Medicine: Hangover Over?

Last week in Modern Medicine, Dr. Bayard Taylor Horton and associates* of the Mayo Clinic at Rochester, Minn* announced a new method of treating the "constant, excruciating, burning, boring" headaches of chronic alcoholics. When the system is flooded with alcohol, large amounts of histamine, a protein derivative, pour into the blood stream. Somehow, said the doctors, the histamine expands blood vessels in the head, causes hangover headaches. Strangely enough, they found that "immunizing" injections of minute quantities of histamine brought permanent relief to 65 patients, no improvement to ten patients.