Best Way to Treat Allergy with Drug therapy

A range of drug therapies that suppress symptoms, or that suppress the inflammation resulting from your exposure to allergens, can be used to treat a variety of diseases, including asthma, rhinitis, conjunctivitis, urticaria, and eczema. But all of these therapies need to be discussed with your doctor who may refer you to a specialist. These treatments do not cure the allergy and the allergic diseases often come back once the treatment has been discontinued. If taken regu­larly by people with daily symptoms, however they do provide very effective relief.

There are certain classes of drug that are common to several of the conditions, the most commonly used being antihistamines.

Antihistamines

This class of drug can be used in the eye (drops), in the nose (spray), or taken orally (tablet or liquid), and it is one of the first lines of treatment for mild hay fever perennial rhinitis, and conjunctivitis, and it is the main treatment for urticaria and simple angioedema.

Antihistamines, as their name suggests, oppose the effects of histamine within the body. Histamine is one of the major chemicals released as part of an allergic reaction and it is an important contributor to the development of symptoms.

There are several ways that histamine can act, and in allergy it is the HI -antihistamines that are used as a treatment. This treatment reduces the itching, the generation of secretions (watery eyes or runny nose), and also sneezing, but it has less effect on obstructive symptoms such as a blocked nose. Asthmatic conditions, too, are less responsive. In general HI -antihistamines are not used for asthma.

A range of different antihistamines is available, some with sedative effects and some without. Since sedative antihistamines can have the side-effect of impairing your social interactions, driving skills, and your ability to concentrate at school or at work, the non-sedating antihistamines should be used in tablet form to relieve symptoms during daytime activities.

Antileukotrienes

Another class of drugs that can be used to fight the symptoms of allergy is antileukotrines. Leukotrienes are important chemicals released by the body during an allergic episode and other inflammatory reactions. The introduction of antileukotrines widens the airways and improves symptoms in asthma. These drugs may also modify some aspects of the underlying inflammation in the airway, but this is still being evaluated. As leukotrines are only part of the allergic reaction, treatment combining both antileukotrines and other drugs, such as HI -antihistamines, is being researched to see if this provides greater benefit.