11years old with hives for 4 days. taking claritin 10 mg once daily with benadryl every 6 hours but hives still coming and going. what could be done? claritin alone always helped in the past and hives would only last a day but not this time. concern?

The claritin dose safely can be adjusted to 20-40mg a day. You can try zyrtec 20-40mg a day instead as well. Most often this will resolve over the next week or 2. An immune response from a viral illness (i.e. common cold) is the most common cause of hives in children. Ref: Ferrante The care pathway for children with urticaria, angioedema, mastocytosis, World Allergy Organization Journal 2015,8:5

Can take a few weeks for hives to resolve,depending on what they are in response to,as that substance,whether an allergen or a virus stays in the body for awhile and the response to it also lasts.This is quite common,especially in someone for whom this is a recurrent problem.The over-the-counter dosing of the Claritin may be able to be increased; trying Zyrtec might work even better;try at night.

It would be beneficial to identify the cause of the hives. However, this is probably going to require a visit to the doctor’s office or clinic for an individual assessment where they may take a medical history.