Are Antihistamines Affective in Treating the Symptoms of Allergic Rhinitis and/or Urticaria?
In treating acute urticaria, H1 antihistamines have been proven to “reduce the number, size, and duration of wheals and decrease itching.” (Simons). Patients with chronic urticaria have a variety of options for treatment. No treatment has been studied enough to be better than the other. Some patients use only first generation, others uses only second generation, while others find a combination of both ( second generation during the day, first generation at night) to work best. Still other treatment options are being researched for chronic urticaria such as using H2 and H1 antihistamines. The choice of medication application weather oral or topical is also of concern to the patient. Seasonal allergy suffers appear to have all symptoms reduced after using H1 antihistamines. Research on first generation antihistamines has not been performed appropriately for today’s standards (ex. randomization, double-blind, placebos) but second generation antihistamines have been shown to work well in r
