Home Energy Drink Facts & Brands NOS Energy Drink Sends Teen to Hospital

NOS Energy Drink Sends Teen to Hospital

nosA Carl Junction, Missouri teen recently had quite an experience after he drank NOS Energy Drink.

Dakota Sailor came home from school and decided he would throw back not one, but two cans of NOS Energy Drink. That is the last thing he remembers as his parents found him unconscious on the sofa aspirating. He was rushed to the hospital and recovered a few days later.

The doctors ran various tests, but concluded that it was probably the energy drink that was the culprit in this incident. The doctors said that  high doses of caffeine could have caused his seizure. Checking out the Caffeine Database, we see that NOS has 260 milligrams of caffeine per can so that puts Sailor at 520mg of caffeine from NOS plus he admitted to having additional caffeine earlier in the day.

Normally, this amount of caffeine isn’t anywhere near a toxic amount. According to Death by Caffeine it would take around 45 cans of NOS to send you packing for the afterlife, but everyone is different and some are more sensitive to caffeine than others. The teen obviously had a reaction to something.

The problem here is that this will just be used as further evidence that energy drinks are bad even though this teen did not responsibly drink the product and heed the warnings clearly printed on the NOS can. It isn’t the energy drink’s fault he had this reaction if he didn’t follow the recommended dosage.

Look at it this way. If a teen went into a Walmart and bought a bottle of ibuprofen and took 20 of them instead of the recommended 2 tablets, no one would blame the ibuprofen company, however, in this case most will blame the energy drink instead of the irresponsible actions of Sailor. Energy drinks have powerful ingredients in them and need to be treated and drunk responsibly. Parents need to be aware of what their kids are drinking and what they are spending their money on.

Part of the reason this site exists is to educate the consumer about the caffeine levels of the hundreds of products that are out there. So please don’t blame NOS or energy drinks for this unfortunate incident and hopefully this event will give this kid a new respect for the products.

Source: The Joplin Globe

29 Comments

  • sue

    you people need to do a little research on these drinks. Yea he was silly for drinkin two but studies show that people who drink them regularly can have heart problems from these drinks. It pumps blood through ur heart so fast that it beats when its not supposed to and will eventually wear out ur heart muscles and then death. also not to mention other harmful side effects such as mood swings headaches and confusion. So jus because u dont feel it effecting ur heart and blood pressure doesnt me it isnt. So dont be uneducated about this serious problem. look it up it might save ur life.

  • ted

    “Studies”? would you mind mentioning one of these? The one’s we have published on the site would suggest otherwise. A heart beating faster doesn’t cause it to wear out. If that was the case exercise would be deadly and not beneficial to the heart muscle.

  • Gina Lee

    I agree with Sue, there are multiple studies that show how energy drinks can cause too much stress on the heart and cause it to stop. Ted, when you exercise and put stress on your heart then rest it is a good thing and it is beneficial to your heart, but energy drinks do not give your heart that rest it needs. You might want to do some research on this topic it might save your life.

  • ted

    Ah… Gina we have a whole site full of “research” here. The heart is a resilient muscle and there is no evidence that moderate caffeine is harmful to a healthy heart. If a person has an underlying heart condition then that is a different story all together. Could you post one of your numerous studies? I would like to have a look at it. Thanks.

  • Jackson

    Guns dont kill people, people kill people, but guns are a lot harder to get the NOS and guns have age limits restricting them to people of hopefully more maturity that might actually care to read the label.
    It might not be NOS’s fault but the fact it is on the shelf and so easy for anyone to buy stupid teenagers will do what teenagers do and over indulge.
    Companies should have a responsibility to protect their customers especially taking this immaturity in to account and making some changes to the way its distributed.

  • Jeff

    Well I would also like to see all these studies that you mention. Yes when energy drinks are abused they can cause problems and even kill but when used responsibly they are perfectly fine. People are to quick to blame drink companies for their lack of responsibility. Yes i can increase heart rate but not enough to kill you unless you have a pre-existing condition or you drink way to many. I’m sure they kid either had a reaction to one of the ingredients or was using more than he said he did. FYI “TEENS LYE ALL THE TIME.”. Please if you don’t like energy drinks then don’t use them and let those of us that do use them be. I blame the parents for not paying attention to what their child was doing and not educating him on responsible use of all products not just energy drinks.

  • Amazed

    He did have a toxicology report for the curious, for you who think you are just so awesome that you can drink as many energy drinks you want, come on really!!! His goal was just to make people aware so he shared his story.It is just a shame how cruel people can be. Hope something like this never touches your lives.

  • ash

    It’s definitely not the fault of the manufacturer, there are warnings clearly printed on the can, and i imagine there were more things contributing to what happened because they used to be all that I would drink and I have drank six in one day and been perfectly fine

  • Connor

    Now I can see where this is getting. I’m 13, and one time I drank Monster (I think it was the 16oz), and my heart rate was 120 for 2 days (but I do have ADHD, so I take 60mg of Adderal XR each day, also I’m not athletic, so my normal heart rate is like 100, also I’m sensitive to caffeine). I did drink it in 10 mins tho which I’m not supposed to do. I do drink NOS sometimes, I just sip it tho, over an hour or 2, but only one can. If you drink only one can and not chug it, you should be fine. But still read the labels!!!!!!!

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Last Modified: February 21, 2010