Allergies, unfortunately, are a growth industry. More people develop allergies to more things every year. That should be a serious concern for thinking people because it is telling us that something is going wrong with large numbers of people’s immune systems. That is not a system people can afford to have fail so any signs that it isn’t functioning correctly should be taken seriously.
However, the first thing someone suffering from allergies wants to do is relieve their symptoms. The symptoms result from immune system overreaction to substances of various types, collectively referred to as allergens when they provoke an allergic response, involving excessive release of histamine. Not surprisingly, immediate relief is attempted by administering antihistamines.
Most medically prescribed antihistamines result in some unwanted side effects. For example, many make people drowsy and cause slowed reaction times, meaning many things like driving can become dangerous. Some newer antihistamines, to be honest, range from quite reasonable to excellent in their effectiveness in relieving symptoms. You didn’t expect me to say that did you?
Still, I have to admit, I’m not keen to see people taking artificial chemicals if they don’t have to. What I tend to find is that people start taking drugs to alleviate their symptoms but do nothing to deal with the underlying problem. Then they wonder why their symptoms return and worsen every year, resulting in higher doses of drugs being needed over time.
So what’s my approach you ask? First, alleviate the symptoms as quickly as possible so you feel comfortable and can get on with dealing with the underlying problem. No one wants to keep suffering allergy symptoms, so that’s where to start.
The way to do this is to avoid the allergen if it is known and if it is practicable to do so. Take vitamin C, which is actually quite a good and safe antihistamine itself, up to your personal biological threshold. If this still isn’t sufficient, add butterbur extract, an excellent antihistamine herb, particularly if your problem is a seasonal allergy.
In a study reported in Phytotherapy Research (2005;19:530–7) 330 adults with untreated seasonal allergies, who were otherwise healthy, were randomly assigned to one of three treatment groups: one group was treated with a standardized butterbur extract providing 8 mg of petasine (an active chemical from the plant) three times per day; another group was treated with the 180 mg of antihistamine fexofenadine (Allerga, Telfast) once per day; and the last group received a placebo.
Each participant underwent a physical exam and laboratory tests at the beginning of the study and again after two weeks of treatment. The people in the butterbur and antihistamine groups experienced significantly more improvement in the major allergy-related symptoms than those in the placebo group. Furthermore, 32 to 33% of those in each group had a 50% or greater symptom reduction. The butterbur extract and the antihistamine were equally effective at relieving symptoms.
Having relieved your symptoms, the next thing to do is to work on the underlying cause. This is where many people get muddled up. There is a tendency to reason that if the problem is with the immune system then it should be boosted. Well, not so fast.
The best thing to do is to undertake a cleanse. Assisting the body to achieve elimination of accumulated toxins can make a dramatic improvement in allergy cases. You can find suitable hearbal products to achieve this at our products site. After a cleanse, by all means attend to boosting your immune system. It is a system that can really benefit from a little support.