Doctor wants to hold off on allergy shots. I would like them soon.

If you just started the Dymista, do know that it takes a while to start working — there's a kind of build-up period before it really kicks in. But we're talking a week, max. Good luck! And if you're really worried about anaphylaxis, some doctors will give you a prescription for EpiPens.

Have you had the scratch and sub-dermal tests done to determine what your are allergic to? If you tested positive for pollens that are in prime season right now, your doctor has a reasonable argument for waiting until the fall to start the shots. As a data point, I've been going for shots once a week for almost a year. Up until six weeks ago I barely had a reaction. As the pollen and the strength of the dosage of my shots has increased, I've had my first serious asthma attack and started experiencing noticeable reactions (redness and swelling) in both arms. In the grand scheme these are minor, but my doctor may end up dialing back my dose rather than allow me to risk a more severe anaphylactic reaction. And I am still on Fluticasone, Montelukast and a steroid inhaler. Seconding that you try a combination of medications to get you through the rest of the summer. That your doctor is being cautious is a good thing.

Allergy shots can cause http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaphylaxis. My father has severe allergies and had to keep re-starting his immunotherapy protocol and eventually had to quite because of anaphylaxis reactions. I would trust your allergist if she says it's not recommended to start right now - it seems logical to me to start at a baseline immune response vs jumping in mid-allergy season. Even if you did start right now it will take years for immunotherapy to show results, so waiting a few months won't make much difference in the end. But you could always get a second opinion, especially if you don't trust your allergist or if she's not explaining her reasoning well enough.

I had immunotherapy for about 7 years as a kid and the MD is right about timing. You should really wait until after your allergy season to start. It's not like a cortisone shot or something, it can take years to build up an immunity so you might not get any relief until a year or more down the line. And the "bad" reaction you get when your allergies are in season combined with a high allergen shot is unlike anything I've ever experienced. My arms looked like I had tennis balls under the skin and I was only 10. That said, they really do work and if you can take being stabbed in the arm a couple times a week for months on end, its worth it. It looks like they don't do it for as long as they used to but I had a lot of allergies and it was a really long time ago.

You say you're wheezing--are you taking any sort of asthma or allergy medicine like singulair? OTC stuff doesn't help my seasonal allergies but singulair + dymista work well for me. Also doing things like getting a HEPA filter for home and using a sinus rinse can be very helpful.

I don't actually wheeze - I just wanted to rhyme :)

I got allergy shots for a few years back when I was a teenager, and your doctor's decision makes sense to me. The allergy shot contains a small amount of the allergen that you're allergic to, and the amount is increased gradually, to build up your body's tolerance to it. If your body is already overwhelmed with allergies & flooding you with histamines, the shot isn't going to have any benefit, it's just going to add ammo to the attack on your system. My allergies were to dust, molds, dogs, & cats. I think the shots were beneficial, but, my allergies weren't very severe - I grew up always having cats in the house so I had some immunities to them, I just tended to have a lot of sinus issues, to the point where the high school nurse said "I'm tired of seeing you in here so much" and gave me the allergist's name to give to my parents. So, I got the shots for a while, and I think they helped, but it's hard to say for sure since my symptoms were so vague, and maybe I would have grown out of them anyway.

I'm no allergist but I suspect that it is hard to imagine what an exponentially magnified level of misery is like (and whether you'd indeed be fine putting up with it) until you've experienced it, and then you can't undo what is done. I just know that I see patients in the ED not infrequently during this season who are desperately begging me for some other medication because they absolutely cannot handle living with their allergy symptoms any longer and have exhausted all options - and I really don't have much to offer them either, and I feel bad about it because they are so desperate. I thus feel that if I were you, and I did not feel like I was at "go to the emergency department and throw myself at a doctor's feet begging for mercy" level of allergy symptoms, I wouldn't really want to take the chance of going there if I could help it. And certainly anaphylaxis is something that should give one pause, after all, it can indeed bring you to death's door and beyond.

Per my allergist, they will not give allergy shots until well out of and long before allergy season for your particular allergies. For me, that means shots starting next January. For my nasal problems, I've been having good results with Omnaris (ciclesonide). You may wish to talk to you doctor/allergist about a prescription for an Epi-Pen, just in case, since your allergies sound pretty severe. Her reasoning is that since it's ragweed season, the shots could potentially make my allergic reactions worse. But the thing is... I honestly don't care if they get worse short-term You're already having severe allergic reactions. Adding more off your allergen into your system could easily trigger anaphylaxis, which could kill you pretty quickly. (Though one does hope that allergists' offices tend to have epinephrine handy.) I'm assuming you've actually had scratch tests to narrow down your exact allergens?