[Question #13528] Testing

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1 months ago

My partner and I want to stop using condoms. I tested 57 days after unprotected vaginal sex with an unfaithful partner, and 27.5 days after receiving oral sex from someone with past genital HSV-1. All results were negative: HIV (4th gen), syphilis, chlamydia, gonorrhea, trichomonas, hepatitis B & C. No HSV/HPV testing; no symptoms. Is this medically clear or should I retest? I’m a heterosexual male


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H. Hunter Handsfield, MD
1 months ago
Welcome to the forum.

These results are solid evidence you were not infected (at the time you were tested) with any of the STIs for which you were tested. In addition, some of them (HIV, chlamydia, hepatitis B and C) were zero risk from oral sex anyway. You cannot infect your partner. However, you don't mention whether or not she was tested -- you might want to consider that, depending on whether she might have had other partners recently. (For obvious reasons, when one member of a couple finds a need for other sexual adventures, often the other partner has done so as well.)

I hope these comments are helpful. Let me know if anything isn't clear.

HHH, MD
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1 months ago
Thanks for the info. I guess the question I was asking and not clear about was whether my results are complete and conclusive enough for me and my responsibility to her? She has been tested and is cleared. My timeline between other exposures was shorter than hers and I wanted to make sure I had done my due diligence. 

Is there any reason to test for HSV or HPV in this scenario? Or is what my GP said appropriate, only test if symptoms are showing?
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H. Hunter Handsfield, MD
1 months ago
Yes, "[your] results are complete and conclusive enough for [you and your] responsibility" to your partner. I'm glad to hear she also has been tested.

Your GP is exactly right. Aside from HPV testing with Pap smears in women (and increasingly anal Pap smears in men who have regular anal sexual exposures, i.e. men who have sex with men), most STI experts advise against routine testing of asymptomatic persons for HSV or HPV. The available tests just aren't accurate enough. There are exceptions, such as the regular partners of persons with genital herpes and some persons with symptoms suspected but not yet proved to be due to HSV. These are the recommendations not only of most individual experts but such agencies as CDC and its counterparts in countries other than the US.
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