Airborne Allergies & Chlor-Trimeton?

My little Hannah Grace is about 4.5 years old. We've had her since she was ~7 mos old and she was sicker than a dog! She had worms, mites, fleas, giardia, URI, cat flu, she was malnourished, had an eye infection, and almost died. Every Dec-Jan for the past 3 years, she starts sneezing, then it progresses to watery eyes (clear discharge), itchy ears, and congestion with mucous being expelled. She does have feline herpes (Lysine daily) and she's had a pseudomonas infection that was successfully treated Dec 08-Jan 09. I'm beginning to think that since this happens at the same time every year, it's an airborne allergen. Mountain cedar is absolutely horrible here from December through March and it peaks in January.

At the recommendation of our previous vet, we've been giving her over the counter generic Claritin, but it just doesn't cut it during this time of the year. Our new vet recommended 1/4 tablet of a 4mg chlor-trimeton everyday instead of the Claritin.

My questions are can cats have airborne allergens like humans? Has anyone successfully treated their cat with chlor-trimeton? I'm a bit afraid of some of the side effects I've read.

Stephanie

I would not use that on me let alone my furry s .... Are you open to some of the more natural ways?

Yes. I'm open to just about anything that isn't going to harm my girl but will help her. We do need something stronger or in addition to the Claritin which works well for most of the year. It's just this perioed from Dec-Feb/March.

They can certainly have airborne allergies; one of my cats has asthma, and we are almost sure that dust is the trigger. His symptoms also seem worse at certain times of year (e.g. when we first turn on the forced-air heat in the fall).

I can't tell you much about treatment options, since my guy's symptoms are different (he doesn't get URIs, but he coughs, so we use a steroid inhaler), but you have my sympathy. My cat rarely coughs now, but it's awful and scary when he does. I always feel so helpless! You must feel the same way when your girl is congested.

I have one with dust issues, and have had him on an antihistamine in the past. He responded well, but I didn't want to have to give that to him daily.

Have you tried all of the things that one does inside to help a person with allergies? Keeping things clean/dusted, using humidifiers, air purifiers, making sure to regularly change your filters if you have central air and heat? ( if you have cats those filters need to be changed closer to every three months due to cat hair)

DH has asthma so a lot of the things I do to make it easier on him works out for Tomas, too. I've never liked carpet due to how much dust it can hold no matter how much you vacuum, so I've ripped most of my carpets up (they were nasty) and it seems to have helped both of them.

DH has asthma, so we pretty much do all those things anyway. I'm just very leery of the chlor-trimeton thing.

Interesting that we both have DHs with asthma, too.

Tomas took chlorphenamine for a bit. He didn't show any side effects - but it is a first gen (I can't take those myself).
I have heard of cetirizine (zyrtec) being used in some cats - but I don't know how common that is. Discuss other treatments with the vet.

Do you up doses of lysine a bit during those bad weeks or before them when you're expecting it to happen?

When we notice her starting to get sniffly, we up the dosage to 1000mg/day. Otherwise she's on 500mg/day.

I wonder what the holistic vet would say? I wasn't overly impressed with him, but he was the one who turned us onto the Claritin.

quercitin ( spell check someone )

How much and can I crush it and mix it in her wet food?

I buy capsule s and if memory serves like 1/4 cap

Capsules would be good!! Off to investigate on Google.

My Kotton has SOME kind of allergies and itches so bad she pulls out all the hair on her butt, hind legs and tummy. She has been on Atopica but it barely works.

I, MYSELF am interested in ANYTHING that will take away her itching!

Originally Posted by MyBabies

My Kotton has SOME kind of allergies and itches so bad she pulls out all the hair on her butt, hind legs and tummy. She has been on Atopica but it barely works.

I, MYSELF am interested in ANYTHING that will take away her itching!

Click to expand...

On topic but not OP

what are you feeding ? brand and types? what have you tried ? has the vet done tests? if so what type and how long ago and what did they say?

No problem hijacking the thread! I'm all for it as long as someone needs help.

Originally Posted by sharky

On topic but not OP

what are you feeding ? brand and types? what have you tried ? has the vet done tests? if so what type and how long ago and what did they say?

Click to expand...

She is on a NO chicken diet and was on Atopica. She itches on the Atopica but worse when off.

Vet looked at her and said no mites. She wanted to do a skin scraping but would charge me $300.00 and I can't afford that as I have another little girl in end stage CRF and a young boy with Asthma.

How long has she been itchy?

is the food dry? wet? homemade ? raw?

chicken is actually a fairly Rare allergy in cats ... Grains are the most common with fish

She has been itchy for about 2 1/2 years. Started with fleas but she gets Revolution every 3 weeks now and Vet does not see any fleas or flea dirt on her.

Her main food is Evo Salmon and herring, but she does get some salmon freeze dried treats and some fish (nothing but fish) canned food on occaision.

Fish is the Number 3 allergen in food for cats... wheat and soy are 1 and 2

I would try a food with rabbit , lamb or beef for 6-8 weeks with treats of what meat you choose