Many people who suffer with spring allergies – commonly called hay fever – would rather stay indoors instead of venturing out to where tree and grass pollens flow through the air. There are excellent medications, available both over-the-counter and by prescription, to help reduce the misery of the spring season.
What's Aavailable for Allergy Prevention
For more than 100 years, injection with a small needle just under the skin, called subcutaneous immunotherapy or SCIT, has been used to modify the immune system. It works by turning off the immune response of cells in the body related to allergy. It achieves this change as you're given very small injections of the pollens that make you sneeze, with the dose increased on a regular basis. Once you reach a maintenance dose after several months, the amount is usually decreased. Typically, patients have the injection in their allergist's office and wait for 30 minutes to watch for possible reactions such as hives and wheezing. These are rare, but as you're getting injections of what you're allergic to, it is important to watch for side effects.
Another therapy approved by the Food and Drug Administration is sublingual (under the tongue) immunotherapy, or SLIT tablets. Presently only tablets for certain grasses are available to treat seasonal allergies, although other countries have a birch pollen tablet that's also effective in patients with oak pollen allergy. These tablets contain pollen and are placed under the tongue and dissolve rapidly. They are not swallowed. SLIT tablets work like SCIT to modify the allergic immune system. They're taken at home daily until after the grass season ends and started again several weeks before the following grass season.
One of the tablets, which contains timothy grass pollen, can be used year-round for three years to encourage a sustained effect against grass pollen. The American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology advises that anyone using SLIT tablets needs an epinephrine autoinjector to address the rare risk of a severe allergic reaction at home. The most common side effect from this treatment is an itchy mouth, which resolves over time.
You may have heard of SLIT drops, in which liquid pollen is placed under the tongue. Though approved for use in many other countries, there are no approved SLIT drops for grass or tree allergies in the US. Because allergy drops are not FDA-approved and are off-label in the United States, they aren't covered by most insurance, Medicare or Medicaid.
