The Medical Thread: We're experts on everything else; why not?

[walrus]

My Gastro and and my GP, $398.00 and $200..00

 

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

I have to believe that despite improved awareness of the sordid history of Big Pharma's 'questionable' marketing ethics, the average has probably gone up quite a bit in the last 20-25 years. It's got to be very tempting to take all the free meals you can get when any decent med school now costs a quarter million to attend and graduate from.

 

[dxmnkd316]

You can look up what your doctor gets paid by pharmaceutical companies. The number should be close to 0 in my opinion. If you look me up, I think I have under $50 which I think came from a lunch I walked into as a fellow and my name got written down.

I delete every email any pharma rep sends me. I have brought a couple to tears when they approach me at conferences when I confront them on their company's bullshit.

If a colleague goes to a pharma dinner, I ask them why they cannot afford their own dinner on their salary.

Anyway, some physicians are like me. Most will do a little interaction that is likely not super harmful, but I still recommend avoiding it. The info you get from the pharma company can be accurate, but usually has a slant or is incomplete. I just tell them to point me to the peer reviewed article and that shuts them down fairly quick.

I didn’t know about this. Neat.

My brother has never accepted a penny and my primary has accepted $11.

 

[Deutsche Gopher Fan]

What do people use for seasonal allergies?

They’ve only happened in recent years. Eyes watering all day, Congestion.

One pharmacist Insisted nasal Spray. Didn’t help eyes at all and nasty as fuck

Different pharmscist Said that’s stupid, never use nasal Spray for Watering eyes.

So I tried zyrtec, didn’t do shit.
Picked up allegra today, may be working

 

[St. Clown]

My daughter’s doc told us that Zyrtec requires months of daily use to build up in your body. Only then will it finally work at full strength. I think that’s why they prescribe it for my daughter, trying to avoid too big of an initial shock to her system. But I’m hardly trained in anything medical, so I’m probably dead ass wrong on that point.

I use generic Claritin, which does the trick for me. I’ve never tried Allegra.

 

[WisconsinWildcard]

Daily use will provide more benefit. Generally, zyrtec will have the most anticholinergic side effects (dry mouth, drowsiness, constipation) of the second generations, with Claritin and Allegra having less side effects for most people.

I use claritin with decent success.

 

[Deutsche Gopher Fan]

Thank you! I’m gonna Stick with allegra for a bit.

I had zyrtec sitting around because it’s the only one Safe for dogs of course

Man that nasal Spray was Like when my old West village walk up would get sprayed for bugs. Just disgusting assault on Senses

 

[unofan]

Any of the pills you need to take daily to build it up in the system. And don't bother with the versions that claim to have decongestants in them; the new formulations that no longer use Sudafed don't work. Just grab generic Sudafed separately from the pharmacist.

The nasal sprays and Sudafed are used to mitigate the bad days. There are some decent eye drops out there as well for days when you want to claw them out.

Allergies are definitely bad this year. My prime allergy season is memorial day through the 4th of July, but i can already feel them starting.

 

[dxmnkd316]

What do people use for seasonal allergies?

They’ve only happened in recent years. Eyes watering all day, Congestion.

One pharmacist Insisted nasal Spray. Didn’t help eyes at all and nasty as fuck

Different pharmscist Said that’s stupid, never use nasal Spray for Watering eyes.

So I tried zyrtec, didn’t do shit.
Picked up allegra today, may be working

It varies. Latest and best info I have is give various things a try for a week. Make a note if they work or not and for which allergens (if you can determine that) and give something else a try. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Claritin works ok for me. But Sudafed works best during the day. It just has issues with over drying my sinuses sometimes.

Was talking to a director of research at a pharma company recently. He suffers from seasonal allergies and said there’s some newer drug that is a combination of a couple drugs that’s extremely promising (not his company). It combines a primary drug with a small amount of a corticosteroid. Long term use of things like Flonase CAN, but not always, lead to glaucoma. But apparently this combo doesn’t have that same level of risk in the latest studies.

Anyways. Give things a shot and talk to your primary.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Any of the pills you need to take daily to build it up in the system. And don't bother with the versions that claim to have decongestants in them; the new formulations that no longer use Sudafed don't work. Just grab generic Sudafed separately from the pharmacist.

The nasal sprays and Sudafed are used to mitigate the bad days. There are some decent eye drops out there as well for days when you want to claw them out.

Allergies are definitely bad this year. My prime allergy season is memorial day through the 4th of July, but i can already feel them starting.

Fake Sudafed was pulled from the market. They finally admitted it doesn’t do shit.