How Do I Know If I Have Chlamydia
If you suspect you have chlamydia, your doctor may want to test cervical or penile discharge or urine using one of several available methods.
In most cases of chlamydia, the cure rate is 95%. However, because many women don’t know they have the disease until it has caused serious complications such as pelvic inflammatory disease, sexually active women under age 25 and others at higher risk should be tested for chlamydia once a year during their annual pelvic exam even if they dont have symptoms.
Pregnant women should also be tested as part of their routine lab work.
What Do I Need To Know If I Get Treated For Chlamydia
If youre getting treated for chlamydia:
- Take all of your medicine the way your nurse or doctor tells you to, even if any symptoms you may be having go away sooner. The infection stays in your body until you finish the antibiotics.
- Your partner should also get treated for chlamydia so you dont re-infect each other or anyone else.
- Dont have sex for 7 days. If you only have 1 dose of medication, wait for 7 days after you take it before having sex. If youre taking medicine for 7 days, dont have sex until youve finished all of your pills.
- Get tested again in 3-4 months to make sure your infection is gone.
- Dont share your medicine with anyone. Your nurse or doctor may give you a separate dose of antibiotics for your partner. Make sure you both take all of the medicine you get.
- Even if you finish your treatment and the chlamydia is totally gone, its possible to get a new chlamydia infection again if youre exposed in the future. Chlamydia isnt a one-time-only deal. So use condoms and get tested regularly.
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To find out more about chlamydia and its treatment, we recommend the following articles:
- Pointers on Chlamydia Prevention and Care for People With HIV
In addition, our Q& A experts sometimes address questions about chlamydia in our “Ask the Experts” forums. Here are some of those questions and our experts’ responses:
- Over the counterWhat over the counter drugs if any are effective against chlamydia?
- How can I get rid of resistant Chlamydia?I have read online of resistant forms of Chlamydia. Are resistant forms impossible to get rid of? Should I ask my doctor about azithromycin?
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What Are The Side Effects Of Chlamydia Treatment
While doxycycline is an effective treatment for chlamydia, some people may have side effects when taking this chlamydia treatment.
Some common doxycycline side effects may include:
- headaches
- increased sensitivity to light
- nausea or being sick
- palpitations
- stomach ulcers
- joint or muscle pain
If you have any side effects when taking doxycycline, tell your doctor as soon as possible.
The full list of doxycycline side effects and cautions can be found in the patient information leaflet that comes with your medicine package.
When taking doxycycline, you should avoid drinking alcohol as it reduces doxycyclines effectiveness. You should also avoid sunlight as increased sensitivity to light has been reported as a side effect of doxycycline.
You should stop taking doxycycline and seek immediate medical attention if you develop any of the following rare but severe side effects, or symptoms of an allergic reaction:
- Ringing in your ear
- Fever, swollen lymph nodes or skin rash
- Symptoms of an allergic reaction such as difficulty breathing, wheezing, chest pain, swollen face, lips, mouth, hand or feet
Sex Partners Need Treatment Too
If you are diagnosed with chlamydia, you will need to tell all of your sexual partners, because they will need the same treatment you are receiving.
In most states, a doctor or other healthcare provider can give you the medicine that your partner or partners will need to take. Then you can deliver it to those partners. This practice is called expedited partner therapy or patient delivered partner therapy.
These options can help a lot if your partner doesnt have a healthcare provider or feels embarrassed about seeking care, says Dr. Dombrowski.
Its natural to feel nervous or upset about having to tell your partner or partners about having an STD. Your healthcare provider can help with this problem. They may even rehearse the conversation with you, says Dombrowksi.
Learning about chlamydia and seeking advice from a healthcare provider about how to discuss it with your partner can help you handle the conversation with less anxiety and more confidence.
Remember, chlamydia is not just common: It is the most common infection reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention . You are being helpful, mature, and responsible by telling your partners.
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Management Of Sex Partners
Sex partners should be referred for evaluation, testing, and presumptive treatment if they had sexual contact with the partner during the 60 days preceding the patients onset of symptoms or chlamydia diagnosis. Although the exposure intervals defining identification of sex partners at risk are based on limited data, the most recent sex partner should be evaluated and treated, even if the time of the last sexual contact was > 60 days before symptom onset or diagnosis.
How Long Does It Take For Chlamydia Pills To Work
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Get Retested Following Treatment
Many people have more than one chlamydia infection. If youre a girl or woman and your sex partners are not treated for the infection, you will be at high risk for reinfection. Repeated infections with chlamydia make it much more likely that your ability to have children will be affected. Repeated infections also raise your risk of painful complications, such as pelvic inflammatory disease.
Both women and men with chlamydia should be retested about three months after they are first diagnosed and treated. Go to be retested even if you think your sex partners were successfully treated.
Parents Have A Role In Chlamydia Prevention
Parents can do two main things to help their kids avoid getting chlamydia and other sexually transmitted infections , says Dombrowski. These two things are:
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What Is The Treatment For Chlamydia
Chlamydia can be easily cured with antibiotics. HIV-positive persons with chlamydia should receive the same treatment as those who are HIV-negative.
Persons with chlamydia should abstain from sexual activity for 7 days after single dose antibiotics or until completion of a 7-day course of antibiotics, to prevent spreading the infection to partners. It is important to take all of the medication prescribed to cure chlamydia. Medication for chlamydia should not be shared with anyone. Although medication will stop the infection, it will not repair any permanent damage done by the disease. If a persons symptoms continue for more than a few days after receiving treatment, he or she should return to a health care provider to be reevaluated.
Repeat infection with chlamydia is common. Women whose sex partners have not been appropriately treated are at high risk for re-infection. Having multiple chlamydial infections increases a womans risk of serious reproductive health complications, including pelvic inflammatory disease and ectopic pregnancy. Women and men with chlamydia should be retested about three months after treatment of an initial infection, regardless of whether they believe that their sex partners were successfully treated.
Infants infected with chlamydia may develop ophthalmia neonatorum and/or pneumonia. Chlamydial infection in infants can be treated with antibiotics.
The Costs Of Infertility
Treating chlamydia is easy, but for those who do not get treated or get treated too late, living with the damage caused by the infection can be hard.
Rabin has treated many women who never knew they had had chlamydia until they couldnt get pregnant due to blocked fallopian tubes. These women often wind up trying in vitro fertilization , which does not always succeed.
There are all kinds of costs involved for these women, say Rabin. There are emotional costs and physical costs. There are also financial costs with IVF. Its much better to not let the tubes get damaged, she says, and get pregnant the old-fashioned way.
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Can You Get Chlamydia More Than Once
Yes, you can get the infection even if youve successfully treated it already.
A sexual partner who has chlamydia can transmit it to you again, even if youve already had it and treated it.
You can also get chlamydia again if it wasnt fully treated the first time. This can happen if you stop taking the necessary treatment. Its important to complete the antibiotics youve been given, even if your symptoms get better.
The CDC recommends getting tested 3 months after treatment of your initial infection to ensure the infection is cleared.
How To Get Rid Of Chlamydia In Males
Chlamydia in males is caused by a bacterial infection. This infection is mostly treated with oral antibiotics. The most effective and recommended treatment for chlamydia is the prescribing of Azithromycin or Doxycycline. After treatment, usually the infection will clear in 7 to 14 days. The recommended dosage should be finished for infection to be completely cleared. For treatment to be most effective, it is recommended that both partner complete treatment and abstain from any sexual contact for at least 7 days after completing their treatment.
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Chlamydia Treatment And Prevention
Milly DawsonSanjai Sinha, MDShutterstock
Chlamydia is easy to cure. If you test positive for chlamydia, basically you take an antibiotic, says Jill Rabin, MD, cochief in the division of ambulatory care for women’s health programs and prenatal care assistance program services for Northwell Health in New Hyde Park, New York.
Your partner must take an antibiotic, too, to keep them from reinfecting you, she says.
You have to have your partner treated, and if you have more than one partner, they should all be treated, says Dr. Rabin, regardless of your partners genders.
Even if you dont have chlamydia now, its wise to learn how to protect yourself so you wont develop this common infection in the first place. In women, chlamydia can create serious health problems, including infertility. Besides, no one ever wants to have a sexually transmitted disease and then have to tell other people about it.
Study Design And Setting
This is a double-blind RCT. Given our primary outcome is treatment efficacy, our trial is double blind to minimize bias that could arise as a result of the different dosing regimens of the two drugs . For example: i) it is possible that taking a 7-day course of daily doxycycline rather than a single dose of azithromycin may deter people from resuming sexual activity while taking treatment, thereby reducing their risk of a new infection, and ii) participants could be less adherent to a 7-day regimen which could impact efficacy . The trial will be conducted within sexual health clinics in Victoria and New South Wales in Australia and in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. The trial was approved by the Alfred Hospital Ethics Committee .
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Variability Of Doxycycline Pharmacokinetics
There are no data on the impact of gender, pregnancy, lactation or liver impairment on doxycycline pharmacokinetics.
The pharmacokinetics of doxycycline has been studied in the elderly, undernourished patients and patients with hyperlipidaemia, infected patients and patients with renal impairment.
In older patients , serum concentrations were higher than those reported for other age groups with a Cmax of 830 mg/L and concentrations at 10 h in the range 510 mg/L.
In undernourished patients, a decrease in the AUC is observed and, in patients with hyperlipidaemia, a significant increase in the AUC is observed.
What Is The Dosage Of Azithromycin For Chlamydia
The recommended dosage of azithromycin for chlamydia is 1 gram as a single dose. This dose may be taken morning or night and can be taken with or without food. Another name for azithromycin is Zithromax.
If you have taken your dose of azithromycin on an empty stomach and your stomach has become a bit upset or you feel sick, it is Ok to eat some food, which may help to settle it.
A 500mg dose of azithromycin is not recommended by guidelines to cure chlamydia. There is also a chance it may increase the risk of C. trachomatis bacteria becoming resistant to it. If you have only taken or only been prescribed a 500mg dose of azithromycin, you need to return to your doctor to get a 1 gram dose prescribed. You should never share your dose of azithromycin with another person.
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Chlamydia Infection Common Symptoms
The first symptoms manifest themselves one or three weeks after youve got the infection. They start with itching, a purulent discharge, pain and burning in the genital area while urinating. Moreover, these symptoms are usually associated with fever, diarrhea and severe abdominal pain. However, in many cases, there are no symptoms at all. These are generally the cases when the infection is not recognized or treated. In men, the prostate, urethra, and epididymis often become inflamed. A strong urge to urinate, as well as urethral pulling pains, are the main signs.
How Is Chlamydia Treated
The following are the recommended treatment regimens for chlamydia according to the Guidelines for Sexually Transmitted Diseases, released in 2015, but still considered current. Only one regimen should be chosen.
- Azithromycin 1 gram orally as a single dose
- OR
- Ofloxacin 300 mg orally twice a day for 7 days.
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How Do You Know If Chlamydia Is Gone After Treatment
Your chlamydia symptoms should improve within a week of completing your course of antibiotics.
You do not need an immediate follow-up test to check if your chlamydia treatment has worked, as dead chlamydia bacteria may be detected 3 to 5 weeks after treatment, which would give a false positive result. But, if you have a rectal infection, you should have a test after treatment is completed.
If you are under 25 and have tested positive for chlamydia, it is recommended you take a repeat test 3 months after completing your treatment, to check you have not caught chlamydia again.
What Happens If You Dont Get Treated For Chlamydia
Even though chlamydia is common and doesnt usually cause any symptoms, it can become a big deal if its not caught and treated early.
Chlamydia can spread to your uterus and fallopian tubes if it goes untreated for a long time. This can cause you to have pelvic inflammatory disease . PID can cause permanent damage that leads to pain, infertility, or ectopic pregnancy. So getting tested regularly for chlamydia really lowers your chances of getting PID.
If you have a penis, a chlamydia infection can spread to your epididymis if its left untreated, and can cause chronic joint pain. Rarely, it can make you infertile.
Having chlamydia may increase your chances of getting or spreading HIV.
If you have chlamydia during your pregnancy and dont treat it, you can pass it to your baby when youre giving birth. Chlamydia can also cause eye infections and pneumonia in newborns, and it also increases the risk of delivering your baby too early.
Testing and treatment for chlamydia is quick, easy, and the best way to avoid all of these problems.
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Doxycycline In C Trachomatis Infections
C. trachomatis is the most common STI bacterial agent worldwide with 100 million adults infected at any point in time. The recommended regimen for Chlamydia infections is reported in Table . A meta-analysis of 12 randomized clinical trials of azithromycin versus doxycycline for the treatment of urogenital chlamydial infection demonstrated that the treatments were equally efficacious, with microbial cure rates of 97% and 98%, respectively. In one recent study, the rate of efficacy of the doxycycline regimen reached 100%.
However, in MSM, in which the prevalence of C. trachomatis infection is high, available data suggest that the prevalence of rectal C. trachomatis infection is higher than that of urethral infection, and in rectal C. trachomatis infection, treatment failures of up to 22% have been reported with the single dose azithromycin regimen versus 8% with doxycycline.
Summarized data on doxycycline in rectal C. trachomatis infection provided in Table suggest that doxycycline may be more effective than azithromycin . Recently, a meta-analysis and systematic review analysed the data regarding the efficacy of doxycycline for rectal lymphogranuloma venereum in MSM. This meta-analysis found a pooled treatment efficacy of 98.5% for 100 mg doxycycline twice daily for 21 days. These data as well as a recent review of clinical cases support doxycycline at this dosage and duration as the first-line therapy for rectal LGV.,