[Question #1762] Are these my odds? HIV...
95 months ago
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Hello Doctors,
I am a lifelong healthy male who, last summer, had unprotected vaginal and oral sex with a female who claims to be HIV negative. Somewhere around 3/4 weeks after the encounter I began to feel terrible. Light fever, lot's of fatigue, total loss of appetite, change in stool patterns and coloration, night sweats, among other things. It's been about 7 months since the incident and I'm happy to say that almost all of my symptoms have resolved. I still have some swollen taste buds and a bit of a cotton mouth.
During this time I tested for all STD's, the results always being negative. I specifically tested for HIV 8 times. 3 times were with an oraquick (which I believe were inside the test window period), 2 times with an HIV RNA (about 1 and 1.5 months after exposure) and 3 times with a 4th generation duo test (earliest was 2.5 months after exposure, latest was about 5 months after exposure).
My odds of meeting a female in the U.S. who has HIV, 1/500. My odds of contracting HIV from unprotected vaginal single exposure, 1/1000. Odds of 5 highly specific, highly sensitive, highly accurate HIV tests giving a false negative within the test time frames 1/495. So my odds of having HIV are 1/247,500,000.
1). Would you agree that these figures are in the ballpark?
2). Are the odds good enough to call myself conclusively HIV negative requiring no further testing?
Thanks!
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H. Hunter Handsfield, MD
95 months ago
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95 months ago
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H. Hunter Handsfield, MD
95 months ago
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95 months ago
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Ah yes Doctor, you are correct. That was a silly math error on my part. In any case, it appears the odds are miniscule and asymptotically approach 0.
I am 30 years old and thereby fully agree with you that I should have had Mono/EBV a long time ago given the statistics. I've had somewhere around 10 partners in my life, so it would make sense that I have it by now. For whatever reason, the testing indicates differently. I also can't remember ever having been this fatigued/ill before, so maybe it was my first encounter with it. Maybe it was something else all together... who knows.
I can only hope my lingering issues resolve over time. Thanks again for your insights and take care.
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H. Hunter Handsfield, MD
95 months ago
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