Archive for the 'Sexually Transmitted Diseases' Category

Human Immunodeficiency Virus in short HIV is a retrovirus.

The rate of this virus is increasing day-by-day because of no cure.

However, an antiretroviral medication is available to control HIV virus.

HIV treatment through antiretroviral medications is known as Combined Antiretroviral Therapy or Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy (HAART).

The antiretroviral medications are also known as antiretrovirals, anti-HIV drugs or HIV antiviral drugs.

HAART is a combination of various anti-HIV drugs to fight against HIV and slow down the copying of HIV in your body. Remember that HIV treatment with antiretroviral medications cannot cure HIV, it only control the HIV virus from making copies of it.

This HIV treatment option is currently recommended by United States National Institutes of Health to all HIV patients as a way to control the virus and to remain strong and healthy for very long time.

It is estimated that over sixty million people all over the world are with HIV infection. Approximately fourteen thousand new HIV cases are raising each day and half of these are young adults below age twenty-five.

Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) is a kind of virus that causes sexual transmitted infections such as Plantar Warts, Common Warts, Flat Warts and Genital Warts.

HPV symptoms for each of these warts vary to a great extent, but will have similarities.

Human papilloma viruses cause all these warts, but each type of HPV grows only on particular areas of the body.

The virus got the name Papilloma Virus because certain subtypes may cause warts, or papillomas, which are non-cancerous tumors.

This is very common type of virus that most women get infected at some time in their lives. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report, about 6.2 million are affecting with sexually transmitted HPV infections every year.

HPV viruses are a group of more than 100 types of viruses. Most of them do not cause major harm to an individual.

Actually, you have a high chance of being exposed to this virus with sexual relationships involving genital contact with an infected person, but only a few HPV infected women can develop cell changes, which can lead to cervical cancer.

AIDS, as we all know, is a contagious disease but how many of us really know about AIDS and AIDS symptoms.

Actually, AIDS stands for “Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome”.

It is the last and most severe stage of the HIV disease caused by the human immunodeficiency virus.

You get AIDS only when HIV destroys your body’s immune system.

Moreover, you need to understand that the term AIDS pertains to the most advanced stages of HIV infection.

Also, being diagnosed as HIV positive doesn’t mean that you are with AIDS because there is a possibility of being HIV positive, and not having AIDS.

Becoming infected with HIV and becoming ill from AIDS are two different things.

Mostly, it takes several years for the HIV virus infection to develop into AIDS symptoms.

Mostly, the AIDS symptoms are the infection’s results that usually do not develop in you with healthy immune systems. Moreover, you may experience no symptoms in the early stages. You can live with AIDS for years not even knowing of its presence in your body.

HIV is the abbreviation for human immunodeficiency virus. HIV Virus is a type of virus called retrovirus.

The virus is of two types: HIV-1 and HIV-2. The HIV virus attacks the T-cells of the human immune system.

Immune system is responsible to fight against the viruses that cause infections to your body.

The size of the HIV virus will be around 0.0001mm, which is too small to see through an ordinary microscope. The HIV virus can be seen easily through electron microscope.

When the HIV virus enters your body, it uses the cells of your immune system to reproduce on its own and reduces the number of healthy T-cells. Thus, it weakens the ability of the immune system to fight against the virus.

The HIV virus reproduces by using the cell’s replicating enzyme. So, the virus uses the cells that have proteins called CD4 receptors on their surfaces because it facilitate the virus to bind with the cell. This is called binding process.

The HIV virus targets the T-cells. The T-cells are a type of white blood cells with plenty of CD4 receptors and responsible for informing your immune system about the virus in the body.

Hepatitis B is a serious health condition that is caused by a virus called Hepatitis B Virus (HBV). It is also known as serum hepatitis.

It is a liver infection attacking the liver and makes it swell and stop working and also causes liver cancer, liver failure and even death.

Liver is the most essential part of the body that helps store vitamins, iron, minerals and energy in the form of glucose.

It is responsible for the production of bile for digestion of the food. It help fight against the germs that enter your body.

It is estimated that, in the United States, approximately 250,000 people are infected with Hepatitis B yearly.

It is a contagious liver infection that can spread easily through direct contact with an infected person because the virus will be present in the blood and body fluids. As it is transmitted from person to person through the infection in the blood, the virus is also known as blood-borne virus.

So, by having sexual contact with infected person, by sharing the drug needles or razor or tooth brush or by using body piercing tools of an infected person, you can easily get infected with hepatitis B.

HIV stands For Human Immunodeficiency Virus.

The presence of the HIV in your blood can be identified through HIV test.

Today, there are three major types of HIV test: antibody test, antigen test, and DNA test.

Each test can determine a specific substance that is present in the blood of an infected person.

The Antibody Test

It is also known as ELISA - Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay test. It is the first HIV test to determine the antibodies in the blood of an infected person.

When HIV virus enters your body, it generates some proteins called antibodies and releases into the blood to fight against the foreign organisms such as virus.

Remember that the HIV antibodies will not be produced immediately when you get infected. It usually takes 1-2 months to appear in your blood.

The period of time between an exposure of an infection and development of antibodies is known as window period. So, ELISA test is ineffective during window period.

For this test, a sample of your blood will be taken to identify the presence of antibodies to HIV virus. If the results are positive, then it confirms that you are infected with HIV virus. If the test results are negative, it indicates that there are no antibodies against HIV in your blood.

Chlamydia is caused by a tiny bacterium called Chlamydia trachomatis.

It is a sexually transmitted disease (STD) that can spread easily through sexual intercourse with an infected person.

It also spreads from mother to child during pregnancy.

Chlamydia treatment is easy and effective with antibiotics azithromycin and doxycycline.

For effective results, you need to continue the treatment according to the prescribed dosage.

It is also important to stay away from sexual activities until the infection is treated completely.

Remember that you can get re-infected with chlamydia trachomatis if your sexual partner is left untreated.

On the other hand, if you are with chlamydia and left your condition untreated then the infection can pass into the uterus and cause another sexual transmitted disease called PID (Pelvic Inflammatory Disease), which can easily damage the reproductive parts. It also leads to infertility or ectopic pregnancy.

The Chlamydia trachomatis damage a woman’s reproductive organs: the cervix, the urethra, and the fallopian tubes. As the chlamydia symptoms are very mild or absent, you may have permanent damages to the organs before you recognize the infection or disease in the body.

Syphilis is a most widespread curable sexually transmitted disease (STD) caused by a type of bacteria called Treponema pallidum.

Actually, a person could get infected with syphilis infection through direct contact with a syphilis sore of an infected person.

These sores, generally, occur on the outer genitals, vagina, anus, or in the rectum. These can also occur on the lips and in the mouth.

In general, the syphilis infection progresses in four stages: primary, secondary, latent (hidden), and tertiary (late). Moreover, the syphilis symptoms differ at each stage.

Primary Stage

This is the first stage of syphilis. Generally, the syphilis symptoms in this stage typically begin three weeks after you become infected.

Normally, the first symptom of primary syphilis is known by the emergence of sores called chancres, which are small, round, firm, and painless.

You can notice these sores at the spots where syphilis entered your body, generally, on the outer genitals or on the inner part of the vagina. You can also notice swelling of the lymph nodes near the chancre area.