[Question #13745] How to learn to think about risk like ID specialists
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30 days ago
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Hello Dr. HHH and Dr. Hook, I trust your advice. Thank you for all you do. I'm not in a committed relationship,
and I probably have some degree of health anxiety, which is why I'd like to
hear your opinion about my most recent encounters. Also, how to approach risk
assessment more scientifically so as to assess it more objectively and less
anxiously. Recent encounters - 1) three instances of unprotected oral sex/fellatio,
which I (a woman) was giving to a heterosexual man. I didn't swallow the
ejaculate. That was a few months back. 2) Most
recently, with a new man, one encounter of a mostly protected sex with a
condom, and a brief midway episode of condomless penetration for about 1-2
minutes, several thrusts, no ejaculation, and then we continued to have a condom-protected
sex. It has been 4-5 days from the most recent encounter.
I am a heterosexual woman in my 40s and my most encounters are w/ hetero men in their 40s. We reside in Canada. I asked ChatGPT and
it said that given the prevalence of HIV in Canada, multiplied by risk per one
encounter, the risk for that brief condomless sex without ejaculation is
1/several millions. Is that the correct risk assessment/math? Is it true
that the risk is much lower due to absence of an ejaculation? Is the risk much
higher for things like chlamydia and gonorrhea or still low given how brief it
was? Is there a difference between a theoretical risk and a real-life,
biological risk? Thinking about the risks numerically helps me understand them
better and it lessens the concern. ID MDs don't generally worry about such encounters because while theoretically possible, there are no
documented real life cases of transmission during single encounters, no ejaculation PIV, or oral sex but no swallowing? Please weigh in and thank you.
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H. Hunter Handsfield, MD
30 days ago
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13 days ago
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