Ragweed – new allergen is increasing in the UK

4th December 2017

Ragweed – new allergen is increasing in the UK

It is that time of year again. The sound of Christmas songs full of cheer and snow fill your ears. But all you can focus on is the never-ending snot dripping out of your nose. Your head is pounding; you want to stick a pencil down your throat and scratch it, and you can’t stop sneezing. It is not precisely the holly jolly Christmas that you expected.

Hay fever is becoming more and more common throughout the UK and Europe. This is due to the rise in warmer autumns and winters over the last few years. The increase in temperature is causing a rapid growth of a pesky plant known as ragweed. This herbaceous rebel is wreaking havoc on an increasing amount of citizens each year.

Warmer weather in the UK

The ever-increasing temperatures in summer, autumn, and spring are propelling the growth of ragweed. This October, according to the metoffice.gov.uk, the average temperature across the UK was warmer than usual, which is nice for people who enjoy meandering outside, but worrisome for those with pollen allergies and asthma.

Last year, “the UK mean temperature was 5.9 °C, which is 2.0 °C above the 1981-2010 long-term average, and the eighth warmest December in a series from 1910″. Unfortunately, ragweed grows at a much quicker rate under a warmer climate and the allergen-causing plant now, reportedly, is the cause of many prolonged hay fever symptoms worldwide. To make matters worse, ragweed can grow back after its removal and its pollen tends to live on for many, many years.

Due to the steady increase in ragweed, hay fever sufferers will experience an onset of symptoms, ones that should not be mistaken for the common cold.

For help and advice relating to hay fever and allergies, please book an appointment with our consultants on our website.

Hay fever desensitisation

24th November 2017

Hay fever desensitisation

At this time of the year, you might not necessarily worry about hay fever. Plummeting temperatures and general lack of spore abundant plant life can often make winter an ideal respite for those of us who live in fear of the phrase ‘high pollen count’. However, what you may not be aware of is that the family of hay fever, asthma, and eczema often coexist in the same individuals. Partly because they share many genetic risk variants that can affect immune-related genes. Thanks to research by a consortium of medical researchers, we now understand more about the relationship between these shared genetic origins.

This is the time of the year to start treatment – hay fever desensitisation can change the underlying cause of allergy. With that in mind, we take a look at how to handle your allergies and reduce their impact.

Understanding Hay Fever

Medically speaking, hay fever is a relatively modern development. As medicine improves and changes in lifestyle have helped develop immunology to many chronic infectious diseases. As a result, hay fever has blossomed (if you’ll forgive the pun). The influence of diet and a lack of microbiome diversity have actually contributed to the emergence of hay fever, and its impact can often occur at a very early point after birth. Straightforwardly put, if you have hay fever, it’s likely that you’ve had it almost since you were born.

So what can you do about it? Thankfully, the worst reactions to hay fever are often at a younger age, but with age comes increased susceptibility to the eczema side of this coin, and such irritations will often first emerge during puberty and can last for several years.

Managing and Desensitising

Arguably the most commonly-used method for combatting hay fever is cetirizine hydrochloride, more commonly known as a non-drowsy antihistamine. When hay fever strikes, your immune system releases chemicals into your body to expel the allergen. These are histamines, and their job is to get whatever is irritating you, out of you. All that sneezing, tearing up, and itching is actually your body expelling whatever is causing you grief!

Antihistamines block the effect of histamine and thus lessens the need to sneeze, rub, or scratch.

Should antihistamines prove ineffective, you may want to consider specific immunotherapy that teaches your immune system not to react. Such therapy has proven incredibly effective against a variety of allergens but is frequently underutilised as a resource. Sublingual allergy treatment is safe and effective. It needs to start at least four months before the season. The process involves placing medication under the tongue every morning for two minutes, the process is both safe and prosperous.

Allergen-specific immunotherapy involves administering gradually increasing doses of the relevant allergen until the patient builds up a tolerance. In cases of allergic rhinitis (that’s hay fever, to you and me) this method has been proven an effective treatment to a variety of catalysts, including tree pollen, grass pollen, and even cat and dog allergies. What’s more, studies have shown that the patient’s symptoms often improve even when they were resistant to antihistamines and conventional drug therapy. In some cases, after three to five years of treatment, the allergy is almost entirely overcome.

If you find yourself suffering from hay fever or other allergic problems book an appointment with our consultants. You can contact us on our website.