 [ Symptoms ] why have experts recommended lowering levels of acetaminophen in prescription and over the counter drugs [ Disease ] this is a hot topic right now i think what a lot of consumers and patients did not realize is that acetaminophen is also known as tylenol over the counter or apap in prescription medications it is also included so we had a lot of people taking two medications that contained a lot of tylenol and exceeding what we call the daily dose if you are a healthy adult you do not want to exceed more than 4000 milligrams a day in the elderly we recommend 2000 milligrams a day we also found out that a lot of people were taking it too many times a day not following the directions on the box so we really want to make sure that people understand it is important to take it as directed as per the instructions on the box if you ever have any questions about the dosing come and talk to the pharmacist we will be more than happy to help you with that we also want to make sure that you do not drink any alcohol while taking these products and that you also want to avoid alcohol containing products some cough syrups still contain alcohol and it is usually just enough that with the tylenol in the alcohol it actually causes an elevation in your liver enzymes we see this a lot sometimes with people who have the flu they tend to not feel well they are taking a lot of cold medicines on top of tylenol for their fever and there has been some emergency room admissions where people is liver enzymes were elevated just from a few days of doing this so that is the reason why it is a hot topic right now