Emergency room

Hello Dr HHH. I know you are very busy so I'll try to save your time and make my story as short as possible.

I had a car crash on Saturday and was taken for a common medical examination to the hospital.

While waiting in line I saw that there was a weird guy in the doctor's office.

It was an old drunk guy with a hurt face and he was bleeding a lot. The doctor was doing something with him and I saw that he had gloves.

I was the next to enter the room. The doctor did not have those gloves any more and after writing something in his papers he stood up and examined my pupils by pushing my eye-lids upwards.

Now I fear that he might have had some blood (resulting from taking off the gloves - maybe he did not wash his hands) and while touching my eye-lids he could have transferred some blood to my eyes resulting in hiv transmission which I fear so much.

What is your opinion on my situation?

Your help meens so much for me.

Yours sincerely.

Pandorabox

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

HIV is not transmitted by the route you imply, period.  If that sort of exposure could spread HIV, you would have had it years ago (and so would everybody else)--from all the other visits to our health care providers.  Most providers have HIV infected people in their offices all the time, often without even knowing it themselves.  And of course most HIV infected persons do not look like the "weird guy" in the doctor's office.

Good luck--  HHH, MD

[monkeyflower]

Absolutely no way were you at any risk whatsoever from your hospital experience.

[Willl]

I struggled with this type of scenario for awhile, mainly because I wasn't able to pin down the "why" behind the reason it does not happen. Maybe it is too low a dose of inoculum, which could mean we are all being exposed to small amounts of HIV all the time and don't even know it.

I look at it like this; the healthcare providers themselves would all be infected if it could be transmitted that way. I am sure doctors and nurses sometimes forget and rub their own eyes or touch the inside of their nose before washing their hands. They touch objects that may have traces of fluid around a hospital, doorknobs and such, and shake hands with people later found to be bleeding. But they don't come up infected.

[oceans3]

i just wanted to add that just because he looked like "a weird guy" doesnt mean you have to worry even more about HIV. there are beautiful men and woman who have HIV and one would not even know it if they had it. would you be as worried if the same situation happened to you EXCEPT it was a young, attractive model (before you) as opposed to the old drunk guy? i am not so sure.
not only that, the dr. had gloves on. they wash/sanitize their hands before the next patient comes in.