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Quell That Queasy Feeling: Motion sickness affects up to 9 out of 10
Motion sickness has sent Dave Evans reeling from movie theaters, made him outlaw ceiling fans and kept him out of carwashes and off amusement park rides. But his most miserable experience came on a bus tour around the Hawaiian island of Oahu.
"The driver allowed me to sit on the steps of the bus," says Evans, 59, of Sun City West, Ariz. "Every time I was ready to unload my stomach, he'd stop the bus along the roadside and open the door for me. . . . It was the worst eight hours of my life."
Evans now takes a daily maintenance dose of prescription- strength meclizine hydrochloride, the antihistamine in over-the- counter motion-sickness medications such as Bonine and Dramamine.
His physical reactions to movement are extreme, but his ailment is common, affecting as many as nine out of 10 people at some point, studies have found.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, almost 60 percent of kids traveling in cars or airplanes and almost all travelers in rough seas experience motion-related discomfort or nausea.