[Question #3579] Herpes?

89 months ago

Hello and thank you for this great service.

I have had unprotected oral sex (both ways) about 3 times in the last month with a sex worker. I have no symptoms. But the other day my wife had a painful white looking sore inside her mouth towards the back of her throat. Worried, I got an std check from Lab Corp. I tested .91 for HSV 2 which they called "equivocal" and say it could be early stages and I should get retested...if that's the case how long should wait . What does "equivocal" mean in this context and what do you think my chances are of having contracted and passed along HSV 2. Maybe coincidentally a few days after the sore appeared, I seem to be having a breakout of my long standing HSV 1 which of course i tested positive for. I tested negative for everything else.

A little history. In that past I tested positive for HSV 2 a few time with Quest but negative with LabCorp. I got the Western Blot and tested negative.

Terri Warren, RN, Nurse Practitioner

88 months ago

I think it is very likely that this equivocal result is along the same lines as your previous positive then negative IgG followed by a negative western blot. I think it is very very unlikely that you would acquire HSV 2 genitally from receiving oral sex, even from a sex worker. People who have HSV 2 orally shed and recur quite infrequently and I doubt you would receive oral sex from her on a day that she happened to be shedding virus. I don't think it would hurt to test once more,perhaps a month out, so see if there is any dramatic increase in the index value but I would be so very surprised if you contracted HSV 2 in this way.

Terri
---