Philip Nelson

Beware of Energy Drinks or How I ended up in the hospital!

Having an insane travel schedule takes it’s toll on you. 5am flights and late nights start to catch up with you after 3 non-stop weeks. How do most people deal with this? Many are turning to energy drinks.

Last Saturday after a sleepless night, I packed up the crew and headed for a beach vacation in Port Aransas, TX.  After about 50 miles of driving the fatigue set in and I need something to keep me awake. I stopped at the nearest convenience store and picked up my favorite energy drink, Rockstar.  About 1/3 of the way through the drink, my heart started going nuts! I was short of breath and I started feeling horrible. The nearest hospital was in Corpus Christi, TX so I put the “hammer down” and got to the ER as quickly as I could.

Yes, I’m a dork who takes my camera everywhere.. Including the ER. After 4 hours of EKG’s and blood tests, the ER doc said that I had an abnormal heart rate and it is very likely that this could have been caused by the energy drink.

After my ER visit, I started talking to various medical professionals that I know and was suprised to find that EVERY SINGLE ONE shared energy drink horror stories. Kids are putting these things away like they were candy and also mixing them with Alcohol! An ER friend of mine said that he sees college kids almost every night with energy drink related heart problems.