Blood transfusion

[carolina48]

I hard a hiv exposes and one week later I had a heart attack and got two pints of blood.I waited 5 months and 1 week to have a antibody test. It was negative.can I on my results or will the blood transfusion effect my results and it take longer for my antibodies to show up. thanks for your help.

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

It's hard to imagine your Red Cross dontation center has never been asked about this.  My guess is you spoke with a relatively low-level employee and not one with much medical knowledge.

As discused in the thread linked above, all HIV tests are conclusive well before 22 weeks.

Thanks for the thanks. Take care.

[dodgeball1]

Thanks for your answer. I was told by the Red Cross that they had never been asked that questio and were not sure how to answer it. I feel much better after your answer. I waited 22 wweeks to be sure. so one more time do you think the test wqs conclusive. thanks last question

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

Welcome to the forum and thanks for your question.  I hope you have recovered well from your heart attack.

The HIV blood tests are among the most accurate diagnostic tests ever developed, for any medical condition.  They are very robust and are not affected by any other health condition, including blood transfusion.  In theory they may be affected by life threatening conditions like terminal cancer or potent chemotherapy, but even here, there are few if any actual cases of delayed HIV test positivity.

And for what it's worth, you needn't have waited (and maybe worried) for 5 months.  The modern HIV tests are definitive after 4-8 weeks, depending on the specific tests (or comination of tests) that are done.  For more detail on this, see http://www.medhelp.org/posts/show/1704700 .

I hope this has been helpful.  Best regards--  HHH, MD