Thursday, March 28, 2024

How To Know If You Have Hiv Female

Syphilis Symptoms In Women

HOW TO Know you have HIV/major AIDs symptoms in men and women

Syphilis is a highly contagious infection thats usually transmitted during vaginal, anal, or oral sex through contact with a chancre . These chancres can appear on your vulva, in the vagina, around the anus, inside the rectum, or in or around the mouth.

In women, syphilis symptoms can be easily overlooked or unnoticed. Sores may be mistaken for ingrown hairs or harmless bumps, or they can occur internally or in places that are difficult to look at. Also, syphilis can be confusing and sneaky because it goes through different stages with varying symptoms, and there may be times when you have no symptoms at all. According to the CDC, the start of first syphilis symptoms can range from 10-90 days after infection.9

Syphilis symptoms in women include:

  • Single or multiple chancres
  • Usually firm, round, and painless or sometimes wet and open
  • Typically pop up where the infection entered your body
  • Red or reddish-brown spots on the palms of the hand and/or bottoms of the feet
  • Gray or whitish lesions in the mouth, underarm, or groin area
  • Sore throat
  • Mental confusion
  • Deterioration of sight or hearing
  • Chancres usually last about 3-6 weeks before healing on their own. Even though the sore is gone, the infection stays in the body and can eventually progress to more advanced stages. Left untreated, syphilis can damage your nervous system, brain, and other organs and cause serious health problems like blindness, paralysis, or even death.

    Managing Illness As A Parent

    Although medical advances now allow people with HIV to live full, healthy lives, you may have times where you or your partner is unwell or needs medical care.

    As with any longer-term illness, this can impact on your ability to earn an income, manage a household or raise children.

    Living with chronic illness can be a challenge and sometimes families need extra support. Trying to sort things out on your own can make life seem overwhelming. Dont be afraid to ask for help from expert organisations that support people with HIV.

    Treatment And Life Expectancy

    If HIV develops into stage 3 HIV, life expectancy drops significantly. Its difficult to repair damage to the immune system at this point. Infections and other conditions, such as certain cancers, resulting from severe immune system impairment are common. However, with successful antiretroviral therapy and some immune system recovery, many people with stage 3 HIV live long lives.

    With todays treatments for HIV infection, people can live with HIV and never have AIDS develop. Its also important to note that successful antiretroviral treatment and a sustained undetectable viral load greatly lowers the risk of transmitting the virus to a partner.

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    Stage : The Asymptomatic Stage

    Once a person has been through the acute primary infection stage and seroconversion process, they can often start to feel better. In fact, HIV may not cause any other symptoms for up to 10 or even 15 years .

    However, the virus will still be active, infecting new cells and making copies of itself. HIV can still be passed on during this stage. If left untreated, over time, HIV infection will cause severe damage to the immune system.

    How Do You Give A Woman Oral Sex

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    Before you begin giving a woman oral sex, she may enjoy it if you spend some time kissing and touching her upper thighs and the area around her vagina first, to help her get aroused.

    The whole genital area is sensitive, but for most women the clitoris is the most sensitive part. Gently part the outer lips of the vagina and look for the vaginal opening, and the hooded clitoris just above it.

    Start off softly, using a relaxed tongue to make slow movements and work up to faster movements with a firmer tongue. You can experiment moving your tongue in different ways and try different rhythms taking cues from your partner to find out what she enjoys most.

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    Are There Any Issues That Affect Hiv Treatment In Women

    Treatment with HIV medicines is recommended for everyone with HIV. Treatment with HIV medicines helps people with HIV live longer, healthier lives. ART also reduces the risk of HIV transmission.

    People should start taking HIV medicines as soon as possible after HIV is diagnosed. However, birth control and pregnancy are two issues that can affect HIV treatment in women.

    Birth control

    Some HIV medicines may reduce the effectiveness of hormonal contraceptives, such as birth control pills, patches, rings, or implants. Women taking certain HIV medicines may have to use an additional or different form of birth control. For more information, view the HIV and Birth Control infographic from HIVinfo.

    Pregnancy

    Women with HIV take HIV medicines during pregnancy and childbirth to reduce the risk of perinatal transmission of HIV and to protect their own health.

    The choice of an HIV treatment regimen to use during pregnancy depends on several factors, including a womans current or past use of HIV medicines, other medical conditions she may have, and the results of drug-resistance testing. In general, pregnant women with HIV can use the same HIV treatment regimens recommended for non-pregnant adultsunless the risk of any known side effects to a pregnant woman or her baby outweighs the benefits of a regimen.

    Talk With Your Hiv Health Care Provider

    Talk with your health care provider about the benefits of HIV treatment and which HIV medication is right for you. Discuss how frequently you should get your viral load tested to make sure it remains undetectable.

    If your lab results show that the virus is detectable or if you are having trouble taking every dose of your medication, you can still protect your HIV-negative partner by using other methods of preventing sexual transmission of HIV such as condoms, safer sex practices, and/or pre-exposure prophylaxis for an HIV-negative partner until your viral load is undetectable again.

    Taking HIV medicine to maintain an undetectable viral load does not protect you or your partner from getting other sexually transmitted diseases , so talk to your provider about ways to prevent other STDs.

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    Reducing Hiv Transmission During Labour

    Ways to reduce HIV transmission during birth include:

    • Avoiding procedures in labour that may scratch or cut the babys skin, wherever possible .
    • Giving antiretroviral medications to the newborn for around 4 weeks after birth.

    Caesarean delivery is recommended if a woman:

    • Has a detectable viral load, .
    • Is not taking antiretroviral treatment.
    • Experiences obstetric delivery complications .
    • Has other medical illness complications.

    How Does Hiv Spread

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    HIV can spread in different ways:

    • Through unprotected sex with a person who has HIV. This is the most common way it spreads. Women may be at greater risk of being infected with HIV during sexual contact than men are. For example, vaginal tissue is fragile and can tear during sex. This can let HIV enter the body. Also, the vagina has a large surface area that can be exposed to the virus.
    • Through contact with the blood of a person who has HIV
    • From mother to baby during pregnancy, childbirth, or breastfeeding

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    What Is ‘safer Sex’

    We know a lot about how HIV is transmitted from person to person. Having safer sex means you take this into account and avoid risky practices.

    There are two reasons to practice safer sex: to protect yourself and to protect others.

    Protecting yourself

    If you have HIV, you need to protect your health. When it comes to sex, this means practicing safer sex to avoid sexually transmitted diseases like herpes and hepatitis. HIV makes it harder for your body to fight off diseases. What might be a small health problem for someone without HIV could be big health problem for you. Your VA provider can prescribe condoms for you if you need them.

    Protecting your partner

    Taking care of others means making sure that you do not pass HIV or any other sexually transmitted infections to them.

    “Being safe” usually means protecting yourself and others by using condoms for the highest-risk sex activities, specifically for anal and vaginal sex. When done correctly, condom use is very effective at preventing HIV transmission. In recent years, “being safe” has come to include two other important strategies for reducing HIV infections: 1. HIV treatment for people with HIV and, 2. PrEP for HIV negative people . Both are very effective at reducing the risk of HIV infection. One or more of them is likely to be appropriate for your situation–be sure to ask your health care provider for more information.

    What about antiretroviral therapy for HIV prevention?

    What about pre-exposure prophylaxis ?

    Top Tips For Oral Sex

    It can take a while to work out what makes someone feel good. The best thing to do is to keep communicating with your partner. Ask them to tell you what feels nice and let them know when you are enjoying something.

    If youre happy and comfortable with someone, oral sex can be a great way to get physically closer and learn what turns each other on. If you find you arent enjoying something you can stop at any time you want, and the same is true for your partner.

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    What Factors Put Women At Risk For Hiv

    HIV is spread through blood, pre-seminal fluids, semen, vaginal fluids, rectal fluids, and breast milk. In the United States, the main risk factors for HIV transmission are the following:

    • Having anal or vaginal sex with a person who has HIV without using a condom or taking medicines to prevent or treat HIV. Anal sex is the riskiest type of sex for getting HIV, because the rectums lining is thin and may allow HIV to enter the body during anal sex.
    • Sharing injection drug equipment , such as needles, with a person who has HIV.

    In women, several factors can increase the risk of HIV transmission. For example, during vaginal or anal sex, a woman has a greater risk for getting HIV because, in general, receptive sex is riskier than insertive sex. Age-related thinning and dryness of the vagina may also increase the risk of HIV in older women, because these can cause a tear in the vagina during sex and lead to HIV transmission. A woman’s risk of HIV can also increase if her partner engages in high-risk behaviors, such as injection drug use or having sex with other partners without using condoms.

    Herpes Might Not Have Any Symptoms

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    You or your partner may not have any herpes symptoms that you can see or feel, or the signs of herpes may be so mild you dont even notice them. Sometimes people confuse herpes symptoms with other things, like pimples, ingrown hairs, and the flu.

    Herpes symptoms come and go, but that doesnt mean the infection goes away or that you cant spread it to other people. Once you have herpes, it stays in your body for life.

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    How Long Does It Take To Show Std Symptoms

    Some women show STD symptoms within days or weeks of infection, but others take longer or may never experience symptoms at all. Its common to show few or no symptoms, so a woman living with STDs may not know anything is wrong for a long time. The incubation period of STDs, which is the time between when you contract an infection and when symptoms first appear, varies depending on the type of infection.

    How Can I Keep From Getting Hiv

    The best way to protect yourself is to avoid activities that put you at risk. There’s no way to tell by looking at someone if he or she has HIV. Always protect yourself. Use latex condoms whenever you have any type of sex .

    • Don’t use condoms made from animal products.
    • Use water-based lubricants .
    • Never share needles to take drugs.
    • Avoid getting drunk or high. Intoxicated people might be less likely to protect themselves.
    • Consider getting testedit is really important to be aware of your HIV status.

    If you are a healthcare worker, you are at a slightly higher risk of getting HIV from a needle-stick injury, skin contact with contaminated fluid or from human bites. You should follow universal precautions:

    • Always wear protective equipment when dealing with blood and body fluids.
    • Follow careful hand-washing guidelines when dealing with such fluids.
    • Follow safe handling guidelines for needles and sharp instruments.
    • Be aware of post-exposure policies at your workplace.

    If you are in a relationship with a partner who has HIV, or you are at high risk for any other reason, consider using pre-exposure prophylaxis, commonly called PrEP. This means taking one of two medicines every day, emtricitabine-tenofovir or emtricitabine-tenofovir alafen .

    If you are a person with HIV who is in a relationship with a person who is HIV-negative, you should also be on a medication regimen.

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    Symptom : Night Sweats

    Many people will get night sweats during the early stages of HIV. These can be even more common later in infection and arent related to exercise or the temperature of the room.

    With such a vast array of symptoms, HIV testing is vital to ensure a proper diagnosis. If you think youve been exposed to HIV, or have an active sex life with casual sex partners, regardless of whether you are showing symptoms of HIV or not, its important to get tested as soon as possible.

    If youre in Sydney, you can get a rapid HIV test and STI check-up at a. If youre not in Sydney, you can still get a rapid HIV test and STI check-up using our where to get tested tool here.

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    How To Know If You Have AIDS – Recognize HIV Symptoms
    • HIV can pass from mother to baby during pregnancy or birth or via breastmilk.
    • Due to treatment advances, mother to child transmission of HIV is very rare in Australia.
    • With medical support, the HIV transmission rate from mother with HIV taking antiretroviral treatment to their unborn child is 1% or less in Australia.

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    How Can I Know If I Have Hiv

    The only way to know if you have HIV is to take an HIV test. Many medical groups recommend routine voluntary HIV screening of all patients aged 18 to 75 years of age as a normal part of medical care. The reason for this is that nearly one out of seven people infected with HIV are not aware that they have the infection.

    What Are The Symptoms Of Hiv

    Some people get flu-like symptoms a month or two after they have been infected. This is called the acute stage. These symptoms often go away within a week to a month.

    You can have HIV for many years before feeling ill. This is called clinical latency or the chronic stage.

    AIDS is the most severe stage of HIV infection. In this stage, the immune system has been weakened by the HIV virus and is less able to fight off infections. Opportunistic infections are infections that could generally be fought off by a healthy immune system. In order to be diagnosed with AIDS, you have to have fewer than 200 CD4 cells per cubic millimeter of blood , OR you must have developed what are called opportunistic infections or certain cancers. You can develop AIDS even if your CD4 count is not 200 or lower.

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    You Actually Get Diagnosed With Meningitis

    As HIV disseminates through your central nervous system, it can cause viral meningitis, a swelling of the membranes that protect the brain and spinal cord, says Amesh Adalja, M.D., an infectious disease expert at Johns Hopskins Bloomberg School of Public Health. According to the CDC, common symptoms of viral meningitis include fever, irritability, lethargy, and vomiting.

    Cryptococcal meningitis is also commonly associated with HIV infections, though usually in later stages or in patients with AIDS. Most people are exposed to the cryptococcus fungus at some point, but a weakened immune system cant fight off exposure the way a healthy one can.

    How Do People Get Hiv

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    You can get HIV when body fluids from an infected person enter your bloodstream. Body fluids are blood, semen, vaginal fluids, fluids from the anus, and breast milk.

    The virus can enter the blood through linings in the mouth, anus, or sex organs , or through broken skin. Both men and women can spread HIV.

    You can have HIV and feel okay and still give the virus to others. Pregnant women with HIV can also give the virus to their babies.

    The most common ways that people get HIV are having sex with an infected person and sharing a needle to take drugs.

    You cannot get HIV from:

    • Touching or hugging someone who has HIV/AIDS.
    • Public bathrooms or swimming pools.
    • Sharing cups, utensils, or telephones with someone who has HIV/AIDS.
    • Bug bites.
    • Donating blood.

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    Do Stds Go Away By Themselves

    You may be wondering what to do next if you test positive for an STD. Do these infections go away on their own, or will you need to seek treatment? Hereâs the deal: almost all STDs will not clear up without medical intervention. If your STD test returns a positive result, you will need to follow the advice of your healthcare provider to protect your sexual health.

    Fortunately, many STDs will clear up with a simple course of oral antibiotics. Bacterial infections such as gonorrhea, syphilis, chlamydia, and trichomoniasis can all be cured with antibiotics. It is crucial, however, to complete the entire course of medication in order to truly clear up your infection. If you stop taking your medication early, even if your STD symptoms have resolved, the infection could remain in your body.

    Other STIs, like hepatitis C, can be cured with some prescription medications if treated early. Hepatitis B, on the other hand, canât be cured. The disease can only be managed with prescription medication. There is, however, a Hepatitis B vaccine. Similarly, HPV canât be cured, but you can get vaccinated for it.

    Finally, some STIs, such as herpes and HIV, have no cure or protective vaccine. Thankfully, you can manage herpes outbreaks with prescription medication, and antiretroviral drugs can help manage an HIV infection.

    References

    1. Chlamydia – CDC Fact Sheet . Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. URL. Accessed March 27, 2020.

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