What is hay fever?

Hay fever is a common phenomenon. Every year, 10-15 per cent of us will be afflicted by symptoms of pollen allergy. Whether you’re sneezing, suffering from a runny nose or experiencing more severe exhaustion and sickness, you’re not alone.

Hay fever works just the same as any other allergic response – the immune system responds to a foreign substance entering the body and attempts to remove it. In the case of hay fever, this foreign body is pollen, which is harmless to your health. Hay fever is simply your immune system over-reacting.

Treatments are available on prescription and over the counter. Around 10 per cent of hay fever sufferers find their symptoms do not respond to readily available treatments such as antihistamine tablets.

Antihistamines are not without side effects and they do not prove effective in every case. As an alternative, sufferers may consider the use of steroids.

Steroids are some of the most powerful anti-inflammatory medications available. They help supress the body’s immune response and are used to treat a variety of conditions in which the body’s immune system gets out of control. These include asthma, rheumatoid arthritis and hay fever.

Triamcinolone (Kenalog) is a fast way to banish hayfever symptoms for the entirety of the season with just one injection.

It given in the top of the buttock and starts working almost immediately and typically ‘kicks in’ anywhere from one to forty-eight hours after administration.

This medication administered when hay fever symptoms first appear can give symptom remission that lasts for the duration of the entire pollen or allergen season (usually three months).

The dose required to control severe symptoms is partly related to body weight, and heavier subjects will require a larger dose to ease their symptoms. We have found that the therapeutic dose for most effective relief is 1mg per kg of body weight, therefore our standard doses administered are 40mg-80mg per patient per season.

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