I've always had a little breakthrough on really high pollen days, but for the most part I felt completely "cured." This season is another story; I might as well be taking aspirin. I've even started taking two Claritins, one in the morning and one in the evening, but 2x0 = 0.
I thought maybe the regional weather conditions had led to a very high pollen year, so, geek that I am, I downloaded the ragweed pollen counts for the past 5 years and plotted them in 5 time series (click to embiggen).
The plots show that this year's (green dashed line) maximum pollen count, which was measured approximately a week ago, is higher than any measurement made in the past 5 years. However, since that day, the pollen count has been at the same level or lower than most measurements made in the last five years. Therefore, there is no reason for me to be suffering like I am.
I conclude that, pharmaceutical hype to the contrary, I have experienced Claritin poop-out. And we're now too poor to be able to afford that vacation home in Iceland. I will have to spend the next 40 days in the shower.
25 comments:
As a fellow severe allergy sufferer, I feel your pain. Claritin worked well for me for a much shorter period than it worked for you, and then it stopped working completely.
Most other allergy medications have also failed me. The only one I've had any luck with consistently is singulair, but I try not to take it all the time so that it won't do the same thing.
I remember when I was a kid we had several ionizers in the house which were great at keeping pollen and dirt out of the air, but my mom got fed up with them because they put that pollen and dirt on her walls. Modern ionizers solve that problem with enclosed magnets, but it turns out a lot of them put out a lot of ozone. If you can find a good one that is shown not to produce high levels of ozone, you should definitely consider getting one. Unfortunately I have not been able to find information regarding how much ozone each ionizer puts out.
According to a NYT article from several years back, Claritin doesn't work for most people:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C07E0D7103BF932A25750C0A9679C8B63
We call it Placebotin at our house.
I want my placebo effect back. It was soooo nice.
My parents seem to survive well enough on Claritin. Me, I'm on my ragweed season regimen of 1 Zyrtec every 12 hours. Yes, I know, that's more than US labelling allows, but I can't go into class with snot periodically gobbing onto the floor, or not being able to breathe at night.
Fortunately the active ingredient is available in generic, now, and CVS had a two for one sale last week.
Wishing you the best [and nice soft Kleenex]...
I've found 25-50 mg of diphenhydramine (generic Benadryl) helps with allergies. And pretty much any other problem, especially work-related problems; thanks to the profound drowsiness usually encountered about 4 hours after taking the medicine, you won't be conscious to suffer bad co-workers, annoying students or silly things like "bills that need to be paid!"
Hi AP,
I also suffer from some pretty serious allergies and find Claritin ineffective. What's worked for me is one (to one and a half) Zyrtec per day and two Benadryl at night. Benadryl seems to take histamine out of the system and appears to make a difference during the day. I'm in the US and I think the effective drug in Benadryl is different from country to country.
I've tried all the over the counter allergy mediations. Claritin was good for a while and I've tried all the rest many of them have the same active ingredient. Reactine, if you haven't already tried it, is metabolized through your liver so it might be worth the effort and maybe after a while if you go back to Claritin it might work in the future. I find the pre-seasonal allergy shots (about a half dozen in the spring) cut the impact of ragweed allergy and finally pregnancy.
You can alway hide inside and never open your windows like I do a lot as well.
Have you tried flonase? I just tried it this year and this has been my best allergy season in a decade.
Considering I was in the ER Sunday night from an asthma attack, I hear ya. I'm still coming down off of the breathing treatment at the doctor's office today, and I'm getting tired of all the meds. Ugh. I'm hoping this is the worst we'll have this fall.
Same story here, but with Zyrtec. It's been working great (indoor/outdoor) but the last few weeks have been just too much for it.
I blame John McCain.
Hmmm...
Claritin poop out sounds like drug resistance - is this possible? What does your doc say?
As the others say, trying some other flavor of KoolAid seems in order.
Hope the recent ugly weather had not made the angry family even angrier.
Best,
Bonzo
You need a drug holiday. Stop taking it. Take a different otc antihistamine. I'm not recommending over the interwebs, but go to a drug store and stare at the offerings, it will come to you. You will need to be off it for a while, but it will work again. (Drug holiday is actually a medical term, funnily enough.)
About 10 years ago, I had that "zap" treatment of my nasal turbinates to improve airflow through my nose. It seems to help a little, but your mileage may vary.
You could also try a sinus rinse (if you aren't already) for some relief. NeilMed has a nice version that isn't the neti pot kind of thing. Once ya get used to the weirdness of squirting warm water up your nose, it feels quite nice.
I suffered for allergies for decades since childhood. None of the drugs seemed to work much at all on certain days.
Then, one day it occurred to me that perhaps there is a long term build up effect from pollen being trapped in various places in the nose for more than a day. As you have also noticed, the next several days after exposure are still very bad even with minimal new exposure to allergens. Cats were especially problematic, but easy to measure because I was only exposed for brief times, yet gave me problems for days, similar to what you are experiencing with pollen (which I also have trouble with).
So I started investigating ways to simply clean out the nose after exposure. There are various ways, some more complex than others. After trying some of them I eventually found that the method called "Jala Neti" in yoga circles (Sometimes those old Yogis got the science right!) was the easiest and most effective. Body temperature saline at the same salt concentration as blood is run through the nose and washes everything out. If you get the temperature and the saline concentration correct you don't even feel the water. You just need to make sure you get all the water out.
I have found this GREATLY improves the effectiveness of my medications. I simply flush the days allergen out of my nose just before I brush my teeth for the night and pop a tavist and I'm good for the next 24 hours. If I have been working outdoors or are exposed to something unusual I simply immediately flush when I get home - the relief is amazing.
Feel free to contact me if you wish: fidler.2@osu.edu
Dear Angry Professor,
This is the medical profession calling. We heard you had allergies and want you to know there are some different approaches that have been developed since you last saw a highly qualified allergy specialist, which we see, if we refer to our calendars, is never.
We know the listings of specialists on sites such as the AMA website, the information site of the American Academy of Allergy Asthma and Immunology, and suchlike are obscure and painful to look at. We know are personalities are grating and our office decor appalling. We miss you. Please forgive us. If you would be so generous as to look at http://www.aaaai.org/physref/ and invite one of us wallweeds to your dance of allergies, we promise to wear our whitest coat.
@ Grandmother, actually, I have seen a qualified specialist. Sure, I was five years old, but still...
The problem is that by the time I get this bad, the season is usually almost over. Maybe next year.
Allergy shots are great if you can stand getting poked with needles once a week.
Angry P - but you can still see the allergist and then when next season comes up it will be betters. (nag nag, I know . . . ) Ohh - think of it as an experiment! This is control year. Start seeing allergist, then collect data in experimental year. Interested?
I also found it helped when I cut my long hair short, got a new pillow, and stopped using one of those foam bed-topper things. Oh, and there seems a direct link between level of stress and how bad the allergies get...
And one other thing-- I use claritin on an "as needed" basis (rather than taking it daily the whole season) and it seems to have worked for years this way. I didn't use it at all the year I lived in Florida, so you know, maybe you should just move to Florida. Near the beach.
I moved to Europe and had many fine years until I began to react to the fun pollens we have over here (rapeseed for one). Did the injections (had reactions), took all the different medicines, and found my medicine a few years ago.
It is called Zolim (active ingredient is called Mizolastin in German), it is horribly expensive, and I will pay the price to breathe.
We now have ragweed in Europe (everything bad eventually shows up here), but with Zolim I just have a few sniffles.
Maybe Clairitin changed its formula?
Oh, I do feel your pain! I've tried them all: Claritin, Allegra, Singulair, Flonase, Zyrtec. All work for a while and then stop; my doc says that you body develops an immunity, so you have to change it up. This year, I'm on Allegra again (the generic shit, though), and it's not helping at all with the HEINOUS ragweed around here. I'm adding Benadryl, too, though to survive, and it seems to be working.
I hope that you feel better soon; there's no worse feeling in the world that hateful ragweed.
RussianViolets
I don't know if it's available in the US but in Canada we have an OTC nasal spray called Cromolyn. It stabilizes the cells that release histamine so that they don't release it and therefore you don't get symptoms. It works wonders for me as I can't take Claritin or any of the "non-drowsy" antihistamines as they put me right to sleep (benadryl puts me into a coma). You have to use the cromolyn 3 to 4 times a day religiously, but I'll put up with that for the sustained relief it affords.
Good Luck!
I'll second side effect sufferer's recommendation.
Here in the US it's called Nasalcrom and sells (over the counter) at grocery stores and Walmart for about $14 for a 0.88 oz. bottle that lasts me for a month. It usually takes three days of use to kick in and the only side effect that I've noticed is a mild sore throat the first day of the season that I use it.
I've been singing it's praises for the past seven years, but to the best of my knowledge none of the people that I've told about it have actually tried it. Side effect sufferer is the only other person that I know of that uses it.
It's probably not worth trying this year, but could be kept in mind for next season.
Hope this helps!
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