Might taking this common drug be a mistake waiting to happen?

It turns out Tylenol isn’t just toxic for our livers — it could be doing a number on our brains, too.

For years I’ve been warning you that acetaminophen — the active ingredient in Tylenol and lots of other OTC and Rx products — is like something out of an Old West carnival barker routine.

It claims to cure just about everything, even though studies have found it’s practically worthless for back pain and even arthritis.

And now Canadian scientists have discovered a new, frightening acetaminophen risk.

Taking the drug can dull your brain so much that you won’t be able to think clearly or tell when you’ve put yourself in dangerous situations.

And the consequences aren’t just serious — they could be deadly.

Your brain on TylenolIf you’ve been reading my eAlert for a while, you know all about some of the more common side effects with acetaminophen.

It’s easy to overdose and damage your liver to the point of no return. Acetaminophen sends nearly 80,000 people a year to the hospital, and it’s the leading cause of liver failure in America.

But, as it turns out, that’s just the start of what this drug can do to your body.

Researchers from the University of Toronto and the University of British Columbia wanted to see if acetaminophen is just as bad for your brain as it is for your liver. And, in a nutshell, it is.

These researchers found that acetaminophen appears to inhibit the part of our brains that responds when we make errors.

You know, that “whoops” moment we all have when we are about to run a red light — or cross a street when that “Don’t walk” sign is blaring? Well, when you’re on acetaminophen, your brain may not get that signal at all — or if it does, it could get it too late.

The “wave” or spike that can be seen on brain scans when we realize we’ve royally screwed up is known as the “error related positivity” (Pe).

The Canadian researchers tested 60 participants, either giving them a placebo or one dose of an extra-strength acetaminophen — 1,000 mg. Then, they played a game where they were supposed to spot easy errors on a computer screen.

It turns out the ones who had taken the dose of acetaminophen showed significantly less Pe brain activity and often couldn’t spot mistakes. That means taking the drug “makes it harder to recognize an error,” said lead researcher Dan Randles.

You know, like when you think your car is in drive, but you’ve actually shifted it into reverse.

Now on the surface, that may all sound a bit silly. But the brain’s ability to recognize day-to-day mistakes plays a very important role in how we do seemingly insignificant little things all the time.

We are constantly multi-tasking without being aware of it, doing things like walking, talking and crossing the street, for example, without thinking twice. Such “cognitive tasks” happen automatically.

But our brains’ ability to generate Pe activity and identify mistakes (including potentially dangerous ones) is important to our safety. And that’s where acetaminophen appears to slow down the brain response that allows that to happen.

That means your thinking could become about as clear as mud, and as Randles puts it, you’re more vulnerable to serious mistakes.

But let’s face it — with all the known risks out there, we know by now that taking anything containing acetaminophen is a big mistake to begin with.

And, unfortunately, it’s one that thousands never realized they had made until it was too late.

Sources:
“Is a popular painkiller hampering our ability to notice errors?” University of Toronto, April 8, 2016, eurekalert.org