinal cord. As a depressant of the central nervous system, alcohol makes it harder for brain cells to talk to each other, which changes how you think, feel, move, and sense things.
Small amounts of alcohol may make you feel calmer and more open or less stressed. But the more you drink, the more drunk you’ll feel. This can make some people talk more or be more friendly while making others act more angry or hostile.
Other signs that someone is drunk are:
• Feeling happy
• Having trouble balancing and coordinating
• Less inhibitions
• Bad judgement (like driving drunk or having sex without protection)
• Slower reaction time
• Slurred speech
How long does that drink last?
About four to five hours pass before half of the alcohol you drink is gone from your bloodstream. This is called its half-life. These days, most people take in alcohol faster than their bodies can break it down.
For someone who weighs 150 pounds, one standard drink will raise their blood alcohol level by about 0.02%1, but their body can only remove about 0.016% of that alcohol every hour on average.2 So, your blood alcohol concentration (BAC) will keep going up even if you only drink one drink every hour. It goes up much faster if you drink more than once an hour.
Oxidising ethanol to acetaldehyde is how the body breaks down alcohol. It is first broken down into acetic acid and then even further into carbon dioxide and water. The liver breaks down most of the alcohol you drink. However, your body removes about 5% of your alcohol through sweat, breath, urine, faeces, and saliva.
There are a lot of things that affect how long alcohol stays in the body, such as the type of drug test being used. Some tests can find alcohol for a shorter amount of time, while others can find it for up to three months.
Detection methods
A breathalyser test can find alcohol on your breath for up to 24 hours after you drink. Other methods include:
Urine: It’s possible to find alcohol in urine for 10 to 12 hours after drinking.
Blood: For up to 12 hours, alcohol can be found in the blood.
Saliva: From 24 to 48 hours, a saliva test can show that someone has been drinking.
Hair: An alcohol drug test can find alcohol in your hair for up to 90 days, just like many other drug tests.
People who have to stay sober for legal or medical reasons are often given a particular test called the EtG test to make sure they are still sober. The EtG test checks for ethyl glucuronide, an alcohol metabolite found in blood, hair, and nails, but it is best done with urine.6 This alcohol metabolite can be found in the blood for 3 to 5 days after drinking, but the EtG test can’t tell for sure if someone is drunk right now.
Interesting Fact About the ETG Test
The EtG test can give a positive result just from being near alcohol, which is found in many everyday items like mouthwash, medicine, cosmetics, hair dye, vanilla extract, and cleaning products. If you use mouthwash or cough medicine with alcohol right before a breath or saliva test, it might pick up on the alcohol metabolites in your mouth and give you a false positive.
Factors affecting detection time
Because metabolism, body mass, age, level of hydration, physical activity, health conditions, and other things affect how long it takes for alcohol to be found in the body, it is almost impossible to say for sure when alcohol will show up on a drug test. The following are some of those factors.
Physique
In the same way that family history can affect the development of an alcohol use disorder, genes can also affect how quickly the body breaks down and gets rid of alcohol.
Gender
Women tend to have more fat and less water in their bodies than men do, so alcohol stays in their bodies longer than in men.
Again, having more fat in your body makes the alcohol stay in your body longer.
People with East Asian roots don’t make as much of a critical enzyme that helps the liver break down alcohol, so they are more likely to have problems with alcohol metabolism. Instead, a harmful alcohol byproduct builds up in the blood and liver, widens blood vessels, and makes the face and neck flush. It also causes headaches, dizziness, palpitations, and nausea. People sometimes call this reaction “Asian flush” or “Asian glow.”
Age
Your liver works less quickly as you get older, so it takes longer to break down and get rid of alcohol. Many older adults also take medicines that can slow the liver’s work, making the process even slower.
Food
About 20% of the alcohol in spirits is taken up by the blood from the stomach and the rest from the small intestine. While alcohol is in the stomach, it takes longer to be absorbed, which means that you get drunk more slowly. Eating before you drink and continuing to snack while you drink will slow the alcohol’s absorption and lessen its effect on getting you drunk, but it will also make it easier to catch you.
Medicines
Some medicines can change how the body absorbs alcohol, and some may even make the effects more potent and make you more drunk. Tell your doctor or nurse the truth about how much alcohol you drink at all times. The following medicines are known to interact with alcohol:
• Medicines for anxiety
• Medicines for depression
• Medicines for allergies
• Medicines for diabetes
· How often and quickly it is used
How long alcohol stays in your body depends on how often you drink, how quickly you drink, and how much alcohol is in your drink. It can take hours for the alcohol to leave your body after binge drinking, which means having five or more drinks in one sitting for men or four drinks in one sitting for women.
There is a chance that you could still have enough alcohol in your body the next day to fail a urine or blood test for driving while impaired. There is a good chance that you will fail a test that is meant to find alcohol in your system.
How to clear your body of alcohol
It doesn’t matter how quickly your body absorbs alcohol; it gets rid of it at a rate of 0.016 BAC per hour on average. Nothing, not even drinking coffee or water, showering, or throwing up, will make you go to the toilet faster.
You can lower your blood alcohol content (BAC) by waiting as long as possible after your last drink if you know you have to take a breath, blood, or urine test.
How long does it usually take for alcohol to leave your body?
The times show how fast a healthy liver’s metabolism works. If you drink a lot or for a long time, your liver may need more time to get rid of alcohol from your body.
Signs of an Overdose
Alcohol poisoning, which is a medical emergency, can happen if you drink a lot of alcohol in a short amount of time.
Some parts of your brain that control breathing, heart rate, and other vital functions can start to shut down if you drink too much, too quickly, or while taking other drugs or medications.
• Breathing slowly or out of sync (less than eight times a minute or more than 10 seconds between each breath)
• Skin that is thick, pale, or blue-tinged
• Confusion
• Lessened gag reflex (needed to keep from choking when vomiting)
• Seizures
• Being very sleepy or losing consciousness
• Heart rate that is too slow
• Body temperature that is too low
• Vomits while unconscious (doesn’t wake up during or after vomiting)
If you think someone you care about is drinking too much and showing any of these signs, call 999 and keep them safe until help arrives.
Signs of Alcohol Poisoning and What to Do to Get Help
Stopping or cutting back on alcohol can suddenly cause physical and mental withdrawal symptoms if you’ve been drinking a lot or often. How bad it is for you will depend on how long you’ve been drinking and how much you usually drink. In the worst cases, delirium tremens (DTs), a type of alcohol withdrawal that can be life-threatening, can happen anywhere from two days to a week after your last drink.
There are many places you can go for help when you’re ready to stop drinking or lessen the damage it’s doing to your life and health. To begin, talk to your primary care doctor. A lot of people also use helpful groups like Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). These groups, whether in person or online, can help you feel less alone and more supported as you recover. You can also contact AddictionsUK for a safe and affordable home detox after an initial assessment by their medical associates.
Are you or your loved one struggling with alcohol addiction? Call Freephone at 0800 140 4044 for prompt support
