One of those "someones" (self-maintenance) is me. I have some scientific support (see the last paragraph of the linked article), but in general allergists don't like the idea of self-administered stings for maintenance therapy. If asked why, they will go on about unmanaged risk (not in a medical setting) and lack of precise dosage, but as there have not been any valid studies looking at self-maintenance they can't give any hard data to back up their statements. I personally favor self-maintenance for four reasons:
1. Real bee venom contains more compounds than the extracts used by allergists, due to evaporative loss of volatile components during venom collection. There are documented cases of people who have completed immunotherapy but continue to have allergic reactions when stung by actual bees; these folks are clearly allergic to a venom component that is lost during processing. I personally found that, in terms of my body's response, one real sting was the equivalent of about two of their "two-sting" injections. Thus I would rather be desensitized to real bee venom vs. the incomplete extract version. (This difference between extracts and real venom is also a good reason to get your first "sting challenge" in a medical setting, or at least to have your epi-pen ready.)
2. Weekly stings provide desensitization of local swelling responses in most people. When I started my weekly stings, I would swell for a couple of days. Now my swelling is much less and usually gone in under 12 hours. I find that the less stings affect quality of life, the more I can enjoy beekeeping without worrying about getting stung.
3. Weekly stings provide peace of mind for me. The natural response after experiencing an allergic reaction is to fear that it will happen again. After about 10 stings that worry abated, and now after 50 weekly stings with no hint of allergy I no longer consider myself allergic to bees.
4. Allergy shots take time and money. I don't expect that I am getting exactly 50 micrograms from each bee, but I do leave the stinger in for five minutes or so to make sure I get whatever that bee has to offer, and I don't believe that precise dosage is all that important for immune stimulus except in the early phases of desensitization when too high a dose could trigger anaphylaxis.
To be fair, there is no reason a person couldn't self-administer weekly stings while continuing to receive maintenance-dose injections. I did that for about six months, until June this year. In addition to the monthly bill, I was annoyed by the allergist's unwillingness to consider the benefit of self-administered stings, the requirement to stay in the office for 30 minutes "just in case" I had an allergic response this time (cell phone Scrabble got a bit old), and the rule that they couldn't inject less than 48 hours after a sting (which I lied about a couple of times). I guess what bothered me the most was their perspective that they had diagnosed me with a chronic condition and that I would always be allergic to bees, whereas I considered myself cured once I had reached maintenance dose and tolerated ~20 stings with no allergic response.
I should add that my allergic response (whole-body hives, itching, racing pulse) came on slowly and was not judged to be life-threatening. I think if I had experienced a life-threatening reaction I would have been more likely to continue the maintenance injections for the recommended 3-5 years.
Finally, I recommend that all beekeepers experiencing allergy read this article, written by a beekeeper MD and compiling much of the available scientific research into a readable form:
http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/entomology/apiculture/pdfs/Marterre.2006b copy.pdf
Mark