GONORRHEA, including symptoms, how to treat it and prevention!
we're going to be covering everything you need to know about gonorrhea, including treatment options. So first of all, let's start off by what is gonorrhea?
Definition of gonorrhea
Gonorrhea is a sexually transmitted infection (STI) caused by the bacterium Neisseria gonorrhoeae. It is a very common STI, and it can be serious if it is not treated.
It's the second most common STI in the UK after Chlamydia with over 70,000 people catching gonorrhea every year in England alone.
How is gonorrhea spread?
Well, the bacteria that cause gonorrhea are mainly found in discharge from the penis and in vaginal fluid, and it can easily be passed from person to person through - unprotected vaginal, oral, or anal sex. Now, some people don't know this, but you can also get gonorrhea if you share vibrators or other sex toys that haven't been washed or covered with a new condom Each time they're being used, the bacteria causing gonorrhea can also infect the entrance to the womb, which is known as the cervix, as well as the tube that passes urine outta the body, known as the urethra, as well as the rectum, and less commonly the throat or the eyes.
That's really important because when we come onto the symptoms, you'll see that some of the symptoms involve the throat and the eyes. Importantly, it can also be passed from a pregnant woman to her baby. So if you're pregnant and you think you've got gonorrhea, it's important to get teste and treated before your baby's born. This is really important because without treatment, gonorrhea can cause permanent blindness in a newborn baby.
Now, a common myth to dispel is that gonorrhea is not caused bites, kissing, hugging, swimming pools, toilet seats, sharing baths, towels, cups, plates, cutlery, etcetera, the bacteria can't survive long enough outside the human body for this to be the case.
Terms of symptoms of gonorrhea
The exact symptoms might be different if you are a man or a woman, but typical symptoms include a thick, green, or yellow discharge from the vagina or the penis pain or burning when peeing and in women bleeding between periods. Some people may also have a rectal or throat infection that doesn't seem to be clearing. So if you're experiencing any of these symptoms, you should get tested. It's also important to remember that one in 10 men and around half of women who are infected don't experience any symptoms. So in terms of getting tested, well, if you've got any of the symptoms of gonorrhea or you're worried you might have an STI, you should visit your sexual health clinic for a sexual health test. And if you're based in the UK, I've included a web link in the last this topic, where you can find your nearest sexual health clinic, as well as a free sexual health helpline phone number that you can call anonymously. Now, in terms of the actual procedure to diagnose gonorrhea, while gonorrhea can be easily diagnosed by testing a sample of discharge picked up, up using a swab, and in men testing a sample of urine can also diagnose the condition.
But essentially, the testing can either be done by nuclear acid amplification tests, otherwise known as nats or by culture.
However, the approach and method used to test for gonorrhea will be influenced by things like the clinical setting, storage and transport systems to the lab, as well as local prevalence of infection and the range of tests available in local labs. It is really important to get tested as soon as possible because gonorrhea can lead to more serious long term health problems if it's not treated, including pelvic inflammatory disease, otherwise known as PID, as well as infertility. So now we've looked at what gonorrhea is as well as the symptoms it can cause.
What happens if your test comes back as positive?
Well, the good news is is that it can be treated with a single antibiotic injection usually given in the buttocks or the thigh. With effective treatment, most of your symptoms should improve within a few days. In the uk, we give either one gram of ceftriaxone intramuscularly as a single dose where sensitivity to antimicrobials is unknown or ciprofloxin 500 milligrams orally as a single dose. When sensitivities are known, it's usually recommended that you attend a follow-up appointment a week or two after treatment so that another test can be carried out to see if you've cleared the infection. And really importantly, you should avoid having sex until you've been told you no longer have the infection. Another really important point to remember is that just because you've been successfully treated in the past for gonorrhea doesn't make you immune to catching it again.
How do you prevent it from happening in the first place?
Prevention is better than cure and gonorrhea and other (STI) can be successfully prevented by using appropriate contraception and taking other precautions. So these are things like using male condoms or female condoms every time you've had vaginal sex or male condoms during anal sex. You can also think about using a condom to cover the penis or a latex or plastic square to cover the female genitals if you're having oral sex. And also, please don't share sex toys and also try to wash them and cover them with a new condom before anyone else uses them.
How to prevent it? What's the prognosis like if you have gonorrhea?
Well, where treatment is rapidly received for a recently acquired gonorrhea infection, prognosis is generally quite good with full recovery as normal. Continuing symptoms are more likely to be due to a reinfection rather than persistence of the original infection. So if you think you still might have gonorrhea because of ongoing symptoms, please get tested. It's important to also note that there is an emergence of a new superbug form of gonorrhea that seems resistant to most traditional antibiotics, and that is causing some public health concern. Finally, the last point that I want to make in this topic is that the risk of infertility increases with repeated episodes of gonorrhea. So it's really important to try and follow the steps I outlined earlier in the topic to prevent the infection from occurring in the first place. That brings us to the end of this topic. I do hope that you found it useful and informative.
Useful links:
NHS website.
UK Sexual health services.
How to access free testing in USA.
