Worried about in-office procedure at a doctor's office

[Houstonia13]

Yesterday I had a minor surgical procedure in a doctor's office in the U.S. The doctor was careful, professional, and worked without the assistance of nurses or any other assistants. During the procedure, when she looked for equipment or exited or entered the room, she changed gloves. She seemed acutely aware of the need to be sterile. She also changed gloves when she needed both hands to reposition the ceiling lamp onto a different area of my body.

However, in once instance, she nudged the handle of the lamp with the back of her gloved hand to slightly adjust the light while making the cut. I know HIV cannot be transmitted via the environment, but since she was cutting into my skin, I'm wondering if I have been placed at risk if there had been any traces of another patient's blood on the lamp handle that touched the same glove that would've touched my fresh incisions. Most likely the lamp handle is sterilized anyways, and any blood from a previous patient would have been dried, but I'd like to know an expert's opinion rather than trying to convince myself.

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

Welcome to the forum.  Thanks for your question.

This doesn't sound at all unsafe to me.  There are two basic reasons why HIV is not transmitted in the environment.  First, assuming HIV exists in the environment, the amount of virus that could have contact with susceptible cells would almost certainly be too low fro transmission to occur.  Second and equally important, is that living HIV almost never exists in the environment -- and that includes the environment of a doctor's office, clinic, operating room, etc.  In other words, I do not accept the premise that there is any serious chance that HIV infected blood or secretions were present on the surfaces the doctor or assistants might have touched; but even if there were, I still cannot imagine a significant transmission risk from the events you have described.

I will also add that there has never once been a case of HIV in the United States that was attributed to catching it in a health care setting.  You aren't going to be the first!  The only such infections have been in health care personnel themselves, and even then, only after deep injuries with sharp instruments visibly contaminated with blood or other body secretions.

So don't give this another thought.  All is well; you don't need testing and if you have a regular sex partner, you can continue normal relations without risk of transmitting HIV.

Best wishes--  HHH, MD

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

I agree that neither of the dental office situations is relevant to your question; and also understand that the Tulsa situation has not identified any infected patients.

I'm glad to have helped.  Take care.

[Houstonia13]

I also think there was a scare with a Tulsa dentist who wasn't sterilizing equipment, although there hasn't been a proven infection from that. But I don't think either dentist, who exhibited something worse than gross negligence, applies to me here.

I haven taken your advice and will put this out of my mind and will continue having sex with my wife without worry.

[Houstonia13]

Thanks for the clarification. Intentional injections of blood are completely separate from the situation you analyzed for me. And I'm guessing my type of situation happens all over the country, every day.

[H. Hunter Handsfield, M.D.]

Just to clarify, I am of course aware of the HIV/AIDS case 20 years ago that apparently was acquired during a dental procedure.  But that probably resulted from intentional injection of the dentist's own blood.