Terfenadine treatment of fall hay fever

A double-blind, parallel, multicenter study was undertaken in 215 ragweed skin test positive-patients with fall hay fever. The patients were randomized and treated for seven days with either 60 mg terfenadine twice daily, morning and evening, and a placebo at noon, or with 4 mg chlorpheniramine or placebo three times daily. The severity of nasopharyngeal itching, sneezing, rhinorrhea, nasal congestion, and itchy, watery, red eyes was ranked daily by patients and evaluated before and after treatment by the physician investigators. The patients reported a significant reduction in symptoms within one day. The physician investigators detected moderate to complete relief of symptoms in a greater proportion of the patients treated with terfenadine (70%) and chlorpheniramine (73%) than in the placebo-treated patients (48%). The incidence of sedation with terfenadine treatment (2.5%) was not different from that with placebo (2.4%) and both were lower than with chlorpheniramine (7.6%). We conclude that terfenadine is as effective as chlorpheniramine for the treatment of fall hay fever and that, unlike chlorpheniramine, the incidence of sedation with terfenadine was not different from placebo.