URGENT!!! Claritin or Zyrtec

[fortindycouple]

Our vet told us to give Jack 2 of either a day for his allergies. Any suggestions or experience with either of these. We're trying to figure out which one is best to use

 

[BruceP]

Sorry, we've never used either. Benedryl works for HRH

 

[Dubbiedog]

Dublin has just awful allergies.. We had her on Benedryl and felt it wasn't working well after a while so the vet said to try Zyrtec. We had even less success with that so now we are back to Benedryl. She gets the max we can give her because the allergies can be so bad at times. No experience with Claritin

 

[linwhite]

Benedryl here - 1 mg per pound of dog. That means a 50 pound dog gets 2 tablets, a 25 # dog gets 1. They are easy to break. Wrap in a glob of peanut butter and the dog will chow down. Target has the best price on generic Benedryl around here. It's way less expensive than the ones you mentioned too. You can dose them every 8 hours. If they get a bit too much all that will happen is they will sleep it off, so it's pretty safe.

 

[cowsmom]

ive not tried claritin but im going to but have used zyrtec. our vet said only one pill a day 1/2 am 1/2 pm. she does ok on it for a few days at a time but i mostly use benadryl. it did seem to help her allergies more and less drowsiness.

 

[Lily122511]

We have only used Benedryl.

 

[Meggs19]

I have tried both! There was a period of time when Tonka kept scratching his corneas because his eyes were itching him so badly. So we tried every antihistamine out there pretty much haha. I know that our vet told us it really depends on he individual dog and the severity of the allergies when it comes to which type will work best. Benadryl did nothing for Tonka but works great for many dogs. I didn't notice a difference between the Claritan or the Zyrtec when Tonka was on them, he kept scratching while on both (he has pretty severe allergies-tested allergic to 15 different environmental items on the skin test). I never noticed any drowsiness with either type since Tonka is super high energy and was a puppy. We now have him on Hydroxyzine-2 per day. I think it's available by prescription only and it's the one that seemed to work best for Tonka of the ones we tried. We also have him on the allergy shots. It's only been 4 months so it's too soon to say if they are working yet.


I think you might need to pick one and try it and see if there's improvement after a month or so and if not, then maybe try the other. One of them might be that "right fit" for your bulldog.

 

[Meggs19]

Oops, forgot to mention that the reason some antihistamines work well for some dogs and not others and the reason to try different kinds/brands is because they belong to different "classes." They all have slightly different makeups. My vet tried one from every "class" of antihistamines to try to find the right fit for Tonka.

 

[Maximus]

Benadryl didn't work for Maximus at all ---- so now he's on Zyrtec .... and the Vet said he can have 2 tabs in the AM and 2 tabs in the PM. I'll see how that works for him ...... no experience here with Claritin.

 

[kazzy220]

We haven't tried these with our bullies, but our black lab mix has seasonal allergies. In the past Benadryl has worked ok. This year has been the worst year for allergies so far. The benadryl completely stopped working and so we gave Zyrtek a try. It did take away about 80% of his itchies but wasn't perfect. Luckily, the temps here are dropping close to freezing every night now and there has been a considerable reduction in his licking and itching. Thank goodness!!!!

 

[sheshistory]

I have used both Zyrtec and Claritin for my itchy bullies and I would say Zyrtec worked better than Claritin - though I had limited luck with each.

 

[fortindycouple]

We decided to try the Claritin first...MISTAKE!!! He was literally bouncing off the walls for 5 straight hours!!!