[Question #6531] Conclusive, right?

67 months ago

Good day Doctors, it’s an honor to have dialogue with you.

So here we go, something I need confirmation on. Back on Nov 22nd, the furthest that went with a female friend was some “fingering” after a night out at the bar. I do bite my nail, so I had a small bleed at some point from this on my finger. This is the finger used on the female. Not long at all, fairly quickly insertive action lasting maybe 30 secs.

So there’s goes my head the next day. What if this and what if that. Which is the first time my anxiety has ever gotten the best of me. So I go in on Jan 3rd (42 days later) to get the 4th Gen Ab/Ag test at S-Quest. Blood withdrawn from vein. Results came back that evening Non-Reactive.

Now I have read your posts on similar questions but as you know why the majority of us are here is for confirmation/reassurance.

Obviously CDC does say 45 days and I have read here and some others say 6 weeks (42 days) as well.

1) Would you consider anything over 40 days on the same status as 45 for conclusive? Or in my case, on the 42nd day?

2) Is a small bleed from nail biting warranted for my paranoia? I hear about “needs bloodstream access” which I assume is access to a vein not a small bleeding cut next to your nail. If you could confirm my thought on this?

And that’s basically about it. Just in advance, thank you all for all you do. Never thought I would be here asking anything like this but this is why platforms like this are available. So thank you all again. Looking forward to your response. Happy New Year.

Edward W. Hook M.D.

67 months ago

Welcome to the Forum. I'll try to help. You can count on the accuracy of your tests, not that you ever needed them (no one has ever gotten HIV through masturbation (fingering) an infected partner. The presence of a cut makes no difference. If your question was whether there was a need for testing, my response would have been an emphatic N0!. HIV is very rare in women and as I said above, no one has ever acquired HIV through masturbation of an infected partner- not ever.

In answer to your specific questions:

1. Yes. There is no meaningful difference between a 40, a 42, and a 45 day test. Further, just to hopefully provide further comfort still, more than 99.9% of tests that are going to become positive are positive by day 28. Neither of us has ever seen a person whose test was negative at day 28 go on to become positive in the next 2 weeks.

2. See my comment above. A tear in your skin from nail biting would not represent a risk.

Hope this helps. Please don't worry. EWH

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67 months ago

Honor to speak to you Dr. Hook. Thank you for your prompt response and indeed NOW I feel perfectly secure with the results.

While I have the opportunity, I would love to gather your thoughts on CDC’s change on the conclusive timeframe. I’m well aware of them being a very conservative organization but do you think they would be changing the conclusive time frame once again to a further timeframe? As I can tell, it has made a lot question their conclusive results at 28 from the previous CDC timeframe.

Other than this last question, being hypothetical as it is, I just want to thank you sir for your response and all the years of work in this field. Absolute respect to you and Dr. Handsfield as well.

Edward W. Hook M.D.

67 months ago

The CDC adopted the 42-45 day time frame at a time when they said they had seen "a few" cases who turned positive after the 4 week/28 day period that we used to quote. To my knowledge they have not published those data and as I mentioned above, neither Dr. Handsfield or I have ever seen or heard of a case which was not positive by 28 days that went on to become positive at a later time. I have no idea if the CDC, which seems to try to "never" be incorrect is being overly conservative or not. As I said, I would not worry. EWH
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67 months ago

Dr, after reading your response again, and I know you get the secondary question a lot and please accept my apology in advance, but I did mention a small “bleed” during the encounter. A tear indeed but with alittle blood. I Want to confirm your assurance even blood with some of my blood present.

Once again I apologize for the double question but this is my last obviously so no more from me. Wish you the best, sir.

Edward W. Hook M.D.

67 months ago

Yes, you did mention it and I considered it in my response. Please not the 4th sentence in the 1rst paragraph of the initial response. You describe a NO RISK event.

Please don't worry. No risk event. Conclusive test.

This completes this thread. EWH

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