Texas Teens Overdose On Benadryl After Watching TikTok Video Which Claimed They Could Get 'High'

Three Texas teens were rushed to the hospital due to an extreme overdose of Benadryl. They got the idea of getting "high" after watching a TikTok video that had claimed it was possible.

The video demonstrated that if a person takes at least a dozen Benadryl pills – a common allergy medication, they could get high and begin to hallucinate, mentioned the Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth, Texas’s blog.

Benadryl (Diphenhydramine) is an antihistamine commonly prescribed for allergies and the common cold. It has also been used to treat insomnia and tremors in parkinsonism. Overdose of the drug can cause blurred vision, hallucinations, confusion, nervousness, anxiety, seizures, heart arrhythmias, and in worse cases, coma or even death.

According to the hospital’s blog, one of the teens, a 14-year-old named Rebekah consumed 14 pills in the middle of the night on Memorial Day. Katie was asleep when Rebekah showed up in her older sister’s room intoxicated form the drug. The eldest sister called their grandmother for help so as to avoid getting in trouble with their parents.

Her mother woke up when her grandmother alerted her about Rebekah’s concerning condition. Katie couldn’t believe that her daughter would do something like that after watching a TikTok video.

"It was scary. She had fractured sentences, hallucinations. Her resting heart rate was 199. We rushed her to the local ER and they decided to transport her to Cook Children's," the hospital’s blog quoted Katie.

"As a parent, you worry about drugs and you know the signs for drug use. I never thought about having to lock up my allergy medicine. I just want other parents to know about this because it’s dangerous and I had no idea. And I’m angry. These people are essentially prescribing medication without a medical degree and our kids are trusting them," Katie told Cook Children’s Blog.

Rebekah’s doctors performed an electrocardiogram (EKG) and the results were bad. She was then admitted to the hospital and was kept under observation overnight. Fortunately, her heart rate returned to normal the next day and she was soon discharged.

The hospital nurse practitioner said they had three teens getting admitted for the same thing in the same week. None of them were trying to harm themselves but just wanted to try out what they watched on TikTok, out of curiosity.

The teens didn’t realize that Benadryl overdose could lead to severe consequences including death.