Food Poisoning, Stomach Flu...what's the deal?

Factual Questions
1

So, having just navigated 36 hours of hell due to SOMETHING completely ravaging my digestive tract, I find myself curious about the whole shebang.

Is there really such a thing as “stomach flu”, by which I mean: a disease that is communicable via some means OTHER than touching food and transferring cooties that results in horrific vomiting, followed by a day or two of complete weakness, inability to do anything except sleep? (That includes watch TV…too much energy needed) Or is what we call “the stomache flu” jsut some e.coli or salmonella or some other “food poisoning”, aka food cooties?

Second question… does the medical community have a clear understanding of exactly what the body is DOING when it does this? Meaning…it feels like the cootie or flu or whatever it is causes the opening to the intestine from the stomach to slam shut, and triple locks it. Which leaves the stomach saying: Damn…gotta get this stuff outta here. I guess the only choice is up and out the way it came. And we aren’t going to stop until every last drop of it is sent back, and only then will we relax and permit anything, even water, to continue down the digestive tract and things to resume. Oh, and this will also cause the rest of the body to completely collapse for a day or two. Which has to be part of the disease itself, not merely blowback from teh unpleasantness and violence of the vomiting, or vomiting from drinking or other reasons would knock you on your ass as well, and it doesn’t, not like this does. I couldn’t sit up straight or walk for longer than a minute or two for almost 24 hours after the actual sickness was over.

So…what was it?

Oh, and what’s with the CLAMMINESS and DIZZYNESS that preceded the ralphing? It felt like someone was spinning me in a teacup and pouring cold water all over my exposed skin.

I’ve been having loads of fun, eh?

2

I used to get “the flu” all the time when I was a kid, complete with vomiting and not wanting to get out of bed or even move. Then, a few years ago, I was told that flu doesn’t cause vomiting and that what I probably had as a kid was food poisoning. By the time I heard this I had been a professional cook for many years, and with my professional knowledge I was able to look back on some of my mom’s food preparation techniques - mostly her manner of defrosting meat on the kitchen counter.

Yup. Food poisoning. If I needed more evidence, I just need to look at the fact that, as an adult doing pretty much all of my own cooking (using my professional knowledge), I haven’t been sick in years aside from an extremely inconvenient case of chicken pox when I was 21.

3

I had that recently as well, and it was as horrible as you described.
What I don’t understand about the food poisoning theory is how different people in the same office (or other situation which implies close quarters but not shared meals), who aren’t eating the same food, can come down with the same “food poisoning”.

4

There are viruses that cause vomiting and nausea.

Winter vomiting disease is a good example. It’s caused by Norwalk-like Virus, aka Norovirus, or small round structured virus (SRSV). It causes 48 hours of fever, nausea, projectile vomiting and diarrhoea. It’s spread by aerosolisation after someone vomits and also inadequate handwashing after using the loo.

5

Stomach flu is a misnomer as the influenza virus does not typically cause gastroenteritis.

Norovirus is the most common cause and is found in food contaminated with feces and can be transmitted from person to person easily by touch. Rotavirus is the other big one which effects infants most severely.

Bacterial infections like salmonella, E. coli, Staph, etc. are less common but usually come directly from improperly prepared food.

6

Norovirus sucks. In my experience, it is super contagious too. I’ve never seen anything spread like that. Also, it comes on really fast. Inside ten minutes I went from fealing normal to projectile vomiting non-stop.

7

The incubation period is 24-48 hours. Before then you simply don’t have enough virus in you to cause symptoms.

8

I used to get stomach flu a lot when I was a kid, too. I’d accept your theory – makes sense – accept for the fact that we didn’t have 6 kids and 2 adults all sick at the same time. If it was just unsanitary food prep, why wouldn’t we all get sick?

9

There are probably a number of factors, like one person being more susceptible at a particular time than the others, or eating more of the tainted food than others. I was always the pickiest eater in my family. I’d eagerly chow down on meat (the mostly likely thing to be tainted) but eschew vegetables which might have made me more resistant. And of course, young children are more susceptible than adults.

I once attended a Thanksgiving dinner with a large group at somebody’s house; the next day about a third of the guests came down with food poisoning to one degree or another, while the rest were unaffected.

10

I’m aware of that, but that doesn’t mean that symptoms don’t strike quickly when they hit. Maybe it took half an hour rather than 10 minutes. It was very fast. I had just sat down to study for a test. Not five minutes in I started getting the spins. I went to vomit once and felt better. Then it went downhill fast. That couldn’t have happened in more than half an hour.

11

Then I would say that you had been exposed 24-48 hours previously and didn’t know it. You simply wouldn’t have had enough virus in your system to cause illness after even 30 minutes.

Bacterial exotoxins, however, can cause symptoms that quickly. Bacillus cereus is a good example. 30 minutes to an hour after ingesting some rice contaminated with that organism and you’ll be speaking on the big white telephone.

12

I think that Christopher is agreeing with you but saying that the symptoms, once the virus has been cooking inside one for a while, strike quickly. Sorry,** Christopher**, if I am misreading you, but that was exactly my experience last week. My kids had Norovirus, so I know how and when I was exposed. Still, I was going along just fine and washing my hands constantly and thinking I might be in the clear. Monday morning, I was getting ready for work—took a shower and ironed my clothes and felt just fine through the the whole process.

Then…boom. Down for the count for 36 hours.

13

Diffferant people have differant tolerances to food poisoning for varying reasons.

Common among them is that although two people look the same, one produces much less stomach acid than another, and this reduces their ability to handle food poisoning bacteria.
This can even be temporary, and person who is highly stressed will produce less acid perhaps following a single very stressful episode, and this can become a chronic condition in a profession where stress is routine.
Naturally if you take lots of antacids this can make you more susceptable, which is one reason that someone with an ulcer should be careful that their food is safe to eat - among other reasons.

Sometimes a delay of only 20 minutes can make the differance between food that is bordeline contaminated to a high risk of food poisoning, so if you are at that buffet or barbeque and are waiting in a long line, it could be enough.

Some bugs survive stomach acid better than others, long enough to reach the gut, but in some folk this may take much longer than others and this again may make for a differance between who gets bacterial food poisoning and who does not.

Stoid

It sound very much like you ate food that was full of bacterially produced toxins rather than have the bacteria in your gut.
Toxins often cause that nausea and, but you vomiting prevented it from entering the intestine, otherwise you’d also have had diarrhea, which can dehydrate you rather quick.You don’t mention diarrhea which you very likely would have done if you’d had it.
Big culprits for this are Stapph A, and Clostridium Perfringens the latter being most usually associated with meat and meat products. Stuff not being proberly cooked all the way through or held at room temperature are the main reasons for this, though these are often tied in with other things such as unhygienic practices.
Barbeques are favourites for this sort of illness.

Norovirus - it actually goes by a few names such as SRSV food poisoning and Norwalk virus could do this too, highly infectious you can get it by being in the same room as someone throwing up from this bug.

If you know a few other people who went down with it, there’s a chance you might be able to pin it down on something, but the reality is that most of us get food poisoning because of something we did at home and its often just those living there that get it - things that make you change your routine such as being busy doing too many things at once can make a person not take the proper steps - we can get busy and rushed and leave stuff out longer than perhaps we should.

Its not pleasant but not usually seen as seriously threatening unless you hve other specific issues.

14

Interesting what you say about different people having different susceptibilities.

I’m 30 and I honestly can’t remember the last time I vomited. It would have been when I was a kid, maybe 6 or 7 I guess. (And as an aside, that makes me really kind of phobic about vomiting, as I cannot remember what it’s like, and I don’t want to find out!)

My girlfriend, on the other hand, tends to pick up any stomach bug that’s going. She’s also a bit less picky about food hygiene than I am, which is probably part of it. (Me: “How long’s this ham been open?” Her: “Oh, I dunno, about a week…” She tucks in, I bin it…)

But I’ve done a lot of travelling too, been all round the world, to Morocco, Cambodia, Mexico, all kinds of places, and never thrown up. I’ve got the runs a few times, and in Morcco a few years back both my GF and I got ill after a dodgy lamb tagine, but while she was throwing up, I just had the runs and a fever, but no vomiting. Strange.

15

On that subject, a webcomic is in order:

(This comic requires the explanation that Minus - the blue-haired girl - is a magical person who can do pretty much anything she imagines. But being a little girl she doesn’t always know what she’s getting herself into.)

16

Thanks for the input…now a bit of amusement:

i was reading a real serious article about vomiting and how it works, and way down the page I read this:

There is also considerable variability among species in the propensity for vomition. Rats reportedly do not vomit. Cattle and horses vomit rarely - this is usually an ominous sign and most frequently a result of acute gastric distension. Carnivores such as dogs and cats vomit frequently, often in response to such trivial stimuli as finding themselves on a clean carpet.

made me giggle.

17

And a cat will vomit and then go on eating the same food that it just vomited as if nothing happened. However, nearly every human will not want to go near food after vomiting.

18

Norovirus infections do suck, massively. My wife and I spent the holidays shooting gunk out both ends last year after her sister’s family came down with it. They were over it, but it’s still contagious for at least 3 days after. (I told her that I didn’t want to help them out with redoing the dance studio because of that, but did she listen?) You can get infected from contact with less than 100 particles, which is a ridiculously small amount. Supposedly hand-washing, especially after using the toilet, and avoidance of contact with vomit can prevent contagion, but all of us washed our hands thoroughly several times that day, washed much longer and more thoroughly after going to the bathroom than normal, didn’t puke anywhere near each other, and it still spread to everyone less than a day after contact.

That was the first time I’d had diarrhea in years and years. Seriously messes you up. Also broke my good track record with gastrointestinal problems.

I got traveler’s diarrhea after coming back from Bali last month. Onset was like some people mentioned: from fine, to feeling the urge to simultaneously barf and shoot poo like Tubgirl in no time.

(TMI Warning) Odd after effect is that whatever bacteria I came in contact with seems to have improved my intestines. I have less gas and firmer stools than before my vacation, with no significant change in diet. Maybe I got colonized by a better strain of gut bacteria.