Dr. Lera (Dr. Larry) discusses whether Benadryl (diphenhydramine) works for pet allergies. He states Benadryl is effective only about 5–10% of the time for typical (mostly seasonal) allergy-related itch in dogs, is less likely to help food allergies, and is much more useful for anaphylactic or vaccine-related reactions. He notes generic diphenhydramine can be used but dosage should be confirmed with a veterinarian, and advises starting Benadryl about an hour before vaccination and continuing every 12 hours for 24–48 hours when preventing vaccine reactions. He also mentions evaluating for secondary infections and considering alternatives (apoquel, oclacitinib, cyclosporine, etc.) for persistent allergies.
Questions this video answers
About 5 to 10% of the time.
Diphenhydramine.
About an hour before vaccine administration.
Continue for another 24 to 48 hours afterwards, giving it every 12 hours.
Chapters
Hey, guys. Dr. Larry here with M and M. And the topic of the video today is does Benadryl work and what are the options? Stay tuned and you'll find out. All right, so does Benadryl work? Short answer, no, it doesn't work. So if that's what all you wanted, video is done. I'm just kidding. So Benadryl typically works about 5 to 10% of the time in allergy patients. Now, when I'm talking about allergies, typically I'm talking about seasonal allergies, not food allergies, because most stocks are going to have skin with ears with general itchiness. And so Benadryl, when it does seem to work, does tend to work about 5 to 10% of the time. If Benadryl does work for your dog in that particular scenario, fantastic news for you because Benadryl is a much less expensive treatment than apoquil, ectopica, tamarel P, cytokine. Those are the medications or treatments that we typically use for allergies and mostly seasonal allergies in dogs. The other thing to keep in mind is if you are looking at using Benadryl, Benadryl is you don't have to use the name brand. You can use the generic, which is diphenhydramine. Typically, you're going to want to talk to your veterinarian about the dosage that would be appropriate for your dog. Again, usually if your dog is having some sort of itchiness or something like that, you'll want to see if there is some sort of secondary infection that has set up shop as a result of the allergies. That being said, when I was talking about allergies and the medications, I said seasonal allergies. I didn't say food allergies. The reason being is that we have a hit or miss with food allergies. The medications and the treatments that we use, even the expensive ones, don't really seem to work all that consistently. So I think the chances of Benadryl working for food allergies is much less likely. Finally, the situation that we do use Benadryl and more Benadryl does seem to work really, really well is in cases of what we call anaphylactic reactions or vaccine induced reactions. So typically if your dog's going to the vet or your cat's going to the vet and you know that they do get tired and they have soft stool or soreness or that kind of stuff, you can look at giving them some Benadryl starting probably about an hour before the vaccine administration and then what you would want to do is probably continue it for another 24 to 48 hours afterwards, giving it every 12 hours. Again, you would go ahead and confirm the dosage with your veterinarian based on your pet's weight, the most recent weight, and if your pet has a severe reaction even, or has some sort of reaction even with the Benadryl, you want to make sure you communicate that with your veterinarian so that way they can go ahead and either a potentially look at giving a different brand of vaccine, b look at separating out vaccines, or c look at maybe discontinuing vaccine if they were able to identify which vaccine actually caused the allergic reaction. So if you guys found this video helpful, please give us a thumbs up. Subscribe and share. Thanks for watching and have a blessed day. Sam.
