Rush Immunotherapy, Environmental Allergens, and Double the Allergy Shots

My daughter has been getting allergy shots for the last two years to help with her environmental allergies. They were working well until she developed a whole batch of new allergies. 

Recently we discovered that my daughter developed new allergies and now she gets 4 shots rather than the two shots that she was previously getting. Her allergy shots have helped her so much that under her allergists care, we were able to lower her antihistamine intake and asthma medications. She felt wonderful for months! Even her oral allergy syndrome was improving, but then all of the sudden, she went from having mostly clear headed and wheeze free days, to struggling again daily with hay-fever, and asthma flare ups. We had moved into a new part of the country, and she had developed allergies to the local environmental allergens. Oddly enough, she is not allergic to ragweed which is one of the most common allergens.

Because of the variety of allergens that she is allergic to (48 out of the 55 tested), the allergist was not able to combine them into fewer than 4 shots. We were told that some allergens degrade the other allergens if combined. Fortunately my daughter is able to tolerate getting four shots at one time. Our allergist told us that it is very unusual to have to get 4 allergy shots at a time and that he only had a handful of patients out of all of his patients that need four allergy shots. He told us that my daughter is supremely allergic, and is a rare case, in his experience.

To go from her 2 shots a month to now 4 shots, she went through a day of rush immunotherapy. Rush immunotherapy is where you get a few months of shots in one or two days. To prepare for this, you have to take a lot of medication. My daughter's allergist had her on a week of pre-medication leading up to the day of, and then more medication for a couple of days after. My amazingly brave daughter had 12 shots in each arm (4 every 25 min) in one morning for a total of 24 shots! She did very well and had just a tiny bit of localized mild swelling. Her arms were sore that day, and the next, but she was grateful to be weeks ahead of where she would have been if we had not done the rush immunotherapy.

To get through her allergy shots, my daughter swears by the "Shot Blocker" which works by distracting your skin with many little hard plastic points. If we forget to bring it, she asks the nurse to give her a good pinch so that she does not feel the needle going in. She also relaxes her arms and a lollipop always helps. Here is the link to the shot blocker on Amazon: SHOT BLOCKER