Allergies and HEPA filters (Read 707 times)

I've been feeling a little under the weather for the better part of a week, now. At first I thought maybe I was coming down with a cold, but it gets no worse, gets no better. I've got sneezing, sore throat, more asthmatic issues than normal, feeling a bit run-down, but not enough to have too much negative effect on my runs, etc. Then it occurred to me--duh, I'll bet the mold is kicking-in outdoors. In the past couple of weeks we've had quite a few days of thawing. I'm guessing the mold count is fairly high (too early for pollen, so that's not an issue). I've never been officially allergy tested, but my mom has and is VERY allergic to mold (as well as dust mites and cats...heh, I have 4 cats and live in an old, dusty house). She and I have pretty much carbon-copy symptoms (hers are generally more severe and less responsive to meds, but coincide at the same time and under the same conditions). Anyhow, her allergist has recommended a HEPA filter for in the house, to help with mold. Does anyone else use a HEPA filter unit? If so, do you find that it helps much?

I think we're behind you (we still have a fair amt. of snow on the ground and it's frozen solid, again). Our trees don't even have buds, much less blooms. May and June are the bad months here for tree and flower pollen. We're about 10-20º colder than average and have been for the past month, so I think I've got a while before tree pollen is an issue.

In our region, pollen counts are already high.

In your region I'll bet you've had more than a week of above freezing temps for the year... It's still brown and frozen here, with large areas of snow (and random flakes in the air, all day...dang). No crocus popping up, though that will be any day now, I expect.

Just a side note: Your posts really make me want to NEVER visit Michigan. I think I would gouge my eyeballs out if it is really how I picture it from what you describe it to be weather-wise

Just a side note: Your posts really make me want to NEVER visit Michigan. I think I would gouge my eyeballs out if it is really how I picture it from what you describe it to be weather-wise

This coming from someone in NJ..."armpit of the east coast." Andy, that's one of the things that keeps me from buying one, even though I'm sure just having one in the bedroom would help. Those filters are insane. As it is we are spending $10 every 3-4 weeks on our humidifier filter to keep our skin from peeling off. Plus I would think all the dust and cat hair in this old place would overwhelm those filters really fast. We've lived in our house for almost 8 years and never had our ducts cleaned. And an extensive kitchen remodel that we are STILL finding drywall dust from almost 2 years later. k

We have a couple of Sharper Image Ionic Breeze GP Silent air purifiers in our house. Please go to the site, or and the store. It is def. worth the $ NO replacement filters.

Ooh, yikes...I did a Google search to see if I could find more info./reviews of that (which looks really good on paper) and came up with this: MSNBC story more from Quackwatch.com I thought I heard recently that SI was going under, too. Too bad...I've always liked perusing their catalog. They do carry some really cool (mostly frivolous) things. I sat in a chair like this one once while having a pedicure done. They practically had to pry me out of it...so nice! And this would be cool for keeping my Diet Chocolate Cherry Dr. Pepper cold. I could put that right next to my computer...

For a couple years now I have been using products like the venta-airwasher... before I had an airoswiss or something like that but it kicked the bucket after 1 year... I needed a humidifier that could run nonstop and wouldn't coat my bedroom with dust... These things are awesome... on top of that my alergies are WAY WAY WAY better. Also... if you get the problem with nose I have been using a neti-pot since this summer whenever I get a bit stuffy and it is also GREAT.. especially when the pollen counts go up. A rinse in the morning and another in the evening and I no longer get blocked up! Honestly the 3 together... running, venta airwasher and neti pot... and I am breathing better than I have in my entire life with no drugs...

I used to live in a house that was surrounded by cut-leaf birch trees. Turned out that I was allergic to the pollen from those trees, and it would get into the house. We got one of those fancy HEPA-filter vacuum cleaners, and kept the windows closed when the pollen was really high, and it did seem to help. It's not the same as the air filters, I know, but that's all I've got for ya.

I have heard great things about the vacuums with HEPA filters...but we have almost no carpet in our house (tore most of it out in favor of pine planks--DS's room and the upstairs are the only carpeted areas. We may eventually pull all of that up, too, since none of it's in good shape). Summers can be tough. We don't have central air, so we have to keep the windows open. We have a window AC unit in the bedroom, though, which is nice. I really hope our next home will have central air...but it's going to probably be several years before we're in a position to sell this old place (housing market definitely needs to improve--it could take years to sell even if we had our place listed right now). I'm happy to hear another good report for neti pots. That's on my short list of things to try. Crystal, Nasalcrom is pretty good stuff. I used that years back. I found the once/day prescription nasal steroids to work even better...I was really glad when Flonase went generic. I had been taking Nasacort and was paying $30-40 every month.