Round 2

[NecroFlesh]

So back at the end of February I had a sore develop on my penis that about 12 days after having unprotected sex with a woman I consulted H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D. He concluded, like other Dr's, that my symptoms were from a reaction, a dermatitis. At 8.5 weeks my Herpeselect ELISA results were all negative. So toward the end of June, my symptoms returned. So, 20 weeks post exposure my Herpeselect are: HSV 1: 0.41 and HSV 2: 0.06. Now I'm wondering wtf?

So I have two theories, 12 days after the last encounter with the girl in question I develop symptoms. I had sex with here again toward the begining of  June and about 12 days later, boom same exact thing again. So I have either been given a yeast infection by her twice now, or this is Herpes.

This time, when the itch came on (in the SAME EXACT SPOT as last time), it came out of left field, just BOOM there it is, extreme itching that later became burning. Then there was redness and MAJOR swelling ( the swelling was very pronounced and over a large area) all within a day, so  I decided to put on some Hydrocortisone. Well come day 2 all of the skin in an area much bigger than a quarter comes peeling off and exposes the dermis. This is on the underside of my penis just below the head on the frenulum on the right side, i am circumsized. Unlike last time, this thing is much bigger and would not stop weeping, it wept for 7 days straight. If I dried it out by sleeping with a fan on my junk, when I got up and put my pants on, it would simply crack and go back to insanely weeping. No constitutional symptoms, so figuring that this could be a fungal infection I put Miconazole 2% cream on there BID, after about 3 days it was starting to resolve. Problem is I don't know if it was resolving on it's own or if the cream was doing it. The sore itself was a giant circle, there was no satellite inflammation, there were never any blisters, but again there were giant deep fissures. It's day 13 now and it still has not fully resolved.

I know hydrocortisone will make a fungal infection explode, but on the flip side I have heard it makes a herpes outbreak worse. What do you think doc? Should I get a Western Blot?


This discussion is related to Reaction or Herpes.

[NecroFlesh]

Yea I posted here by mistake the first time thinking it would post there instead of here, sorry about that.

[gracefromHHP]

you have a post on the std experts forum, you can follow up there.

I won't move this post to the herpes forum since it's being followed up on in the experts forum but any future herpes questions, should be posted there :)

grace

[scarednow526]

No.  You should believe your blood tests you already have or get a PCR swab done on the sore when it is fresh.

The thing is, you are pitting two tests against each other that are within a percentage point or two in accuracy performance comparison.  In the end, the real variance in the two tests are less than the likelihood of never seroconverting.  The chance that you are one of those people who never seroconvert is what you are really worried about.  Ask me how I know.

So, you get the Western Blot and improve your accuracy by 1-2%.  It's still not 100%, right?  98-99% is all you are gonna get.  I've done the math in my head hundreds of times.  If you don't believe the Herpeselect, you are not going to believe the WB.  Some of us just struggle with that.
Read my posts.  I'm as paranoid as they come but I've decided that the tests say I don't have Herpes, so I don't have Herpes.  I'm ignoring the symptoms that "don't sound at all like Herpes" or "look nothing like Herpes".

If a sore pops back up, I'll have it swabbed only because my Dr. suggested it.  Otherwise, neither you nor I have Herpes.  

Congratulations.

[NecroFlesh]

here is the link to the prior conversation:

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/STDs/Reaction-or-Herpes/show/1916457