The unnamed 50-year-old builder was admitted to hospital with hepatitis after downing up to five energy drinks every day for three weeks.
He also suffered from severe liver damage, anorexia, malaise and abdominal pain on top of nausea and vomiting.
The American lad originally thought his symptoms were down to a flu-like syndrome. But he became alarmed when his urine became dark and he developed jaundice.
He hadn't changed his diet, drank alcohol, smoked tobacco or taken illegal drugs – he'd just started downing energy drinks to get through his labour-intensive construction job.
Doctors are warning that downing too many energy drinks can cause hepatitis because they believe the American patient's condition was brought on by the controversial beverages.
They reckon the labourer, who was admitted to the University of Florida's emergency department with hepatitis, overdosed on niacin, more commonly called vitamin B3, which can damage the liver if taken in large amounts.
Dr Jennifer Harb, of the university's college of medicine, said: "To the best of our knowledge, only one other case report has previously documented acute hepatitis from over consumption of energy drinks.
"We present a second case of a patient who presented with acute hepatitis secondary to energy drink consumption. Energy drinks contain a mixture of B vitamins and an 'energy blend'.
"The B vitamins involved include high amounts of vitamin B12 (cyanocobalamin), B9 (folic acid), B6 (pyridoxine) and vitamin B3 (niacin)."
She continued: "Many of these ingredients are present in high concentrations, lending to their risk of accumulation and adverse effects.
"Although several of the ingredients are known to cause toxicity with overdose, none of their toxicity profiles include hepatotoxicity, except vitamin B3 (niacin).
"We therefore suspect the development of acute hepatitis in this patient was due to the daily consumption of high quantities of niacin rich energy beverages."
Dr Jennifer said doctors should be aware of the "potential adverse effects" of popular energy drinks and quiz patients who have unexplained acute hepatitis whether they have recently consumed them.
She added: "By alerting physicians to this phenomenon, we hope patients will be educated about the potential risks of energy drink over consumption and thus, many unnecessary liver injuries will be prevented, or at least promptly identified and treated appropriately."
The patient was treated with close observation, frequent monitoring and symptom management.
He stopped drinking all energy drinks and was advised to avoid any similar niacin-containing products in the future.
The man's case was recorded by medics in the journal BMJ Case Reports.
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