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STDs (Expert Forum)
Aldara cream - but no warts?
Answered by
University of Washington
Seattle - WA
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This forum is limited to questions about STDs other than HIV/AIDS. For questions about HIV prevention, or if you have general questions about safe sex (e.g., condoms, how to protect yourself from HIV and STDs), please visit the HIV Prevention and Safe Sex Forum
Some of the most common types of questions concern the risk of HIV or STD after a particular sexual exposure, and about symptoms that might or might not be due to HIV. If your question is along these lines, please visit the HIV Prevention and Safe Sex Forum.
Aldara cream - but no warts?
by girlgurl, Jun 28, 2005 12:00AM
Apologies for starting a new thread - I have a new question, but please feel free to move my post if need be. I'm asking because my situation sounds frightenly similar to that of ggazoo's girlfriend.
To refresh: my boyfriend and I met when we were virgins about 3 years ago. But, he recieved unprotected oral sex from a woman about a year and half ago. A few months after that (so for the past year and a bit), I got a every irrated vagina, which included a rash between my legs. My doctors thought I kept getting yeast infections, (because of the discharge) but after a biospy last week I was diagnosed with "vulva warts". No mention of HPV (in the report that I saw, it was just a printout), although the doctor did hand me a pamphlet on it.
My problem though, is that my doctor never saw any "warts", although he did take a skin sample from a "bump" on the vulva. He was lucky to even get that, because the bumps only last a day or two... the rash however, persisted, and is just now going away.
I was just put on Aldara cream... but I don't have any visible warts down there. I do have a VERY red vagina, near the back... it's almost raw (but not quiet). As well, the discharge is still there. Does that sound like a result of HPV? Do you think it's something else?
And, if I don't have any visible warts, should I keep using the Aldara cream? He gave me enough for 6 weeks - even though I don't see any, should I finish the perscription?
I just want to ask becuase all of ths started hapepning after my boyfriend's oral sex episode... it's just all too convient. :(
To refresh: my boyfriend and I met when we were virgins about 3 years ago. But, he recieved unprotected oral sex from a woman about a year and half ago. A few months after that (so for the past year and a bit), I got a every irrated vagina, which included a rash between my legs. My doctors thought I kept getting yeast infections, (because of the discharge) but after a biospy last week I was diagnosed with "vulva warts". No mention of HPV (in the report that I saw, it was just a printout), although the doctor did hand me a pamphlet on it.
My problem though, is that my doctor never saw any "warts", although he did take a skin sample from a "bump" on the vulva. He was lucky to even get that, because the bumps only last a day or two... the rash however, persisted, and is just now going away.
I was just put on Aldara cream... but I don't have any visible warts down there. I do have a VERY red vagina, near the back... it's almost raw (but not quiet). As well, the discharge is still there. Does that sound like a result of HPV? Do you think it's something else?
And, if I don't have any visible warts, should I keep using the Aldara cream? He gave me enough for 6 weeks - even though I don't see any, should I finish the perscription?
I just want to ask becuase all of ths started hapepning after my boyfriend's oral sex episode... it's just all too convient. :(
Doctor's Answer
by H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D., Jun 28, 2005 12:00AM
, Jun 28, 2005 12:00AM
Some aspects of your story don't quite compute. Any bump that comes and goes in a day or two definitely is not a wart or any kind of HPV infection. HPV doesn't cause vaginal discharge. I don't know what to make of a biopsy that diagnoses warts but doesn't diagnose HPV infection (although that might just have to do with the words the pathologist used to describe what was seen under the microscope). "Irritated" vagina with redness sounds like idiopathic (a fancy word for unknown cause) vestibulitis, which some studies have concluded might be associated sometimes with HPV, but no connection has ever been proved. Vestibulitis probably isn't sexually acquired. But if the redness and soreness first appeared or got worse after you started Aldara, that might be the whole explanation.
The timing--several months after your BF received oral sex--is too long to attribute your symptoms to that exposure, and in any case fellatio is unlikely to give him anything he would transmit to you and cause these symptoms. Not to judge your partner's credibility (you know him and I don't), but I have to wonder whether he is telling you the whole story about other sexual exposure(s).
Sorry I can't help more; I just don't know what's going on. Consider getting a second opinion from a gynecologist with particular expertise in infectious diseases (often available at major medical centers) or from a dermatologist.
Good luck-- HHH, MD
The timing--several months after your BF received oral sex--is too long to attribute your symptoms to that exposure, and in any case fellatio is unlikely to give him anything he would transmit to you and cause these symptoms. Not to judge your partner's credibility (you know him and I don't), but I have to wonder whether he is telling you the whole story about other sexual exposure(s).
Sorry I can't help more; I just don't know what's going on. Consider getting a second opinion from a gynecologist with particular expertise in infectious diseases (often available at major medical centers) or from a dermatologist.
Good luck-- HHH, MD
You mean HPV might be the explanation? The redness was alawys there, but it has gotten a lot more sore with the Aldara cream.
HHH, MD
Can the biospy be wrong? Like I said, no metion of HPV... so confused!
He said my irration was probably just sweat, and to keep using the cream... yes, it was causing the redness, and he said the orginal redness was part of the wart irratation.
As far as my boyfriend goes - yes, I'm 100% certain that he has only been with me, not including the fellatio episode.
It was almost all the time during the last year. :(
HHH, MD