Zyrtec, Allegra and Benadryl: the bizarre world of allergy med names

Allergieth thuck. Itchy eyeth, runny nothe, non-thtop thneething — they’re your bodieth way of gibbing you the finger while cocooning itthelf from the world.

Unfortunately, there is no cure for allergies. But if you want to at least keep those springtime sniffles at bay, you have two realistic options: move to Antarctica, or drug it up. Assuming you prefer to live with humans and not penguins, here’s a look at a small sample of the names of allergy fighters. Because, obviously, names tell us everything we need to know about medicine.

Benadryl

Drug – Diphenhydramine

Category – One of the more popular over-the-counter antihistamines, which relieve symptoms by blocking the body’s production of histamine during an allergic reaction.

Name – Benadryl manages to sound both Italian (read: exotic) and effective, in that you’re literally using a “good drill” to pummel and evacuate your nasal passages of pollen intruders.

Worst Side Effect – The zombie stare

Weird Fact – Benadryl is regularly used to help control shaking and tremors associated with Parkinson’s Disease.

Anagrams – Bland Rye, a lesser-known Jack Daniels variety.

Flonase

Drug name – Fluticosone

Category – Corticosteroid, designed to reduce inflammation associated with allergies in the nasal passages.

Name – Obviously you don’t want “steroid” anywhere near your name, but Flonase feels like it might turn on some nose faucet that I’m not quite prepared for. I want the river to dry up, not turn into the Mississippi.

Worst Side Effect – Overgrown nasal muscles

Weird Fact – In cream form, fluticosone is used in the treatment of eczema and psoriasis.

Anagrams – Snafelo; on fleas

Allegra

Drug Name – Fexofenadine

Category – Antihistamine

Name – The Roman goddess of cool breezes? One of the good witches in The Wizard of Oz? Allegra (Italian for “joy” or “lively”) definitely conjures an image of some benevolent Earth priestess using one hand to shield your nose, and the other to banish weed pollen into the darkness.

Worst Side Effect – Flying monkeys

Weird Fact – Allegra was the name of the illegitimate daughter of Romantic poet Lord Byron and Claire Claremont, sister of ‘Frankenstein’ author Mary Shelley.

Anagrams – Gearala; All-ager

Atarax

Drug Name – Hydroxizine

Uses – An antihistamine and anxiolytic, prescribed for either mental disorders like dementia OR itching from allergies. Or both, though a demented person with chronic hay fever sounds like a Batman villain.

Name – An allergy medicine with an axe. I’m willing to bet anyone looking to beat their allergies (or dismember them) will happily reach for a drug that literally has a murderous weapon in its name.

Worst Side Effect – Gothamitis

Weird Fact – Marketed by Pfizer since 1957, the drug was widely used as a mild tranquilizer by dentists and is well-known for its ability to enhance the effects of pain-killers.

Anagrams – Ax Tara …

Zyrtec

Drug – Cetirizine

Category – Antihistamine

Name – The Z and hard C give Zyrtec the sound of a lethal, snot-killing robot from outer space. To tell you the truth, I would much rather have a pollen-killing alien cyborg on my side than any human-spawned medication.

Worst Side Effect – Imagine putting the terminator IN YOUR BODY…

Weird Fact – Zyrtec was the highest-selling new non-food product in the United States in 2008.

Anagrams – RecZyt, not your mom’s acne medication.

Azmacort

Drug Name – Triamcinolone

Category – An inhaled corticosteroid that shrinks inflamed air passages; Won’t work for up to two weeks, so plan asthma attacks accordingly.

Name – Azma is a good play on asthma, one of those words that actually gets harder and harder to say the more you stare at it. Still, the word makes it sound like the drug was made by Aztecs.

Worst Side Effect – Yeast infections in your mouth and unusual hair growth. Seriously.

Weird Fact – In early 2010, the manufacturer of Azmacort agreed to stop producing the drug due to the spray can’s emissions of chlorofluorocarbons, chemicals which deplete the ozone layer.

Anagrams – Cram-O-Taz

As we can see in the brands above, allergy medicine names tend to fall into two categories: sanctuary or slaughter. Allegra, Claritin — these tend to have an airy, peaceful quality to them, as if the drug will sweep you away to a magical place where hay fever and eye-rubbing don’t exist. Conversely, names like Zyrtec and Atarax sound like they will destroy anything in their path, possibly including your esophagus.

With drug companies prohibited from using a brand name that might “encode or imply a dosage, imply efficacy, or suggest unapproved indications,” this corner of the naming universe is a bizarre confluence of the need to convey an effect … without being able to specify exactly what that effect is.

So until Pfizer is allowed to call its newest drug HappyNasalFantasticCureAllSpray, count on trying to sort through today’s fanciful, foreboding and ultimately meaningless medicine names to cure your allergy woes.