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Daily dose of zyrtec?

593 views 3 replies 3 participants last post by  Audra 
#1 ·
I just took my dd to see her allergist. She hasn't been in year since she was diagnosed with all her allergies. We've been able to manage her food allergies pretty well with just diet & the occasional dose of benedryl if she a really bad reaction to something. Her main symptoms are hives & eczema. She's only had a couple reactions where her lips swelled.
Anyways the dr. says that she has what he calls the "allergic march". That as she gets older & is exposed to more things she will become more & more allergic. That now she will start developing more environmental allergies. He says there have been studies in Europe about taking a daily dose of zyrtec to slow down this "allergic march". It won't prevent her from developing new allergies but delay their development by potentially years. I told him I'm not really comfortable having her on a medication daily. But he really wants her to take it.

I have experience with allergies myself. In my 20's I developed horrible seasonal & environmental allergies & even developed asthma. I was on allergy meds for years but now I feel that I have been able to manage my allergies by changes in my diet, supplements etc. I still have the occasional flare up in which I might take something. If she had horrible symptoms of course I would give her something for relief. I'm just having a hard time with the thought of her being on daily meds to possibly slow down allergies he thinks she MAY develop. Also I am very sensitive to some meds & I just worry they will affect her the same way. When I took zyrtec I was in a complete fog. I was just hoping there is a better way. Now that she is older I feel more comfortable giving her supplements so I've been researching that.

So I just don't really know what to think. I'm confused as to what the right choice is & would like to see if someone can give me some input. Thanks in advance for your help. Sorry this post is so long but I wanted to give you more of the "big picture"
 
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#2 ·
My son is on zyrtec but for chronic hives.

He appears to continue developing allergies to me. I wish zyrtec stopped it honestly. We lose more and more foods and I'm stressed out about it. But it hasn't stopped the allergic march here (though his asthma is doing well I attribute that to singulair). We do natural stuff here too (healing gut type stuff and allergy control mostly). Still our "allergy march" continues.

I did see research on daily zyrtec showing no differences between medicated kids and unmedicated as they aged except the medicated were less likely to have asthma. If I remember that was true well after they stopped the medication. We started after we already had asthma. I wish we had prevented that one.
 
#3 ·
Two of my kids are on Zyrtec. My older one only has allergies to dust/dust mites and cats. My younger one has all sorts of food intolerances plus now seasonal allergies (not sure which yet, but from when it started, doc says either mold or dust). My husband has asthma so I'm hoping all of my kids avoid that. I hadn't heard that allergy medicine could stop the allergy march (which I also hadn't heard of). Is it Zyrtec in particular, or any antihistamine? My middle son has seasonal allergies but I can't find anything that works on him (we've tried benadryl, zyrtec, claritin, and beconase nose drops). I know the Zyrtec stops the incessant coughing that my children do when they're not on any medicine, and develop less colds as well. I'm off to do research on this now.
 
#4 ·
Thanks for your replies! Reading your stories is helping me wade through all this. But I just wanted to clarify that the dr said the Zyrtec would NOT prevent the allergies from developing but DELAY them. I guess it would give the child's system somewhat of a break to play catch up. I don't know...
 
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