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Your next line of defense is drugs to block the culprit that causes your symptoms. Symptoms are caused not by the allergens themselves, but by the histamines your body produces to fight the allergens you’re allergic to. Big chain stores offer half-price, house brand, true equivalents for many of the drugs discussed here.
One group of hay fever drugs – the antihistamine -- tries to “neuter” histamines before we react to them, and should be taken before and during your allergy season. Older OTC antihistamines such as Benadryl and Chlor-Trimeton make us really groggy (Benadryl’s active ingredient is diphenhydramine, the main ingredient of many OTC sleeping pills), but newer ones such as OTC Claritin and the more effective prescription Allegra let us think more clearly and drive more safely. In general, antihistamines help most of the symptoms except nasal congestion, a shortcoming often overcome by combining oral and nasal antihistamines.
The most effective AR meds are nasal spray prescription corticosteroids such as Beconase, Rhinocort, Nasarel, Flonase, Nasonex, and Nasacort. Their primary side effect is nasal membrane irritation. Safer, but less effective, are mast cell stabilizers such as Nasalcrom, Alimide, and Alocril. There’s also a new nonsteroidal prescription oral drug, Singulair, which fights asthma and seasonal AR in yet another way, by blocking leukotrienes our bodies produce to oppose allergens. Systemic (oral or injected) steroids for AR are unadvised due to side effects.
Those meds take weeks to become effective, so are ineffective as an overnight cure for an AR attack. They should be used throughout your allergy season, beginning weeks before it begins. For occasional, instant, overnight, relief from a nose too stuffed for sleep, there’s the brute force, last ditch, short-term-safe, nonsteroidal OTC nasal decongestant. A simple snort of Afrin, for example, can shrink your swollen nasal passages in seconds to clear your head for an entire night of pleasant sleep. Similar choices include Actifed, Dristan, Sudafed, Allerest, and Neo-Synephrine; ask your drugstore pharmacist which one s/he recommends. But remember: if used more than three or four successive nights they are likely to cause much worse congestion. Save them for the occasional real sleep emergency when you feel like you have footballs up your nostrils.
The right mix of OTC eye and nose drops and pills (again, ask the drugstore pharmacist) can safely mitigate symptoms enough to let many sufferers get on with their lives, maybe even in relative comfort. If not, ask your doctor about prescription drugs. At the very least, they don’t knock us out like older OTC antihistamines do. Whether it takes OTC or prescription drugs to control your AR, allergen avoidance is still important, as allergen exposure challenges even the best meds.
For those whose immune systems really go berserk and drive their symptoms off the charts, there’s immunology -- allergy shots, hundreds of them, spread over years. If your insurance covers the cost, there’s no downside. The needle is too small to feel, and if they work for you, you’re cured. Mine were worth every shot, including the need to carry my vial of “formula” with me on prolonged trips so I could drop into any clinic and get my weekly or monthly shot.
Hay fever need not be endured. It’s usually preventable or curable, or at least reducible to a minor nuisance, with an informed mix of effort, OTC meds, and/or the assistance of physicians. Don’t let it ruin what should be a good night’s sleep, a great time of the year, or your child’s health. For much more information, ask Google about “allergic rhinitis” “hay fever”, including the quotes to narrow your results.
Bless you.
