The Oral Swab Test takes mucous from your throat and tests it for HIV antibodies, rather than taking blood. It is not available everywhere.
The Blood Test takes a small blood sample and tests it. It is widely used.
The most common (and cheapest) test is the Eliza antibody (described at the University of Arizona's Biology Project web site), which tests for antibodies to any of the HIV proteins; two Elizas are done on all blood and mucous samples; if these are positive, they are confirmed with a Western Blot antibody test. The Western Blot antibody test, described at the University of Arizona Biology Project web site tests for antibodies to at least several different proteins that are crucial to HIV. It is much less likely to produce a false positive than an Eliza, which tests for antibodies to any HIV proteins.
The Polymerase Chain Reaction tests for the virus itself, but is quite expensive. It may be ordered by a physician
It takes time for both enough antibodies and enough copies of the virus to develop to get a positive test. This time is known as the Window Period.
.This depends. If you are seeing your doctor anyway, you may get a test through your doctor. Public test sites provide more counseling, however. In addition, public test sites are more likely to provide anonymous testing.
If you test during the window period, your test may come back negative, even though you are infected with HIV!
The Window Period is the period after a person is infected during which he or she does not test positive for HIV. Usually testing positive for HIV means testing positive for HIV antibodies. After a person is infected, the body's immune system develops antibodies, which attack the HIV. However, it takes time to develop enough antibodies for the antibodies to show up in an antibody test. Most people develop enough antibodies to get a positive antibody test result within 3 months, and almost all people develop enough antibodies to get a positive antibody test result within 6 months. In rare cases, it may take as long as a year or two to develop enough antibodies to get a positive antibody test.
There is also a test which looks for the virus itself. Enough copies of HIV are produced to give a positive result on this test within about two weeks after being exposed to HIV. However, this test--the PCR or Polymerase Chain Reaction is very expensive.
It is a good idea to wait the duration of Window Period after your last possible exposure to HIV, and then retest. If you are exposed regularly, you should test every six months!
It is required by law that you notify all current sex and needle sharing partners. If you do not wish to notify your current partners yourself, your local health department will notify them without giving them your name. You just need to provide your health department with a list of names and addresses. The health department will send a form letter to the people you have listed telling them that they may have been exposed to HIV, and recommending that they get tested. That's it! The department of health will not give your current partners your name, or tell them that you are infected!
Of course, you should warn any new partners yourself before having sex or sharing needles. You should use condoms, too, and clean needles and syringes. This will not only help to prevent the spread of HIV, but will also help to protect you from opportunistic infections! If your partners do not wish to use condoms or discuss HIV, they are not worth your time!
Nutrition, rest, exercise. . . sound familiar? These all help your body heal naturally. A number of prescription medicines and alternative therapies may also help heal you at different points in your illness.
.A list of medications that the state of Florida provides for persons infected with HIV appears at a link below. Check with your local state health services for medicines provided by your state.
Brief suggestions about exercise, nutrition, restoring immune function, combatting opportunistic infections, and combatting HIV itself.
A List of Drugs Used to Treat HIV AIDS Treatment Data Network's Simple Facts Project Drug List--Descriptions of Drugs and Treatments"
A Short Summary of Some Alternative Therapies for HIV AIDS Treatment Data Network's Alternative Treatments Page"
State Coverage for HIV Medications--For Florida residents who are HIV positive, and whose incomes are less than four times the poverty level.The Florida Department of Health's AIDS Drug Assistance Program (Check your state's department of health for similar programs there!
Information About Clinical Trials: AIDS Clinical Trial Information Service (Select HIV/AIDS Clinical Trials Databases)
Information About Clinical Trials in Canada: The Canadian HIV Trials Network (in English and in French)
See IAVI, Vaccine Science--but beware--some vaccinations use live viruses, and may be dangerous; and vaccinations are never 100% effective, and are never tested for a lifetime until people start getting the vaccinations! Options looked at include live vaccinations, made by attaching HIV proteins to live, and generally harmless bacteria and viruses (the live bacteria and virus bring the HIV proteins to the body's immune system which then learns to recognize and respond to the proteins); live vaccines, made from modified HIV (considered very risky at this point); killed vaccines, made with inactive parts of the HIV virus itself; and injections of single proteins from HIV. Though most vaccinations are injected into the blood, scientists are also exploring ways to provide mucosal immunity against HIV. Mucosal responses may be different than blood responses to viruses and vaccination, and the mucosal area may provide a place for HIV and other diseases to live even when they are destroyed in the blood. It seems that the antibody response in the mucosal areas may be crucial in combatting HIV and other sexually-transmitted diseases. Today mucosal immunity is being researched. Unfortunately,immune responses themselves are still not that well understood according to Myron S.Cohen and Joseph Eron's HIV/AIDS Case Management 18, and all HIV vaccinations are still in the trial stages. Again according to Cohen and Eron, most vaccination research is done in the U.S. and on the varieties of human immunodeficiency virus that are found in the U.S.
In their review of a book by Jon Cohen, Shots in the Dark: the Wayward Search for an AIDS Vaccine (2001), Medscape's Medpulse editors write:
"To date, we have failed to develop any vaccine capable of blocking infection of a sexually transmitted pathogen at a mucosal surface, although not for lack of effort. Clinical trials for vaccines designed to prevent gonorrhea and herpes have failed."
Clearly, much needs to be learned about the immune response in the mucosal areas! And HIV in countries outside of the U.S. needs to be studied. But this does not mean that finding a vaccine is hopeless! (However, as noted above, vaccinations may not be 100% effective; therefore, many people think a vaccination program might leave people vulnerable because people, feeling secure with a vaccine, might stop taking care to prevent HIV and even other 'curable' STD's; perhaps vaccination cannot be that effective without good STD prevention and treatment programs, too.)
Also, according to Researchers in Kenya (HLA Typing May Be Advisable Before HIV Vaccine Trials; reprinted in Medscape last month), responses induced by vaccines may not work with certain types of HIV which resist these responses. The researchers suggests mapping of "local alleles" to determine ways they resist the immune sytem's responses.
(In this article, Dr. Rupert Kaul from the University of Toronto and colleagues identified two novel HLA class I alleles among commercial sex workers in Kenya, as well as among lower-risk women, that restrict cytotoxic T lymphocyte responses to locally prevalent HIV-1 clade A. [Reuters Health Information, October, 2002.])
Great Reading
These books are generally available at libraries. If not at your library, you can get them through interlibrary loan. They're also available at Amazon.com.
