Usually short-lived. Getting fluids right matters more than stopping the vomiting — and a few patterns need urgent care.
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Nausea and vomiting are symptoms, not diagnoses, and the list of things that cause them is long — infection, medication, migraine, pregnancy, inner ear problems, and occasionally something obstructive or serious.
Most episodes are a short-lived viral gastroenteritis that settles within one to three days. In those cases the priority is not stopping the vomiting but keeping up with fluids, and doing it the right way: small sips, frequently, rather than a large glass that comes straight back.
What raises this above a self-limiting nuisance is the company it keeps. Vomiting with severe abdominal pain, with a headache, with chest pain, or in someone who cannot keep any fluid down at all, is a different problem — and this page sets out where that line sits.
Small amounts, very frequently, beats large amounts occasionally — and this is where most people go wrong. A glassful hits an irritated stomach and comes straight back; a teaspoon or two every five minutes is usually kept down and adds up to a great deal over an hour.
How often someone passes urine, and how dark it is, is the most reliable dehydration marker at home. Fewer wet nappies, or not passing urine for eight hours or more in an adult, is the signal to seek help. Other signs: a dry mouth and tongue, sunken eyes, no tears when crying, and unusual drowsiness or floppiness.
Never stop your insulin because you are vomiting and not eating. This is one of the most dangerous and most common mistakes in illness — the body needs more insulin when unwell, not less, and stopping it precipitates ketoacidosis.
Do not force food. Once vomiting has settled for a few hours, eat what you fancy in small amounts — the old advice about dry toast and bananas only is unnecessarily restrictive. Getting back to normal food within a day helps the gut recover. Avoid alcohol, very fatty meals and caffeine while things settle.
Stay off work, school or nursery until 48 hours after the last episode of vomiting or diarrhoea — this is national guidance and it genuinely limits outbreaks. Norovirus is not killed by alcohol hand gel: wash hands with soap and water, and clean surfaces with a bleach-based product. Do not prepare food for other people, and do not swim for two weeks afterwards.
Video works reasonably well here — how someone looks matters a great deal in assessing dehydration, and that is visible.
Volume is the enemy; frequency is the answer. Take a teaspoon or two every five minutes rather than trying a glass. It feels absurdly slow and it works — an adult can take in close to a litre in an hour that way, while a single glass would simply come back up.
Oral rehydration sachets are meaningfully better than water, because the specific salt-and-glucose ratio activates a transport mechanism in the gut that keeps working even when it is inflamed.
Yes, and it is often the thing that breaks the cycle — someone who stops vomiting can drink, and someone who can drink usually avoids hospital.
Several options exist, including preparations that dissolve on the tongue for people who cannot swallow tablets. The choice matters: some are unsuitable in pregnancy, some in Parkinson's, and some in younger people, which is why they are prescribed rather than bought. We can issue one the same day to your pharmacy.
Keep taking it. Illness raises blood glucose even when you are not eating, and stopping insulin during illness is a leading cause of diabetic ketoacidosis — which is life-threatening and entirely avoidable.
Check glucose every two to four hours, check ketones, keep taking small amounts of sugary fluid, and seek urgent help if ketones rise or you cannot keep fluids down. Some oral diabetes medicines are paused during illness; insulin is not one of them. Ask for your personal sick day rules while you are well.
Vomiting usually settles within a day or two; diarrhoea can persist for up to a week. Norovirus is characteristically dramatic and short — severe for 24 to 48 hours, then over.
What is not normal is vomiting continuing beyond 48 hours, diarrhoea beyond a week, blood in either, or a high fever — each warrants assessment rather than waiting it out.
Do not simply endure it. Nausea in early pregnancy is common, but when it prevents you keeping fluids down, causes weight loss, or produces ketones in the urine, that is hyperemesis gravidarum — a treatable condition, not a normal part of pregnancy to be tolerated.
Safe and effective anti-sickness medicines exist and are used routinely in pregnancy. Contact your midwife or GP, and seek same-day help if you cannot keep fluids down for 24 hours, are passing very little urine, or have lost weight.
The company it keeps is what matters:
48 hours after the last episode of vomiting or diarrhoea, regardless of how well you feel before then. You remain infectious after symptoms stop, which is precisely why the rule exists and why outbreaks in schools and workplaces persist when it is ignored.
Worth mentioning one specific pattern, because it is common and routinely missed. Cyclical bouts of intense vomiting in a regular cannabis user — relieved, characteristically, by long hot showers or baths — is cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome. People often go through repeated hospital admissions and extensive investigation before anyone asks.
It resolves completely on stopping cannabis, and only on stopping it. Other causes of recurrent vomiting include migraine, gallstones, gastroparesis and reflux, all of which are worth investigating properly.
Clinically reviewed by Dr Mohammad Zubair Khan, GMC 7563469
Last reviewed
August 24, 2026
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