For years allergists and ear, nose and throat docs have preached Afrin avoidance due to its addictive nature. In some people use of Afrin for as little as four or five days can lead to severe addiction with rebound congestion. Such patients often are trapped into escalating use of Afrin with poor outcomes.

That said, Afrin is very seductive as it is an extremely effective way to reduce nasal congestion. Hence, the University of South Carolina School of Medicine did a study to see if nasal steroids could prevent Afrin addiction.

In this study patients used both Afrin and a nasal steroid once nightly for six weeks.

The results were amazing.

The patients had excellent improvement in nasal congestion and no rebound effect. The researchers cautioned that this was a short-term study and plan to study such an approach over a longer time frame.